Before we get to the kickoff Look Back/Look Ahead Series feature for 2025-26, we wanted to take a moment to explain how we are doing it a little different this year.

None of us in the Crew, nor really the brewery staffers out there, have a lot of time on our hands these days. So we made the decision to effectively shorten these articles by whittling it down to three key questions.

1. What was the biggest challenge that your brewery faced/overcame in 2025?

2. What was the biggest accomplishment for your brewery in 2025? 

3. What is your biggest goal/project/idea for 2026?

Let us know what you think about the new format and if we need to tweak it further. Hopefully this should still produce informative articles that are more concise and quicker to read. Hey, nowadays, none of us have that spare time that we used to have a few years ago.

I caught up with Boxing Bear co-owner Kevin Davis last week after he volunteered to go first.

Boxing Bear moves on without a founder

The biggest change to happen at the brewery was behind the scenes as a very familiar face moved on to a life outside the industry.

“We had a couple of significant challenges, the first of which was when Justin (Hamilton) accepted our buyout,” Davis said. “Justin meant a lot to this company. This brand wouldn’t be what it is without him. And so, him choosing to go a different direction, we appreciated that that he made that move in his life that was best for his family. But, it took a little bit of adjusting on my part, and Dave (Kim)’s part, and Dylan (Davis’) part. There was a pretty good learning curve there.”

Hamilton was one of the three founders of Boxing Bear along with Davis and Kim, and served as head brewer and later director of brewing operations throughout the brewery’s entire run since 2015. Much of what Boxing Bear has evolved into was at his direction, especially on the brewing side as various styles rose and fell in popularity.

“Bottom line is Justin will always be a part of this brand, he’s helped us build this brand, and we always appreciated what he brought to us,” Davis said. “It did take us a little bit of a while to get over that hump. Now things are running more smoothly and we seem to be on schedule. Our production is slightly up this year from last year, which is good.”

It was in production that the second of those big challenges struck Boxing Bear, and they were far from alone.

“But, I’d say the real challenge that we had to meet this year is something that all of the breweries are facing and that’s inflation,” Davis said. “The cost of cans, the cost of malt, the various tariffs, it’s hard to deal with all of that stuff without raising your prices. One of the things that we’ve done is we’ve tried not to raise our prices and contribute to the inflation that Albuquerqueans are suffering right now.

“I think as long as things don’t change for the worse anytime soon, we won’t be seeing any price hikes. We’re just going to absorb any of the costs of the tariffs ourselves. We import all of our malt. So we’ve been very fortunate that our distributors are helping a little bit on the cost of the tariffs. But, the cans, we don’t package a whole lot, but what we do package is important to us. A 1- or 2-cent increase in the cost per can that’s a lot, that’s a lot taken out of your bottom line.”

Any brewery that is able to keep those cost increases from passing onto their customers is worthy of our thanks and appreciation.

Even amid all the down notes being played right now, Boxing Bear remains optimistic for the future.

“Really, those were the only two major challenges we faced, other than the fact that craft beer is kind of not hip like it used to be,” Davis said. “Craft beer is kind of on a little bit of a downturn that we think will change here hopefully pretty soon.”

Cleaning up at NABA

It was at the North American Beer Awards that Boxing Bear enjoyed their greatest accomplishments of 2025, with a couple of other positive outcomes on the beer side of the business.

“Well, we have a lot of new beers that we’re doing, like for example the (Black Mesa) dunkel that we talked about,” Davis said. “That was a recipe that I personally contributed to (from an old home-brew recipe). We won a gold medal at NABA with that recipe, and we came in fourth place at GABF, which I was very proud of.”

Boxing Bear also won gold medals for the latest batch of Albu-murky Hazy IPA, which Davis said they were proud of in such a crowded category, and for the new Golden Gloves, a premium lager created by their newest staff addition, Rob Palmer.

“I’ve got to say our biggest accomplishment was some of the new additions we’ve made to the brewing team, and keeping the quality of our beer where want it to be,” Davis said. “We had a lot of changes that happened.”

For all the good new additions, there were some notable subtractions besides just Hamilton. Luckily, there was a perfectly good reason for why brewer Cami O’Brien left, and that was because she accepted the job of head brewer at High and Dry.

“Thankfully, Cami didn’t leave until late spring/early summer, so we got to hold onto her while we got through the learning curve of me trying to learn Justin’s job, and Dylan having to do a lot of Justin’s job,” Davis said. “But, we were really happy that Cami got that gig because she’s a hell of a good brewer. The only thing that hurt us losing Cami (in the long run) was she was our best forklift operator. Now we have to pay attention again to what guys are doing again back there.”

Davis said that last bit with a laugh, but he did confirm that O’Brien was truly his best driver. When he got a call from High and Dry asking to borrow a forklift to move some new equipment into their brewery, he did not hesitate to let her do just that.

Oh, and one other thing that Davis forgot, Boxing Bear did win the New Mexico IPA Challenge again, their fifth title since 2016. Congrats again to the whole brewing team on that.

The target for 2026

The big goal for next year for Boxing Bear has a specific number, though to get there it will take a lot of work outside the spreadsheet.

“For 2026, our goal is to increase our package distribution by about 20 percent, and I think we can hit that,” Davis said. “This year, our package production that we sold through distribution increased about 15 percent over last year.”

To get there will require plenty of innovation and adaptability for Boxing Bear. Luckily, Davis said they have the right people in place to do that.

“Of course, that means we’re going to have to keep the quality up and keep the interesting beers up,” Davis said. “I think our brewers do a really good job of that. Eddie (Dominguez, head brewer) is phenomenal at coming up with beer ideas. He’s really been at the tip of the spear, so to speak, with new styles and new types of beers to bring into the taproom.”

A big thanks to Kevin for agreeing to go first and be our guinea pig for this new Look Back/Look Ahead Series format. We look forward to all the new beers, new events, and all the returning old favorites coming back in 2026.

Oh, and a big thanks to Rob for a sample of the forthcoming Russian imperial stout before I left. It’s gonna be a beautiful beast of a brew.

Keep supporting local!

— Stoutmeister