CGA: Labor Day Weekend Velocity Gets a Lift
On-premise sales over Labor Day weekend received “an uplift in velocity” on Sunday (+16%) and Monday (+54%) compared to the previous week, NielsenIQ’s on-premise tracking arm, CGA, reported today.
Monday trends were driven by traffic (+44%) to bars and restaurants, with check value also up +7%. All of CGA’s key states posted double-digit growth on Monday, driven by Texas (+60%) and California (+59%).
CGA added that recent velocity trends have tracked closely to seasonal trends of previous years. Velocity in the week up to September 3 declined -5%, followed by velocity ticking up +2% over the most recent week. That growth was driven by increases in ticket count (+2%) and check value (+1%).
For the week through September 10, velocity increased +8% compared to 2021, due to an increase in check value (+9%). However, ticket count declined -1%.
Stem Cider to Open New Taproom, Sibling Brand Howdy Beer to Occupy Former Space
Lafayette, Colorado-based Stem Ciders will relocate from its Denver taproom to a new space, allowing sister brand Howdy Beer to open in the vacated taproom.
Stem occupied the taproom on Walnut Street in Denver’s River North (RiNo) neighborhood for nearly 10 years, according to a press release.
“The neighborhood has certainly evolved over the last ten years, and we’re thrilled to grow into
a new space that will better reflect how Stem has also evolved over the last decade,” co-founder Eric Foster said in the release.
Stem acquired the intellectual property for Howdy Beer from multi-location brewpub The Post Chicken & Beer in April. The companies have forged a partnership in which Stem products are available at The Post’s locations. Howdy Beer is contract-brewed at Sleeping Giant and distributed in Colorado, Texas, Tennessee and Oklahoma.
The new Howdy Beer taproom will open next month in time for the Great American Beer Festival in Denver. It will be “a no-frills country western-themed bar in the heart of the RiNo Arts District,” according to the release.
“The state of Colorado is still in many ways the Wild West,” Foster said. “With Howdy Bar, we’re hoping to channel that Western spirit of peanut shells on the ground, old school country music blasting, shots of whiskey, pitchers of Howdy Beer flowing, crisp refreshing ciders, and generally an approachable place for industry friends to come hang post shift.”
Stem’s new taproom is slated to open before the end of the year a few blocks away on Blake Street. The new facility will include a full kitchen, indoor and outdoor stages and a rooftop patio.
WeldWerks Brewing Co. Signs with Ska Distributing
Ska Distributing will sell the portfolio of Greeley, Colorado-based WeldWerks Brewing Co. in southwest Colorado, the companies announced today.
“Partnering with Ska for distribution to Southwest Colorado was a natural fit for us at WeldWerks,” director of sales Alex Paine said in a press release. “They know that market better than anyone. Their attention to quality and relationships align perfectly with our focus on expanding our Colorado footprint.”
WeldWerks is currently self-distributed in the greater Colorado Springs, Denver, Boulder and Fort Collins markets. Ska Distributing is seven-year-old WeldWerks’ first wholesaler partner.
Ska Distributing serves the southwest Colorado market, including accounts in Durango, Telluride, Ridgway and Ouray. Its portfolio includes offerings from Ska Brewing, Bristol Brewing, Bruz Beers, La Cumbrew Brewing, Left Hand Brewing, Lone Tree Brewing, Stone Brewing and Telluride Brewing.
Denver’s Black Project Spontaneous Ales Shuttered
Black Project Spontaneous Ales owner James Howat announced earlier this week the Denver-based brewery’s taproom was “closed effective immediately.”
“It is with a heavy heart that I write to tell you that I’ve decided to close and bring Black Project to an end as gracefully as possible,” he wrote on Instagram. “A lot of different things have come together over the last year that have made this project no longer viable.”
Howat pointed to “decreased foot traffic, rising rent and raw materials prices, and a changing beer market, among other things” as factors that “made it so that it isn’t possible for me to go on making the kinds of beers I want to make.”
