Cerveceria Tropera

Cerveceria Tropera began in 2012, founded by Franco Valdes and Catalina Prieto in Coyhaique, in Chile's Aysen region. The couple were completing postgraduate studies in Boulder, Colorado, when a day of mountain trekking ended with a beer at a local pub -- an experience that led them to bring the idea of an independent brewery back to Chilean Patagonia. The name comes from the "troperos," the gauchos who move cattle across the open Patagonian plains on long overland drives, a nod to the brewery's regional identity from the outset. After roughly a decade based in Coyhaique, Tropera relocated its main production to Puerto Varas, where it now runs one of Chile's larger independent craft breweries, brewing across eight beer styles. What started as a single taproom has grown into a network of venues spanning Coyhaique, Puerto Varas and Frutillar, plus an outpost as far north as Santiago, each pouring the same rotating range alongside food built to go with the beer. The expansion tracks the founders' original instinct -- that a genuinely independent Patagonian brewery could travel well beyond the region where it started, without losing the plains-and-cattle-drive identity built into its name.