December, they announced plans to expand to Kentucky with a new distribution facility in Erlanger. Market research firm IRI reported that Rhinegeist was the top new craft beer vendor of 2014 in U.S. supermarkets, based on $782,539 in supermarket sales. The brewery sold nearly 11,000 barrels of beer in 2014. By late 2014, the brewery and its founders started receiving national attention. In September 2014, Bryant Goulding was credited by GQ as a craft beer expert. In November 2014, Rhinegeist's Truth IPA was named to a list of the 100 best beers in the world by Men's Journal. Regional expansion In March 2015, the brewery announced plans to install a new brewing system that would enable them to triple their production rate and expand into the Columbus market. In May 2015, they announced plans to open a small-scale brewing facility in Columbus. They also expanded into hard ciders with the introduction of their new Cidergeist product line. They launched their first two ciders in their taproom in July before distributing them broadly to markets and restaurants in October. By the end of 2015, they were selling beer and cider in Cincinnati, Dayton, Columbus, and parts of Kentucky, and IRI reported they had sold 31,470 barrels that year. Rhinegeist continued to expand its market reach over the years that followed. Rhinegeist arrived in Cleveland and Boston in fall of 2016. This was followed by Pittsburgh in March 2017, Indiana in July 2017, and Nashville in February 2019. In 2020 Rhinegeist expanded to East Tennessee and Wisconsin. According to founder Bryant Goulding, the company focuses its expansion on individual cities that are close to their existing markets, as a majority of their beer is self-distributed and must be delivered from their fleet of vans for freshness. The brewery's production and sales volume increased with the market growth. Their annual production increased to 56,500 barrels in 2016, 86,242 barrels in 2017, and 100,302 barrels in 2018. In 2017, Rhinegeist was 33rd in 2017 on the Brewers Association's list of the largest craft brewing companies by sales volume, and in 2018, they moved up to 28th on the list. As Rhinegeist's availability was growing on a national level, so too was its popularity. In February 2016, Rhinegeist earned second place in a USA Today Readers' Choice New Breweries poll. In March 2017, Forbes called Rhinegeist "arguably one of the hippest beer brands in the