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Okabe: Please state your name and relationship to the business. <br />Roberts: My name is Brenden Roberts, I am the Chief Financial Officer and President <br />of Big Island Booch Inc., and The Booch Bar. We've been operating our business, <br />which is a wholesale and non-alcoholic beverage company, we make kombucha tea, as <br />well as a local farm -to -table casual dining restaurant in Hilo, we've been doing that for <br />about the past ten years. Now, we're seeking to make hard kombucha products in <br />addition to the products that we already make. We're going to be serving them in our <br />restaurant as well as, distributing to local vendors throughout the State. <br />Okabe: Have you received the application reports? <br />Roberts: Yes, I have. <br />Okabe: Are there any changes? <br />Roberts: No, those are all correct. <br />Okabe: Any public testimony for this applicant? <br />There was no public testimony. <br />Okabe: Hearing none. Commissioners, do you have any discussion or questions? <br />Taniguchi: What kind of alcohol, or what goes into your new product? <br />Roberts: So kombucha tea is generally a non-alcoholic beverage and it's fermented <br />tea, instead of being fermented with yeast, it's fermented with a culture like yogurt or <br />sauerkraut or kimchee. And, the hard kombucha is very similar, we essentially take <br />regular kombucha, then we referment it with a brewers yeast, an additional sugar <br />source, and that brings the alcohol level up somewhere between like 5 and 6%, is about <br />what's going on there. And so, you know different flavors, you'll see hard kombucha <br />products, you know lots of imports on the market. As far as I know, there's nobody <br />locally in Hawaii that is making hard kombucha right now. <br />Taniguchi: Thank you. <br />Ventura: How much time does it add to the process? <br />Roberts: It adds about two weeks to the process, so we were looking at about a <br />four -week process, now we're looking at a six -week process. And then it's complete but <br />for quality we actually like to age it in the package for another couple weeks before that, <br />it's about two months. <br />Ventura: And then, what percentage of your product are you planning to be alcoholic <br />vs. non-alcoholic? <br />MINUTES - LIQUOR COMMISSION MEETING - THURSDAY, AUGUST 7, 2025 - KONA PAGE 17 OF 49 <br />