The company confirmed to SanDiegoVille that it is abandoning its in-house brewing model and transitioning to what it describes as a “horizontal production model,” meaning its products - including JuneShine Hard Kombucha, JuneShine Spirits ready-to-drink cocktails and the Willie’s Remedy+ THC beverage line - will now be manufactured by outside partners.
In a press release announcing the move, the company said outsourcing production will “maximize efficiencies, bolster profitability and accelerate long-term growth,” while allowing JuneShine to focus on product development and brand expansion.
The change represents a stark reversal from the strategy JuneShine pursued during its early years, when the company aggressively invested in its own brewing and production infrastructure in San Diego.
Founded in 2018 by Gregory Serrao and Forrest Dein, JuneShine launched inside the Brewery Igniter facility in North Park and quickly positioned itself as “California’s first organic hard kombucha brewery.” The brand leaned heavily into San Diego’s surf and outdoor lifestyle culture, using athletes and influencers to promote its products as a healthier alternative to traditional alcoholic beverages.
Within a year of launching, the company began expanding rapidly. In 2019, JuneShine took over the 24,000-square-foot former headquarters of Ballast Point Brewing Company in Scripps Ranch, a facility once central to San Diego’s craft beer boom. The acquisition dramatically increased the company’s production capacity and signaled ambitions to scale the kombucha brand nationally.
The company also pursued retail expansion. In 2020, JuneShine announced plans to relocate its North Park tasting room into a new 2,000-square-foot space at The Jackson on 30th Street. While the company eventually left its original Brewery Igniter location, the widely promoted North Park tasting room never ultimately opened.
By 2022, JuneShine had announced another expansion, launching a canned cocktail line called JuneShine Spirits and taking over a nearly 10,000-square-foot industrial building in Poway that previously housed The California Spirits Company. That facility was intended to support the company’s entry into the rapidly growing ready-to-drink cocktail market.
At the time, JuneShine appeared to be doubling down on its identity as a San Diego production company. Now the company is dismantling much of that infrastructure.
Rather than producing beverages locally with its own staff and brewing equipment, JuneShine will rely entirely on contract manufacturers to produce its drinks. Company executives framed the shift as a necessary adaptation to rising costs and supply chain complexity.
“At our current size and trajectory, this realignment allows us to be a more agile and effective partner,” co-founder Forrest Dein said in a prepared statement.
The operational shift will also eliminate local jobs. JuneShine told SanDiegoVille that 24 employees will be affected by the closure of its brewing operations. However, industry outlet Brewbound reported that as many as 30 workers could be impacted, highlighting some uncertainty around the total number of employees tied to the facility. The company says affected employees were given 90 days’ notice and offered severance packages and career transition support.
The change also raises questions about the future of the Scripps Ranch facility itself. JuneShine confirmed to SanDiegoVille that the property is now being listed for sale.
Meanwhile, Brewbound reported that the company intends to keep a tasting room operating at the former Ballast Point property even after production shuts down, though JuneShine has not publicly detailed how that arrangement would work while the building is on the market.
The restructuring arrives at a time when the once-hyped hard kombucha segment is facing increasing pressure from a crowded ready-to-drink beverage market. Hard seltzers, canned cocktails, functional beverages and hemp-derived drinks are all competing for the same consumers that hard kombucha brands once hoped to dominate.
JuneShine’s pivot toward outsourcing reflects a broader industry trend in which beverage companies focus on marketing and brand development while leaving the capital-intensive work of brewing and manufacturing to contract producers. Still, the move underscores how dramatically the company’s trajectory has shifted.
Just a few years ago, JuneShine was acquiring brewing facilities and promoting its San Diego production footprint as a cornerstone of the brand. Today, that same infrastructure is being dismantled less than a decade after the company launched.
JuneShine’s production facility is located at 10051 Old Grove Road in San Diego’s Scripps Ranch community. The company says it plans to transition fully to outsourced production by June 2026.
Originally published on March 12, 2026.
