US Beer Shipments Down Nearly 1.5 Million Barrels Through First 2 Months of 2022; February Shipments -5.8%

2022 is off to a slow start for U.S. brewers.

Through the first two months of the year, shipments are down -6%, to 23.4 million barrels shipped, according to the Beer Institute (BI), citing domestic tax paid estimates from the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB).

That’s a decline of nearly 1.5 million barrels compared to the first two months of 2021.

In February 2022, domestic brewers shipped 11.1 million barrels of beer, a -5.8% decline compared to February 2021, the BI reported. February 2022’s 681,000-barrel year-over-year decline followed January 2022’s 815,000-barrel decline (-6.2%).

At this same time in 2021, U.S. brewers had shipped 24.896 million barrels of beer.

Market research firm NielsenIQ reported that overall off-premise beer category (beer, cider and FMBs) volume sales are down -7.4% year-to-date through March 19 compared to the same period in 2021. Meanwhile, off-premise beer category dollar sales have declined -2.5% through the same timeframe.

Overall in 2021, U.S. brewers shipped 169,154,000 barrels of beer, roughly flat at -0.1% (-233,691 barrels) compared to 2020’s 169,387,691 barrels shipped, according to the TTB.

Nevertheless, domestic shipments have now declined in seven of the last eight months, with November 2021’s +2.8% gain breaking the negative trends.

The March 2022 domestic tax paid estimates are slated to be released on April 27.