In October of 2024, we shared the story of several longtime employees at Oceanside-based Belching Beaver Brewery teaming together to form their own beer brand. Dubbed Hop Habit Brewery, that operation started brewing a largely hoppy portfolio of beers at its Belching Beaver’s Vista production facility, tapping them at its Pub980 tasting room while also distributing kegs to San Diego bars and restaurants.
That activity started slow, built up a bit, then seemed to fall off completely with fewer Hop Habit beers on tap around the county and nearly a year of inactivity across the company’s social-media accounts. All evidence seemingly pointed to an early exit for the suds spin-off, but it turns out the aforementioned downtime was spent ramping up for a full-throttle return that’s currently underway.
Hop Habit’s beer-making efforts are the charge of Belching Beaver’s award-winning Head of Production and Quality Manager Thomas Peters and Brewer Eric Childress, while all other aspects of the business are handled by Director of Sales Mark Truex and Human Resources Manager Diane Magrath.
The foursome (which still works full-time for Belching Beaver) says early account and consumer feedback was extremely positive. Encouraged and optimistic, the Hop Habit decided to take over the Pub 980 brewery and tasting room it had been sharing with Belching Beaver, and make it into the new operation’s headquarters.
That conversion, which is currently underway, was accelerated and made necessary thanks to the recent inking of a deal to add Hop Habit beers to the lineup at numerous big-name grocery stores throughout Southern California. So, too, was a rebrand to a sharper logo that is the centerpiece of six-packs of canned Hop Habit beers, which debuted on store shelves last month.
“The brand was really a draft-only offering, so we hadn’t focused on can-art yet,” says Peters. “When the opportunity to get our beers into retail stores presented itself, we envisioned a clear, eye-catching look for the packaging that would easily convey to customers what they would be getting.”
Hop Habit currently has three core beers available in cans, each of which is named simply by style: West Coast IPA, Tropical Hazy IPA and Hoppy Pale Ale. Two other IPAs – Desk Pop and a hazy called El Niño – are also available year-round in kegs.
“Right now, we have space limitations, so the lineup is going to remain somewhat simple, with just our core offerings and a few one-offs sprinkled in,” says Peters.
In addition to getting a facelift to reflect its new, singularity identity, the Pub 980 space will also have its beverage offerings updated. Along with Hop Habit beers, the tasting room will offer a line of seasonal cocktails. An assortment of games and other activities will also be available for families to partake in. Hop Habit expects the renovation to be completed before spring is out.
Hop Habit Brewery is located at 980 Park Center Drive in Vista