To change the beer world, it takes a visionary to see where it can go. Keith Villa, as the founder and head brewmaster of Blue Moon Brewing Company (an operating unit of Miller Coors), changed the way we all viewed and enjoyed Belgian beers. He now is taking on the non-alcoholic (NA) and the THC/CBD industry with the same tenacity by co-founding Ceria Brewing Co. with CEO, Jodi Villa.
Most brewers are concerned with standard metrics to know the alcohol by volume (ABV), international bitterness units (IBU), and perhaps a microbial check for their own knowledge and for that of their customers. Ceria Brewing has to approach all of this differently because the alcohol is vacuum distilled out of the beer, a process of lowering the pressure in a column to less than the vapor pressure of the beer, causing the alcohol to evaporate off. It is important to have the metrics accurate because they must be reflected in labeling, which is why they choose to work with a lab. “Fermly has allowed us to confirm that our beers are consistently 0.0% ABV and free from microbial bacteria. As an alcohol-free product, it is of the utmost importance to make sure that our beers are clean and safe for consumers. We don’t want anything harmful growing in our beers and consumers don’t want beers to have even a trace of alcohol” says Villa.
As if making a non-alcoholic beverage wasn’t enough of a challenge, Ceria Brewing has gone the extra step to add infusions of cannabinoids THC and CBD. Aside from extremely specific and stringent labeling requirements from state to state, infused beverages cannot have any alcohol. Per Villa, “Since some of our alcohol-free beers are infused with cannabis in Colorado and California, and because it isn’t legal to combine alcohol and cannabis, we need to ensure that our beers contain 0.0% alcohol.” With Fermly’s quick turnaround and data platform, Ceria is able to efficiently move through the labeling process and any other government requirements.
Non-alcoholic beverages were for a long time defined by the same beers decades upon decades. Ceria Brewing is changing the concept by creating great-tasting beer with the boon of health benefits, from carbs to trace nutrients, a point of pride for Ceria Brewing. “We constantly test nutritional information because CERIA is low in calories and, because there is no alcohol, it’s actually good for you as a hydrator and a source of vitamins and minerals.” More knowledge of the NA benefits, both physical and psychological, has resulted in an optimistic market trend of 9.2% to 2026.
If you ask Villa what his favorite beer is, he has been known to reply “the one in my hand!” With the creation of Ceria Brewing, he has made fermented malt beverages more accessible to people that are choosing or on a different path. As easy as an “Add to Cart,” more people will be able to answer the question of what their favorite beer is because they can finally enjoy a beer brewed true to style without the weight of the alcohol!
Looking to learn more? Lucky you that there is a book all about this subject!
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