There are at least 6,372 breweries in America today, according to the Brewers Association. That number has grown every year since 2005, spiking at exponential rates in recent years to grow more than 340% since then.

The association counts 225 craft and microbreweries in Ohio today. Destination Cleveland estimates that 22% of those are in Greater Cleveland. There were just 45 across the state in 2011. That's an increase of 400% since then. Comparatively, total U.S. breweries grew by 211% over that same period. That means craft brewers in Ohio are growing at nearly twice the clip of the national rate.

With the Cleveland program, there are now eight official beer trails in the state, according to the Ohio Craft Brewers Association (OCBA). That doesn't include wine or mixed beer/wine/spirits trails, like the Darke County Whiskey, Wine & Ale Trail. The first was the Columbus Ale Trail in 2015.

The OCBA created its own passport program as well via the Ohio On Tap app, which debuted in May 2017 and earned an Ohio Travel Association RUBY Award for best mobile app of 2017.

That program awards users for collecting stamps through the app at various tiers, starting at 10, then 25, and increasing at increments of 25 from there. The top prizes are awarded to those who collect 150 stamps and those who complete the entire list, which currently includes 180 breweries. Details about that can be found on the app.

"As the number of breweries has grown across the state, so has the prevalence of beer trails and brewery passports," said OCBA spokesman Justin Hemminger. "Brewers banding together to get people excited about visiting breweries is a natural offshoot of the highly collaborative and cooperative nature of the craft beer industry."

In Summit County, the Summit Brew Path, organized by the Akron Summit County Convention and Visitors Bureau, is in its second year and Year 3 is already being planned out because of its inaugural success, said spokesman Jim Mahon.

"What we found almost immediately is there's this camaraderie and synergy in what you might think of us competing entities," said Mahon of local brewers banding together. "They all understood that if the profile of craft beer was raised, everyone was going to do well. That's exactly what happened."

That trail includes 18 breweries this year, compared with 14 when it debuted last year.

The budget for that program in 2017 was $15,000, and participating breweries were asked to kick in $500 this year to cover some of the costs. Last year's program saw nearly 20,000 passports handed out, with 2,600 people completing the path.

"It certainly benefits us when we talk about Summit County's assets," Mahon said. "We heard from many brewery partners they would not be doing as brisk of sales or be able to entertain expansions if not for the Summit Brew Path. And that's a wonderful thing to hear."

North Canton's Royal Docks Brewing Co. — which is preparing to brew its first beer in its new, expanded brewhouse this week — has been included in the Summit program because of their close proximity to the other breweries (and because organizers felt participants aren't focusing too much on city borders). A couple other Stark County brewers are included in there, too.

Royal Docks founder John Bikis said the program has been clearly additive to their business.

"We are fortunate enough to be included, and I think we are forever thankful for that because it did provide a way to get people into the Canton beer scene," he said. "We saw so much value in it. We really wanted to see it continue."

Bikis noted that efforts have been underway to create the Lincoln Highway Ale Trail, a beer trail specifically for Stark County. He's been one of the organizers of that effort.

Brewers were working with the Stark County Convention & Visitors Bureau on that last year. But when Gervasi Vineyard was included in that, brewers decided they wanted to "go on their own," Bikis said, simply because brewers have been adamant about having an exclusively beer-focused trail.

"Speaking for us, we have a great relationship with the Gervasi group. It's just that this is a brewery tour, a brewery path, and the visitors bureau basically wanted to hijack this and include other businesses," Bikis said. "So this wasn't anything against them. This is a brewery path, and that's how we're going to continue."

Bikis said plans are in the works for the Lincoln Highway Ale Trail to launch in 2019.