We in the craft brewing industry have had our share of opportunities and roadblocks here and elsewhere, as the country and the world learn more about our industry’s evolution and growing contributions. It has been several years since the Aloha Brewers Guild started lobbying for beer-friendly legislation. One event has led the way, with dedication to community and skill of execution, illustrating the positive influence our industry can have on those local communities with which we interact.

Now in its 15th year, the Kona Brewers Festival has emerged as one of the premier craft beer events in the world, due largely to its continued expansion into varied areas not always associated with beerfests.

The series of public events actually begins on the Thursday prior to the Saturday festival, when Dining Under the Stars, a Brewers’ Pa’ina (a luau-style beer-themed dinner), is served at the Outrigger Keauhou Beach Resort. The sunset dinner is held on the lawn right by the ocean.

Calming waves splash against the black lava rock shore, Hawaiian music soothes the nerves, and delightful local dishes are served with several Kona Brewing Company brews, hand-picked by Brewmaster Rich Tucciarone to best complement the pork or poi or pineapple on your plate. This event is not your standard luau, even though all the aspects of a luau you’d expect are present; it’s relaxing, friendly and well-attended by the vast number of brewers and brewery owners who flock to this event every year. Do you want to know a secret? The best way to tell how well an event is planned is by counting the brewing professionals in attendance.

On Friday morning, the Kona Brewers Fest Golf Open is held at the Big Island Country Club. Four-person teams tee off with a shotgun start at 9:00 a.m. There is a $10,000 hole-in-one prize shared with a charity, and dozens more prizes are donated by local sponsors. In addition, $10 mulligans are available to those of us who need them. This year’s celebrity golfer was Sam Choy, a famous island chef and restaurateur. If he plays golf half as well as he cooks, he’s the guy to beat. The money earned goes to Hawaii Montessori Schools, a festival beneficiary. Golfers receive a welcome bag of goodies from the sponsors, a continental breakfast, a box lunch, a golf cart and 18 holes of golf on one of the most beautiful courses in Hawaii.

Early in the morning on the day of the fest, when those of us with less ambition are still in bed, the Run for Hops starts and finishes at the Kona brewpub in Kailua-Kona. This five- or 10-kilometer run/walk for charity boasts a Keiki Bike Rodeo featuring local children on their bicycles, followed by a healthy picnic lunch and a beer tasting. Run for Hops serves as a warm-up for the main event later in the afternoon. PATH, People’s Advocacy for Trails Hawaii, is a primary beneficiary of funds gathered. PATH creates new bike paths in the beautiful Hawaiian countryside without damaging the natural ecosystems.

During the weeks preceding the festival, local and distant homebrewers prepare their best submissions for the Kona Brewers Festival Homebrew Competition, a very competitive event sponsored by the American Homebrewers Association that garners hundreds of submissions in 28 different beer, mead and cider styles. The professionally judged event for amateur brewers provides bragging rights to a few winners who show off their gold, silver or bronze medals at the main event on Saturday afternoon. The Best of Show winners are the best beer, mead and cider entrants chosen from all the style winners. They have the biggest grins on fest day, and their names are engraved on a koa wood barrel trophy at the Kona brewpub.

All this is lead-in for the main event on Saturday afternoon at King Kamehameha’s Kona Beach Hotel, on an isthmus jutting into the Pacific and best known as the starting spot for the Ironman competition. The fest always sells out (this year, weeks prior), so tickets must be purchased in advance through a link at KonaBrewersFestival.com or at the Kona pubs on the Big Island and Oahu. A long, snaky line slithers through the coconut trees and hotel grounds before the gates open at 2:30 p.m. Some 70 beers from more than 35 breweries share the fest grounds with 25 of the island’s best restaurants, creating one of the best — if not THE best — food and beer pairing festivals on the planet.

The ticket price includes all food samples and eight beer tokens, with more tokens available for purchase. If you start at the entrance and pair food with beer heading toward the main stage, at the ocean end of the festival, you will enjoy a very different tasting experience than if you turn around and work your way through to the front. It’s a delicious way to try new flavor combinations while enjoying music played on the main stage, making educational stops at the tables of charities that benefit from the Kona Fest events, or just sitting at one of the central tables and beer people–watching. This festival is filled with some of the best entertainment, beer, food samples and knowledgeable beer lovers of any event I’ve ever attended. The grounds are of limited size, so the number of tickets is also limited to provide the best possible experience for the attendees.

In each of the 15 years the event has run, more new breweries, new brands and new brewers have been selected to show off their best efforts. Each year, a few new breweries are featured to provide new tastes to the crowd. This year, Jim Ebel, half of Two Brothers Brewing Company from Warrenville, Ill., west of Chicago, joined the island brewers and others from the mainland. His Cane & Ebel provided a taste of the Midwest. Other first-timers included Pike Brewing of Seattle and the Breckenridge Brewery of Denver.

Someone in the crowd said the fest was “like eating at all the best Big Island restaurants in one day.” One of the charities to benefit from the money raised by the event is The American Culinary Federation Kona-Kohala Chefs de Cuisine, a culinary academy that produces some of the best chefs in the islands. The academy folks received their first set of utensils — the tools of their trade — from the festival’s donations, and they return each year to show their thanks and show off their skills. Attendees are treated to small samples of the academy’s best treats paired with some terrific beer, on a lush lawn on the Pacific Ocean, with music playing in the background, surrounded by others enjoying great food and beer. Creating and maintaining that atmosphere is the real trick, and the Kona crew creates magic every year!