Revolution Brewing Becomes Latest Top-50 Craft Brewer to Launch Delta-9 THC Brand

When I left Revolution Brewing in April, there were a number of initiatives in planning, as always, but the very biggest surfaced just last week. The craft brewery unveiled REVERB as its new family of THC and CBD beverages, beginning with the Splash line of sparkling waters made with real fruit and 5mg of both hemp-derived THC and CBD.

I have to admit, it was fun to be on the other side of receiving their press release having been “in the room where it happens” for so many years, And it was exciting to see the final touches put on the packaging before its official launch.

While the market may feel plenty inundated with brands in this emerging space, by my count Revolution (#36) is the largest independent craft brewery in the entire country to get involved, outside of publicly-traded Tilray Brands (#4), with Surly Brewing (#39) being the other major player in the Top 50. To me, that matters, and shows how normal it has become for craft to reach beyond beer.

In this piece, I will unpack what makes Reverb and other THC brands created by craft breweries different: not just the branding, but the business decisions behind them. I’ll get into why Revolution made a significant investment that most breweries don’t have the capital or risk appetite for and how the brand’s visual and verbal identity ties back to the brewery, while clearly charting its own course. There’s a lot going on beneath the surface here, and it’s a compelling case study in how a well-established craft brewery builds a credible new brand in a category still defining itself.

Craft Breweries Entering Hemp Beverage

With hemp beverages, there’s two common scenarios for how new brands originate. On one side, you’ve got long-standing craft breweries getting into the category. Minnesota has served as a model. These are operations with existing beer brands, in-house production, a track record of innovation and rotating SKUs, established independent distribution, and built-in customer trust. Because they own their operations, they also own more of the margin, which gives them flexibility in how they grow, price, and invest in the brand.

On the other side, you’ve got newer founders entering the space by partnering with contract manufacturers and avoiding the massive capital outlay that it took craft breweries to get started and expand. These teams are typically all-in on hemp beverages, without needing to balance the declining margins and shifting identity of craft beer. Their messaging is usually more focused and aimed at the beer occasion. They move at pace, even if they don’t yet have the same depth of distribution or consumer base.

Of course, there are plenty of hybrids and other scenarios out there as well, but these two paths offer a helpful lens for understanding the range of business models and trade-offs shaping the category right now.

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