In the hyper-competitive craft beer industry in which growth has started to level off in recent years, Old Nation Brewing Co. proves the exception to the rule. The Williamston-based brewery has garnered a name for itself with its M-43 brand, a popular New England-style hazy India Pale Ale that carries a suggested retail price of $13.99 per four-pack of 16-ounce cans.

GRAND RAPIDS — Craft beer enthusiasts are a spirited bunch who want to discover and follow breweries and brands. This has created an environment of constant sampling at the hundreds of tasting rooms and beer festivals across the country — and a big haul for brewers who are regularly on the road.

Although Michigan has earned a spot among the nation’s top producers of hops after a growth spurt in the last five years, 2018 served as a moment of reckoning for the state’s growers, whose overall acreage declined. The state remains the fourth-largest cultivator of hops, although still lags well behind the Pacific Northwest region of the U.S., where almost 96 percent of the nearly 58,000 acres of hops are grown in the country.

Founders Brewing Co. has partnered with its Spanish investors to acquire a majority stake in a Colorado-based craft brewer.

The founding couple whose initials gave ELK Brewing LLC its name are no longer with the company.

Two West Michigan craft brewers operating with vastly differing business models are taking a similar approach to growing their operations by using capacity at other breweries. Both Sawyer-based Greenbush Brewing Co. and Muskegon-based Rake Beer Project LLC are taking advantage of a production model that allows them to get beer into the market without a significant upfront capital investment.

A West Michigan brewpub in planning has agreed to change its name as part of a settlement in a trademark infringement case brought by Railtown Brewing Co. last August.

Brewery Vivant is planning to open a satellite facility that will help ease space constraints and give the company a broader reach into the greater Grand Rapids area, MiBiz has learned.

An established Grand Rapids-area craft brewery is suing a nearby Byron Center-based brewpub in planning, alleging that the startup’s name is confusingly similar.

Vander Heide, the current president of the Michigan Cider Association, said the cider industry fought hard to be included specifically in the new law’s language outlining the council’s governing board.

An update to Michigan law is bringing a more equitable approach to how license fees from craft beverage producers are spent.