“We are beer culture now,” Firestone Walker co-founder David Walker opined Tuesday morning during the keynote speech at the California Craft Brewers Association’s Summit in Sacramento.
“It belongs to us,” he said. “The people in this room. We are beer culture now and we’re in charge of curating it. And I think it’s really important that we don’t just sort of walk away from that.”
When Firestone Walker was founded in 1996, Walker said the largest brewers were rooted in beer culture.
“They were tough competitors and they were assholes to us, but the fact is, they kept the beer business healthy,” he said of the big brewers in the 1990s, crediting them with creating cold-chain distribution, inventing “unbelievable rotational expectations from the consumer,” and offering fresh beer.
However, in 2023, those companies’ missions have changed as they’ve engaged in total beverage alcohol battles, leaving beer culture behind, Walker argued.
Walker admitted he’s “utterly and completely confused” by the industry’s shifting landscape titling toward alternative alcoholic beverages.
“I look at some of these beyond beer elixirs, it’s like a chemistry experiment chasing numbers,” he said. “They just don’t align with the values that we set out to propagate when we started brewing beer, and I just don’t feel comfortable in that space. But it doesn’t mean that we can’t own it at some point. But I think we’re a long way from it. And I think we need to be careful because it’s dangerous.”
The danger lies in chasing consumers who don’t care about the origin of those products or who makes them, Walker said.
“Monsanto could make half of these beers and people wouldn’t give a tinkle,” he added. “That’s not an argument as small craft brewers we can win. I mean, our story is the artisanal narrative. It is rooted in beer culture.”
Instead of chasing those dragons, Walker encouraged American craft brewers to hold themselves in the same esteem as Scottish whiskey makers, French champagne makers, Mexican distillers.
“The minute that we essentially leave the mantle of beer culture, we’re on our own and we’re in the big pond going up against Coca-Cola and Monster and Brown Forman and Monsanto. Who cares? I don’t know. But it’s a big world that I don’t think we can win.”
Walker admitted craft brewers are a little beat up. The “COVID conga line economy” continues with rising interest rates, inflation, increased costs of goods, increased cost of living for Firestone Walker’s staff; a “nightmare” that is “really affecting [their] path.”
And while the on-premise is back, “it’s not all the way back,” Walker said.
“We have to get those guys back,” he urged. “They’re our theater. That’s where we tell our stories. That’s where we own the on-premise as craft breweries. We have got to get those guys back.”
Meanwhile, consolidation across the industry continues, especially within the wholesaler tier. Walker suggested that brewers must think intelligently about how that consolidation evolves.
Although the industry is facing tough times today, they’ve been “a hell of a lot worse,” Walker said. He recalled the difficulty Firestone Walker faced in its early days just getting distribution or the equipment needed to produce smaller batches of beer. And then there was the consumer, who was indifferent to craft beer.
“That’s not something we have now,” he said. “In those days, people didn’t care about craft beer. Frankly, I don’t even think they cared about beer. I mean, they had a relationship to it, like Ford and Chevy, but they weren’t interested in the things that we were interested in, like beer culture, and all the things that sort of flowed from that. That was our narrative. That was our platform. That was all we had to talk about.”
So in 2023, those are not issues that craft breweries are facing. For its part, Firestone Walker plans to brew about a half a million barrels of beer, Walker said.
“A little less than last year, but it’s half a million barrels. It’s an extraordinary thing,” he said. “I truly believe 20 years from now, we’ll be as relevant as it is today.”
Peering into the future of the business, Walker said he believes “the future is bright.”
“It’s not going away,” he said. “Brewers for centuries have been making beer locally for their regions, fresh, affordable, high quality and delivering it to their friends. That is the model and frankly, that’s the model for 99% of craft brewers in America.”
Although the number of craft breweries opening may be slowing, Walker said there will be “a helluva lot more craft brewers in my lifetime, whether they’re replacing existing ones or we continue to grow.”
“More brewers and breweries are coming, and that, my friends, might seem confusing and counterintuitive, but it’s absolutely brilliant for us because with each brewery, a new authentic voice, new authentic beer, new authentic communities that have been touched,” he said. “The fact is, you continue to do that, we’ll continue to change the world of beer forever.”
Walker also pushed the idea of a strength in numbers, which was a recurring theme of the opening session.
“You’re sitting in this room, shoulder to shoulder with friends, not competitors,” he said. “It’s really, really important that we acknowledge that.”
Lori Ajax, CCBA executive director, opened the meeting noting there are now 1,100 licensed independent craft breweries operating throughout California. She called those businesses a “strong and sustaining force” in California’s small business community and part of the “social fabric of every city, town and neighborhood where they’re located.”
Although California has among the most brewery-friendly laws in the country, some of those privileges are at risk, both Ajax and Lori Porter, co-founder of Smog City Brewing and CCBA board chair, said.
“The vast majority of our time at the CCBA has been protecting your privileges that are under fire every year,” Porter said. “You need to remember that the rights that we have are not guaranteed, and there are forces that would love to lose them.”
Porter encouraged brewery owners to build relationships with local and state lawmakers to advance the collective agenda. She acknowledged that the last three years have been “incredibly tough” for many small breweries.
“This year for the first time in over 10 years we’ve seen a decline in master licenses,” she said.
Porter encouraged brewers who are doing well to support and give back to those who are not. “Don’t be a passenger in our industry,” she urged the brewers in the room. The industry needs leaders to be involved locally and industry-wide.
“If you’re struggling, know that you’re not alone and now is the time to reach out for help from your industry friends and seek resources from the CCBA,” she said. “Remember, our industry’s greatest resource is sitting right here in this room.
“Look around and take advantage of the camaraderie that is in this room and learn from it. Support each other.”