Founders Brewing Co., Michigan's largest brewery, will cede majority ownership to its Spanish brewing partner, creating a shock wave in the state's craft beer scene.

Documents filed by Founders last week with the Michigan Liquor Control Commission show that Spain's Best Beer Inc., an affiliate of Mahou San Miguel Group, will own a 90% stake in the Grand Rapids-based company beginning in January 2020. Mahou San Miguel had previously purchased a 30% stake in December 2014.

Mike Stevens and Dave Engbers, who co-founded Founders in 1997, will each retain a 5% share.

MiBiz.com first reported the deal Thursday afternoon. Founders confirmed the move in an email to the Free Press shortly after.

"Since 2014, we’ve enjoyed an excellent relationship with Mahou Group," Founders said in a statement. "We’re fortunate to have a partner with whom we can exchange brewing knowledge and business strategy, who also reflects our values as a company. Day-to-day operations will continue to be led by the existing Founders team. We’ll continue to make the beers we love and have a partner in Mahou Group, who is just as passionate about beer and the future of Founders as we are.

"Founders will remain autonomous in managing its business, products and teams. Engbers and Stevens will continue to be shareholders in Founders and have no intention of leaving. Their commitment to the brewery will remain and their roles and responsibilities will continue as they are now."

More details from MiBiz.com:

The investment from Mahou allows Founders to buy out the more than two-dozen minority shareholders it accumulated over the years, including family members of various executives, local business people and other investors, according to filings with the MLCC. ... According to documents MiBiz received via a Freedom of Information Act request, the 2014 Founders-Mahou acquisition agreement for the 30-percent stake, valued at around $96.3 million, included a provision allowing Mahou to acquire the remainder of the company starting in the fifth year after the initial deal.

The move is about two things: Money and growth. Mahou San Miguel, founded in 1890, is a major international brewer, and the 30% minority stake it purchased in December 2014 allowed Founders to expand its growth capital and broaden its reach across the globe the past several years.

It also allowed Founders to pass Bell's Brewery, which remains 100% independent, as Michigan's largest brewery in 2017, and become the first craft brewery in Michigan to distribute to all 50 states this past June.

Founders, the 14th largest brewery in the U.S. as of 2018, produced 563,700 barrels of beer last year, an increase from 193,000 barrels in 2014. Last April, Founders and Mahou San Miguel purchased 70% of Boulder, Colo.-based Avery Brewing Co., allowing Founders to brew its signature All Day IPA out of state for distribution.

Founders has taprooms in Grand Rapids and Detroit.

Is Founders still a craft brewer?

Though Founders Brewing Co. says day-to-day operations won't change and Stevens and Engbers will stay with the company, questions remain about its status as a craft brewer and the future of its beer.

According to the Brewers Association, an American trade group, Founders hasn't been a craft brewer in almost five years, when it sold the 30% minority stake to Mahou San Miguel. Guidelines state that a brewer must produce less than 6 million barrels of beer a year and be less than 25% owned or controlled by an alcohol industry member that is not itself defined as a craft brewer.

Many consider the 25% number to be arbitrary, which allowed Founders' status as a craft brewery to remain up for debate. But now that Founders is ceding majority control to an overseas company, that raises questions as to whether Founders remains an American company, let alone a Michigan craft brewer.

Stevens doesn't appear concerned about those distinctions. He sees this move as an opportunity to weather any possible storms in American craft beer which, despite exponential growth the past 15 years, has seen momentum slow down.

"We really have to start looking beyond craft and beyond that industry," Stevens told MiBiz.com. "We are starting to see a slowdown there, but there is so much opportunity out there when you really start to look at it and evaluate the beer industry.

"Eighty percent of the beer drinking public does not drink craft. What does that mean? It means there’s a sea of opportunity. That opportunity is going to take a lot of resources — resources greater than any craft brewery in our industry has. We look at this opportunity with Mahou as our opportunity together to break into a much larger segment of the beer industry."

What about Founders' beer?

Like operations, Founders says the beer won't change. But what happened with Chicago-based Goose Island Brewery should be a cautionary tale.

Goose Island, once one of America's largest and most widely renowned craft breweries, was purchased for $38.8 million by Anheuser-Busch InBev in 2011. The move stunned the craft beer world, as one of its stalwarts "sold out" to big beer and triggered a series of events that led to deeper, tougher competition among independent breweries across America. Josh Noel, beer writer for the Chicago Tribune, covered the saga in his book, "Barrel-Aged Stout and Selling Out."

At the time of the sale, founder John Hall had planned to stay with Goose Island for several years, Noel wrote. He left one year later. Meanwhile, Goose Island's seasonal beer releases — summer, fall and Christmas — were replaced by three now-discontinued IPAs because hoppy beers were trendy at the time, and production of another popular beer, the 312 Urban Wheat, moved into the same tanks used to brew Bud Light.

Other craft breweries have sold out since, such as Lagunitas Brewing Company (to Heineken) and Ballast Point Brewing Company (Constellation Brands), much to the chagrin of many craft beer enthusiasts. AB InBev continued its spending spree of craft breweries, including Four Peaks Brewing Co. in Arizona, Elysian Brewing Company in Washington and Breckenridge Brewery in Colorado.

Whether similar ownership decisions will affect Founders' products is a mystery. For what it's worth, the partnership has always been about resources for Founders. As it expanded its footprint the past five years for popular session-able beers such as All Day IPA and Solid Gold lager, it continued rolling out high-quality offerings such as Kentucky Breakfast Stout every March and brought back its top-rated Canadian Breakfast Stout each of the past three years (though that will go on hiatus this fall). The "Mothership Series" has also been crucial in keeping Founders' beer repertoire fresh and exciting with innovative choices.

But ceding majority ownership — and, ultimately, final decision-making — to Mahou San Miguel, which has limited experience in craft beer save for Founders and Avery, can't be seen as anything other than a risk to the quality of some of Michigan's most beloved beers.

Spirits of Detroit writer Brian Manzullo covers craft alcohol for the Free Press. Contact him: bmanzullo@freepress.com and on Untappd, bmanzullo and Twitter, @BrianManzullo and @SpiritsofDET.