Know thy enemy. If you’re a brewery trying to make it in today’s crowded alcohol marketplace, that means understanding the strategies that wine and spirits brands have used to snatch 10 percent of total U.S. alcohol shipments away from the beer category over the last 20 years.
One year after inking a deal with coffee giant Starbucks, the world’s largest beer company is making another investment in the non-alcoholic beverage segment. Anheuser-Busch InBev today announced plans to acquire Hiball Inc., a San Francisco-based beverage company founded in 2005 that produces a range of caffeinated beverages, including energy drinks, sparkling waters and cold brew coffees. The company also makes a line of non-caffeinated juices and seltzers, called Alta Palla.
Coronado Brewing Company today announced it would acquire a majority stake in Monkey Paw Brewing, a small craft brewery located in San Diego’s east village neighborhood. Specific financial terms of the deal, which is expected to close on September 1, were not disclosed. Coronado will use cash flow from its production brewery and brewpub operations to finance the transaction, chief operating officer Brandon Richards told Brewbound.
After an nine month search, New Belgium Brewing has found its next CEO. The Fort Collins, Colo.-headquartered company, which also operates a brewing facility in Asheville, North Carolina, today announced that Steve Fechheimer, the former chief strategy officer at Beam Suntory, would take over as CEO in mid-August.
After about 20 months of planning and building, Craft Brew Alliance (CBA) will finally open its Redhook brewpub in downtown Seattle in August. Located in the Pike Motorworks Building in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood, the 10,000 sq. ft. Redhook “Brewlab” will feature a 10-barrel brewing system, 16 rotating draft beers and seating for 260 people, according to Derek Hahm, CBA’s vice president of sales and brewpubs.
Brooklyn Brewery and Danish brewer Carlsberg have announced yet another international craft brewing partnership — this time in Eastern Europe. The two companies have formed a joint venture with Švyturys Brewery, based in the port city of Klaipėda, Lithuania.
MillerCoors today announced that chief public affairs and communications officer Pete Marino will be taking over as the president of Tenth and Blake, the company’s craft and import division, on September 1. Scott Whitley, who had led the division since October 2014, will retire on September 30, according to CEO Gavin Hattersley.
Once a nomadic “gypsy brewer” without a place to call its own, Denmark-based Mikkeller will soon be brewing out of two U.S. locations after announcing plans to open a brewery and restaurant inside Citi Field, the home of the New York Mets. The 10,000 sq. ft. location, which is slated to open this fall, will include a 20-barrel brewhouse, numerous fermenters and a canning line, according to a press release.
Last month, nearly 200 beer industry professionals converged on New York City for the Brewbound Session business conference and videos from the event are now available for viewing. Held on June 15 at the at the Metropolitan West, the summer 2017 edition of our bi-annul business conference featured a variety of thought-provoking conversations with craft brewery founders, interactive panel discussions with retailers and distributors, and engaging presentations from the likes of Nielsen, First Beverage Group and Harpoon Brewery.
In an effort to broaden its innovation pipeline and grow its direct-to-consumer business, Maryland’s Heavy Seas beer will invest upwards of $2 million to expand its brewery and taproom. In an interview with Brewbound, brewery founder and managing partner Hugh Sisson said the project, which will be financed through a combination of cash flow and bank debt, would include the installation of a new 15-barrel pilot brewing system (for research and development) and a more robust canning line.
After six consecutive years of double-digit growth (2010-2015) within the craft beer segment, and a three-year period of intense merger-and-acquisition activity (2014-2016), brewery multiples are beginning to normalize, according to First Beverage Group managing partner Townsend Ziebold.
Drink Craft Beer LLC, a Boston-based beer festival organizer, has purchased various assets of The Pintley Company, an events business that helped craft breweries promote their products through various meetups across the United States. Specific financial terms of the transaction, which closed earlier this month, were not disclosed, Drink Craft Beer co-founder Jeff Wharton told Brewbound.
The Brewers Association – a not-for-profit trade group representing the interests of small and independent U.S. craft breweries – today debuted an official “independent craft brewer seal” that it hopes brewery owners will “proudly display” on packaging, marketing materials, merchandise, websites and in taproom windows, among other places. The marker is aimed at helping drinkers distinguish between beers produced by small craft beer companies and those made by multinational corporations, such as Anheuser-Busch InBev, which has purchased 10 craft breweries since 2011.
Standard Sales Company, based in Odessa, Texas, has announced plans to purchase Falls Distributing Company in Wichita Falls, Texas. Specific financial terms were not disclosed, and the transaction, which is pending supplier approvals, is expected to close on September 1, according to a press release issued by Standard Sales Company last Friday.
