After one month in the black, domestic tax paid shipments from U.S. breweries dipped into the red again with a -2.3% decline in March 2023, according to the Beer Institute (BI), citing numbers from the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB).
Domestic brewers shipped an estimated 14.9 million barrels in March 2023, a year-over-year (YoY) decline of -353,488 barrels. Year-to-date though the end of March, tax paid shipments have declined -0.8% compared to 2022. Domestic shipments increased +5.1% YoY in February, but declined -4.4% in January.
Despite this decline, domestic shipments have increased +2.7% compared to 2019, BI VP of research Danelle Kosmal wrote in her latest economic report.
Imports outpaced domestic shipments with a +6.9% increase compared to March 2022. Mexican imports (+12% YoY) led the segment. Compared to March 2019, import volume has increased +13.3%.
Kosmal cautioned that shipments (sales to wholesalers) are outperforming depletions (sales to retailers), which could lead to an imbalance in the market and future declines for shipments.
“While shipments showed some improvement for March, sales to retailer [STR] volume declined -4.9% compared to last year,” she wrote. “Given the soft performance of STRs for March, I would expect shipments to wholesalers for April to experience a bit more of a decline compared to March trends.”
At the state level, Rhode Island recorded the largest increase in shipments (+22.4% YoY) compared to March 2022, followed by Idaho (+15.4%), North Dakota (+14.9%), Wyoming (+10.2%) and Hawaii (+9.6%). California recorded the steepest YoY shipments decline in March (-18.9%), followed by Indiana (-15.6%), Arkansas (-13.7%), South Carolina (-12.1%) and Alaska (-10.5%).
In March, Texas led the way in volume, with 1.972 million barrels shipped, followed by California (1.617 million barrels), Florida (1.448 million barrels), New York (852,000 barrels) and Ohio (664,000 barrels).
Year-to-date, the Lone Star State still shipped the most beer (5.01 million barrels), followed by California (4.629 million barrels), Florida (3.673 million barrels), New York (2.054 million barrels) and Pennsylvania (1.714 million barrels).
The BI is scheduled to share its April 2023 economic report on June 8.