Black Project opened in 2016, after Howat and former spouse Sarah Howat morphed their prior, more traditional brewery, Former Future, into one that only fermented beers with wild yeast, according to the Denver Post.
Black Project produced 1,150 barrels of beer in 2021, according to the Brewers Association’s May/June issue of the New Brewer.
Wil Fischer Acquires A-B House Western Beverages in Kansas
Wil Fischer Companies, an Anheuser-Busch wholesaler that operates in Missouri and Kansas, has closed on a deal for Western Beverage.
“As of September 10th, Wil Fischer is servicing 100% of Western Beverages sales territory,” the company wrote on Facebook. “With that being said, there is now a Wil Fischer warehouse in Dodge City and Hays, Kansas.”
Wil Fischer operates facilities in Lenexa, Kansas, as well as Poplar Bluff, Springfield, and St. Joseph, Missouri. The company distributed 5 million case equivalents in 2021, according to its website.
Pennsylvania’s Spring Hill Brewing to Close
Pittsburgh-based Spring Hill Brewing has announced it will close after more than four years in business. Friday, September 23 will be the brewery’s last day in business.
“Thank you all for joining me at this beautiful, little weird hilltop brewery that’s practically been my home for the last five years,” owner Greg Kamerdze wrote on Instagram. “This is an amazing community and I’m extremely lucky to have had this surreal experience with such supportive neighbors.”
Spring Hill opened in July 2018, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
Philadelphia Brewing Loses Annual Hop Crop to City Clipping Crew
Philadelphia Brewing Company lost its homegrown hop crop this week when a city crew mistakenly cut down the 30 plants the brewery was growing.
“It’s sad; it’s disappointing – I don’t understand it,” Philadelphia Brewing owner Nancy Barton told NBC Philadelphia. “I want to know what they’re going to do to compensate us or make us whole. It’s a lot of revenue loss.”
The brewery grows its own hops each year for Harvest From The Hood, a special wet-hopped IPA it releases each fall. Philadelphia Brewing estimated it lost 60 pounds of hops and “tens of thousands of dollars in projected revenue” due to the hops’ destruction.
The hop project began 10 years ago through a partnership with New Kensington Community Development Corporation (NKCDC), a local nonprofit in the brewery’s neighborhood that allows Philadelphia Brewing to grow the hops on a nearby lot, according to KYW Newsradio.
A team from Philadelphia’s Community Life Improvement Programs (CLIP) mistook the hops for overgrown weeds despite a sign in the lot explaining the project. The brewery was issued a citation last month, which Barton thought she cleared up with the city, so she was surprised when they were destroyed.
“Regrettably, due to miscommunication and staff error, the hops were removed as they were initially marked as a violation as it appeared the lot was overgrown,” a city spokesperson told KYW. “We are reaching out to Philadelphia Brewing and NKCDC to explain the situation, apologize and explore what we can do to rectify this situation.”
Constellation Brands and A-B Still Arguing Over Definition of Beer in Lawsuit
The legal battle between Anheuser-Busch InBev subsidiary Cervecería Modelo and Constellation Brands over Corona Hard Seltzer – and what constitutes a beer – is still raging in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.
A-B filed the lawsuit in February 2021, alleging that Constellation’s launch of Corona Hard Seltzer violated the companies’ 2013 licensing agreement because it isn’t traditional beer. Last week, Constellation filed a motion in opposition to the statement of facts filed by A-B.
In a 110-page document filed on September 9, Constellation countered dictionary definitions of “beer” should not be applied to the licensing agreement because those definitions vary among the 11 dictionaries cited. Rather, the Internal Revenue Code definition – which is how the federal government defines, regulates and taxes beer and beer-adjacent products, including hard seltzer – should be used.
“To the contrary, ‘beer’ as used in the sublicense definition of ‘beer’ is a federal regulatory concept, as made clear by the pairing of that word with ‘ale, porter, stout,’ and expansive language ‘any other versions or combination,’ and covers at least all products meeting the federal regulatory definition of ‘beer’ as set forth in IRC and TTB regulations,” Constellation wrote in a dispute of A-B’s argument.