Islander Cliff Goodman’s Vashon Brewing Company, born of an empty nest and a desire to no longer give several hours a day to an off-island commute, is on the verge of making a big leap, both in production and distribution.

Four years ago, with children grown and flown and the prospect of too many more years of ferry travel ahead of him, Goodman decided to leave his job as an accountant to make a career out of his longtime hobby — brewing beer.

Launching his nano-brewery out of an 8-by-12-foot shed, he never imagined that some day people from Bellingham down to Olympia would become customers and that he’d have a distributor looking to sell Cliff’s Beer on the other side of the sound. But that is exactly what has happened.

“I’ve just been selling locally, building my brand on the island,” he said. “I didn’t have the capacity to sell elsewhere. But word still got out.”

Got out it has, and Goodman will host an open house this week to showcase his new facilities and the equipment that will allow him to triple his production.

No longer in the shed, now two 24-foot long cargo containers on Goodman’s Quartermaster Drive property house the one-man brewery.

“I started with a one-barrel system and now I have three,” Goodman explained. “I was brewing about 90 gallons a week before; right now I’m at twice that and will fine tune things to get up to triple. Then I’ll have enough to be able to ship excess production off the island.”

The demand for Goodman’s product began with a donated batch to a Labor of Love auction for Vashon Community Care a few years back.

“I got great feedback, everybody loved it,” he said. “It sold out very quickly.”

Indeed, just three years into his hobby-turned-career, Goodman found himself having to deny requests from caterers and nonprofits that he had been donating to for fundraisers, and cut back on his sales at the farmers market when two of the triangle route ferries agreed to sell his beer. Determined to quench Vashon’s thirst for his brew, Goodman knew it was time to expand.

With all going as planned, the increased production has allowed him to supply all three boats on the north-end route, as well as offer kegs for sale or donation to private events  and nonprofits again.

Meanwhile, as word travels through the craft beer connoisseur world, not only have people contacted him from various parts of Washington outside of Vashon, but his endeavors recently caught the taste buds of a seattlepi.com wine, beer and spirits blogger known as the Pour Fool, aka Steve Body.

After enjoying a Cliff’s Aromatherapy India Pale Ale (IPA) — one of the five different ales that Goodman brews — he wrote that with only a couple of possible exceptions, Cliff’s was easily the best nano-brewery ale he’d ever tasted, and urged Goodman to think about selling his wares off-island.

And thanks to a fortuitous ferry ride, Body may well get his wish.

Goodman explained that beer and wine distributors generally need to work with companies that can produce a large quantity of product, so selling Cliff’s Beer anywhere but Vashon had never been something he thought about seriously.

One day, when Goodman was on a Vashon to Fauntleroy ferry run still in his work clothes and a pair of ripped jeans, a man tracked him down, handed him a business card and said he wanted to talk. That man was a representative of C & G Wines, who distribute Dragon’s Head cider, and he’d been behind Goodman in the galley line. He decided to order a Cliff’s Beer after hearing the busy brewer talking about his products with the staff.

In order to work around the production limitations, C & G and Goodman came up with the idea for the distributor to put together a portfolio of small niche breweries to offer its customers.

“It’s in the works,” Goodman said. “I expect it will all come together some time this fall.”

Despite the increased production and impending mainland debut, Vashon’s only commercial brewer has his feet firmly planted on the midpoint of the now well-supplied triangle route.

“If I ever need to expand again, I’d have to move,” he said. “But I’d stay on the island.”

Overall, he is glad he made the career change, as is his family.

“It’s not my goal to be bought out by a huge company,” he mused. “I just want to keep making a living doing this.”

For more information and detailed descriptions of the different ales, see cliffsbeer.com.