Anheuser-Busch InBev today announced it would acquire fast-growing hard seltzer producer Boathouse Beverage LLC., which makes and markets the SpikedSeltzer brand. A final acquisition price was not disclosed, but Boathouse co-founders Nick Shields and Dave Holmes described the deal as a 100 percent equity purchase.
Anheuser-Busch InBev has struck another high-end deal, this time purchasing the 225-year-old Belgium-based Brouwerij Bosteels. American financial news and services website TheStreet.com, citing Belgian press reports, pegged the deal at $225 million.
The U.S. Department of Justice has officially closed its investigation into Anheuser-Busch InBev’s acquisition of Devils Backbone Brewing Company, according to a statement issued today by Deputy Assistant Attorney General Juan Arteaga. Citing conditions in a previously agreed upon settlement between A-B InBev and the DOJ — one that permits the world’s largest beer company to proceed with its acquisition of SABMiller — Arteaga said the “competitive implications of ABI’s acquisition of Devils Backbone are too uncertain at this time to warrant further investigation.”
Brooklyn Brewery today announced that longtime beer industry veteran Dave Duffy would join the company as the vice president of business development, a newly created position at the 29-year old company. Duffy — whom over the last 20 years has held various sales and marketing positions with Boston Beer Company, New Belgium Brewing and Great Divide, among other organizations — had most recently been working with First Beverage Group.
Denver’s Stem Ciders, which recently signed a distribution agreement with Breakthru Beverage for coverage throughout Colorado, has partnered with Fort Collins-based craft beer maker Odell Brewing for sales support across the state. Similar to a traditional broker relationship, the smaller Stem Ciders will gain access to Odell’s sales force as well as its inventory and customer relationship management (CRM) software programs in exchange for a fee.
Call it the Oskar Blues effect. Since its sale to Oskar Blues Holding Co. last March, Michigan’s Perrin Brewing Company has been growing like a weed. Volumes have increased 92 percent over last year, and $1 million of equipment investments enabled the company to eclipse 14,000 barrels of production in 2015, the company noted in a press release detailing its growth.
After a yearlong search, Stone Brewing Company has finally identified its next chief executive. The San Diego-based craft brewery today named Dominic Engels, who most recently served as the president of POM Wonderful, as its next CEO.
Craft Brew Alliance’s long-term route to market in the U.S. — and perhaps its future ownership structure — became clearer this week after the publicly traded craft beer maker unveiled enhanced distribution and contract brewing agreements with its largest individual shareholder, Anheuser-Busch InBev.
Craft Brew Alliance and Anheuser-Busch InBev today announced a new set of commercial agreements that will give the smaller CBA guaranteed distribution via A-B’s wholesalers in the U.S. through 2028 and expanded access to a variety of international markets as well as brewing capacity at many of the larger company’s 12 brewery locations. In a joint announcement, the two companies said the new arrangements would “expand and strengthen the companies’ long-term relationship and create new growth opportunities for both companies.”
Simon Thorpe, the guy at least partially responsible for convincing Boulevard Brewing founder John McDonald and Firestone Walker co-founder David Walker to sell their businesses to Duvel Moortgat, is on his way out. I’m not sure if Simon is sitting at home right now polishing up his resume. But, much like the NBA’s Kevin Durant lottery earlier this summer, a big-time free agent creates plenty of interest in realm of Hot Stove speculation. So here’s my list of the top six franchises that might want to consider adding this big-time leader to their lineup, and why.
Simon Thorpe, the president of Duvel Moortgat USA, has resigned and will be replaced by Jeff Krum, who currently serves as Boulevard Brewing’s vice president of corporate affairs. Thorpe, who has served as the president and CEO of Duvel USA since 2009, will continue in an advisory capacity through the end of August, the company said.
It’s been more than four years since San Diego’s Green Flash Brewing first announced its intent to build a secondary brewing facility on the East Coast and the company has finally set an official grand opening date. Green Flash today said it would open its 58,000 sq. ft. brewery in Virginia Beach, Va. on Nov. 13, marking the occasion with a series of events, the company said via a press release today.
John Cochran, who last month sold Terrapin Beer Company to MillerCoors, is diving headfirst back into the beer business with a new craft brewery venture in Asheville, North Carolina. Using proceeds from the sale of Terrapin, Cochran said he has purchased the assets of Altamont Brewing and will rebrand the company as UpCountry Brewing.
In this week’s Last Call: Milwaukee Brewing has announced plans to significantly expand its operations in Brew City, inking a lease agreement for 58,000 sq. ft. of space on the site of the original Pabst brewery; BrewDog reportedly plans to spend about half of the $50 million it is currently trying to crowdfund to build out a number of BrewDog-branded bars in the U.S., according to a report from restaurant briefing service Propel Info.
