According to a new report from the Brewers Association, Durango’s Ska Brewing ranked as the ninth largest craft brewery in an eight-state Mountain West region.

The report, included in the May/June issue of the Brewers Association’s publication The New Brewer, ranks the 10 top-selling craft-brewing companies by region.

The Mountain West region includes Colorado, as well as Arizona, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Utah and Wyoming.

Breweries in Colorado took eight of the 10 spots, with New Belgium Brewing Co. way ahead of the pack, recording 957,969 barrels sold in 2016, more than all the breweries combined in the Mountain West top 10.

Still, Durango-based Ska Brewing had a strong showing, recording 34,300 barrels sold in 2016, a 9 percent increase from 2015.

And, according to Sales and Marketing Director Kristen Muraro, Ska would like to see continued moderate growth.

“We’ve invested into our brew house to help maintain and increase our capacity,” she said.

Muraro said Ska has added a second kettle, as well as five fermenters, which will help the brewery’s overall efficiency and help brew certain types of beers.

According to an April 27 news release, the improvements give Ska a 20 percent increase in brewing capacity.

Muraro said Ska would like to see a couple more thousand barrels brewed in 2017 to represent another 5 to 8 percent in sales growth, but the local brewery isn’t looking to outpace itself.

“Compared to some of those other breweries on the list, we’re not looking to double our capacity or anything like that,” she said. “We’re happy where we’re at right now, and we’ll continue to grow sales where we can.”

jromeo@durangoherald.com