Athletic Brewing Launches Earth Month IPA to Fund Trail Conservation Grants

What started as a $6,000 grant in 2018 has scaled into what Athletic Brewing Company now describes as the largest annual environmental grant program in the craft brewing industry. The non-alcoholic brewer launched its Earth Month campaign, titled "Our Brews Give Back," on April 1, releasing a limited-edition Two For The Trails Milestone Edition IPA with the grant program's cumulative reach as the centerpiece of its retail story.

The Milestone IPA is brewed with Proximity ReGenMalt and Hopsteiner-bred hops, both chosen for a lower carbon footprint. That's not incidental: Athletic tied those sourcing decisions directly to its sustainability argument, making the supply chain part of the pitch rather than an afterthought buried on a label.

Two For The Trails now reaches 46 U.S. states and three countries. Co-founder and CEO Bill Shufelt framed the scale as obligation, not marketing: "The trails, parks, and waterways we rely on don't preserve themselves... Two For The Trails is our commitment to protecting access to the outdoors."

For the campaign, Athletic partnered with AllTrails to highlight specific trails that have received Two For The Trails grant funding, creating a direct line between buying the limited IPA and a named outdoor outcome. The beer and associated merchandise are distributed nationally through Athletic's existing retail footprint.

The company's model, pairing a limited release with a grant program backed by specific state and country counts, is a more defensible conservation claim than the vague sustainability language that fills most beverage marketing. As the dominant player in non-alcoholic craft beer, Athletic's framework for connecting product formulation, supply chain sourcing, and philanthropic programming into a single launch sets a bar that other breweries, alcoholic or otherwise, will have to reckon with.