Region & History

How the Tusker brewery came to be in Nairobi is a story Kenyans love to tell with an elephant in it. The Welsh brothers George and Charles Hurst founded Kenya Breweries in 1922, which later became East African Breweries. The first brew ran on December 15, 1922. The first delivery went to the Stanley Hotel in Nairobi, where the new beer reportedly met with a mixed reception.

Already in 1923, George Hurst died on a hunt, killed by an elephant. His brother Charles then named the first lager Tusker, after the great bull elephants of East Africa and their tusks. To this day, the brand features an elephant head. The details of the story are told differently across Kenya, but the core remains the same.

The beer originated in a British colony, where settlers, hotels, and traders were the first customers. Locals, however, had long known their own drinks, such as the maize beer Busaa, brewed at home. Kenya gained independence in 1963, and the brewery remained, growing alongside the country.

Today, East African Breweries is listed on the Nairobi Securities Exchange and is majority-owned by the British drinks conglomerate Diageo. Tusker is a brand, not a protected name: lager describes a style, and there is no protected designation of origin for the beer, as exists in Europe under the PGI system.

Alongside the corporation, small brewers have set up shop in Nairobi. Big Five Breweries has been brewing since 2009 and runs a brewpub where guests can see the operation. Bila Shaka launched Kenya's first IPA in December 2017, and 254 Brewing sells beer that is neither filtered nor pasteurized.