AOPA Pilot Magazine - December 2015 - 120

PILOTS

NORTH CAROLINA CRAFT BREWER

Mark Doble
What happens when passions for flight, brewing intersect
BY MIKE COLLINS

MARK DOBLE never intended to become
a professional brewer. But then, he never
intended to become a pilot, either.
Doble learned to fly when he lived in Tampa,
Florida, earning his private certificate in 1998.
He went to buy an airplane, "and that's when I
got sticker shock," he recalled. So he bought a
Mustang II kit from Mustang Aeronautics and
built the aircraft in half of a two-car garage. The
project took three and a half years with the help
of his wife, Lianna, and younger brother David.
Just as the aircraft neared completion in
2003, however, Doble and his wife moved to
North Carolina. "I had to fly back down there
and put the wings on." Another pilot handled the
test flights, and Doble flew it to their new home.
To stable the Mustang, he bought a 40-by-50foot hangar at Triple W Airport south of Raleigh.
Fast forward to 2008. Doble was working at
Hewlett-Packard when the economy crashed,
and he decided to take a layoff package. "The

LOGBOOK

WHO | Mark Doble, founder and

owner of Aviator Brewing Co.

HOURS | About 650
FAVORITE AIRCRAFT | Mustang

II. "That was a lot of rivets to
smash in!"
EXTRA | Doble was driving to the
state capital to file his corporate paperwork and didn't have
a name for the business. "I just
thought Aviator sounded good.
I think everyone envisions that
flying would be fun."

plane is tiny and that hangar is huge," he said. "As
a temporary thing, I thought I'd brew some beer
in the hangar." A homebrewer since the 1980s,
he started brewing 300-gallon batches. Some nights, 500 people would drive down a
rough, narrow road to have a beer at the isolated airfield.
Doble was amazed. "I didn't anticipate the brewery becoming a business-it just
went crazy." In 2010, he moved from the hangar to a 10,000-square-foot building in an
industrial park. In 2013, he added 12,000 square feet. In 2015, he began planning a large
brewery expansion on a new five-acre site-and ordered a still to make craft liquor.
In 2009, the company opened the Aviator Tap House in an old train station in downtown Fuquay-Varina. Now it, the Aviator SmokeHouse across the street, and the Aviator
Beer Shop in an adjoining building are leading a revitalization of the historic downtown. And the new brewery location will include another restaurant.
The former one-man operation today employs 102 people and produces about
15,000 31-gallon barrels of beer annually. Few Aviator beers are aviation-themed-
Double Ugly, a rye pale ale that honors the McDonnell-Douglas F-4 Phantom, is an
exception-although the brewery's tap handles are made from 6061 aircraft aluminum.
Doble has other ways to share his love for flight. "We've been giving away intro
flights on our brewery tours," he said. "We ask a beer question, and the person who
answers gets a certificate. We think it's the best way to get people into flying. We talk
it up on our tours. We need to make people feel as if flying is accessible."
AOPA

MIKE COLLINS

120 | AOPA PILOT December 2015

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of AOPA Pilot Magazine - December 2015