2024's "Painful Period of Rationalization" and other Beer News
Powered by historical perspective:
The good news? Well, it sorta got a bit easier to run a brewery this year, depending on how you look at things.
That’s because there’s less competition from other breweries, which is the bad news coming from the Brewers Association last week. Their “Year in Beer” recap post made it official: More breweries closed than opened this year, dropping to 9,736 by their count.
The quote from the subject line on this post comes from the BA’s Bart Watson, who said in full:
“Craft has been going through a painful period of rationalization as demand growth has slowed and retailers and distributors look to simplify their offerings or add options for flavor and variety outside of the craft category.”
We’ll get more details when they share their Annual Craft Brewing Industry Production Report, which usually hits around April. I did a bit of digging to see when the last time the overall number of US breweries dropped, and according to the Historical U.S. Brewery Count graph here, we have to go back almost 20 years.
In 2005, overall breweries dropped to 1,447 from 1,468 the year prior, and that’s when the rocket ship took off. To extend that metaphor, I’d say now we’re roughly in a standard orbit. I’ve also long thought that the plateau for US breweries would hit at about 10K and I think that’s bearing out.
The BA tracked 335 openings and 399 closings overall, though that number may need to be adjusted a bit based on some of the news stories below. One of those just-closed breweries was the Revolution Brewing Milwaukee Avenue brewpub, which had its final “last call” on Saturday night.
I’ve updated our Chicagoland Craft Beer Map, and that was a real bummer of a “delete” button to have to press. According to my document history, there were 235 beermakers on our list as of early January. Today, our list sits at at 219.
By that math (and I know it’s imperfect because we’re working from two wildly different data sets), the brewery closures around Chicagoland alone could account for a full quarter of the nationwide overall losses.
Tough year.
Congrats to Sketchbook Brewing for being named Business of the Year in Skokie! Patch has the story.
Patch also wrote about the return of the Flipside / Open Bottle seasonal collab for charity, Santa’s Midnight Snack.
A Forbes writer checked in with Chicago’s Beverage Tasting Institute to find out what their beers of the year are.
Eater updated their list of the city’s best beer bars; nice to see the Village Tap and the Long Room on there, but no Green Lady? No Kaiser Tiger? No Bitter Pops? Odd.
Riggs Beer Company is hosting a German-style Christmas Market at their farm-based space on the weekends with rotating vendors, brats, mulled wine and more. Plus beer, naturally.
The Illinois Farm Bureau partnered with DESTIHL to produce a new “Roots Lager,” made with corn grown on a Knox County Farm Bureau member’s farm.
FOX-59 covered the final days of Lawrence’s Triton Brewing.
NUVO takes a look at what’s going on around the greater Indy area for an end-of-year wrapup with comment from Broad Ripple Brewpub and Great Fermentations.
The owner of Workshop Brewing Company and its sister space, Kingsley Brewing, recently put both businesses up for sale. Workshop has been in business for over a decade, so if anyone wanted to come north and step into a turnkey brewery, this is the one, especially at just $150K for the business. (Psst … middle brow … take a look.)
Hopcat Detroit celebrated ten years in business this weekend with a Short’s tap takeover.
Craft Brewing Business previews this year’s Great Beer State Trade Show & Conference coming up in early January.
After 12 years in business, Mankato Brewery announced it would be closing at the end of January after failing to find a buyer.
Kasson’s Chaotic Good Brewery also announced their closure, with their last day set for Dec. 23.
4 Hands is getting ready to open their taproom at STL’s Lambert International Airport.
Bud Light is no longer the nation’s most popular draft beer, falling behind Michelob Ultra. A-B, of course, makes both of them but Ultra only grew 4% while Bud Light shrank 13% last year, which isn’t great for them overall.
Job alert: If you want to sell Great Lakes beer in Wisconsin and Minnesota, they’re looking for you.
Toledo’s HEAVY Beer Company closed its doors yesterday.
Isthmus looks at a few small batches from Supermoon and rounds up a few of the new big, smoky beers from around Wisconsin, including the S’Morror from The Brewing Projekt that Premium Subscribers saw a little while ago.
After 15 years, the Wisconsin Brewers Guild is moving locations and changing the name of the Wisconsin Beer Lovers Festival for 2025.
Lakefront is holding a special Swedish New Year gathering on the 31st, complete with a Swedish buffet. (Think they’ll have lutefisk?)
This weeks’ Meet A Brewer column for the Milwaukee Record chats with Rob Gustafson of Vennture Brew Co., who really seems to love High Life.
Vinepair published their list of the 22 Best New Breweries of the year, with some good representation from the Midwest: Industry Ale, is/was, Casa Humilde and Suncatcher all got nods from Chicagoland, as well Austin Mill from Ohio, Blue Jay Brewing in STL, and, for some reason, Garage Beer as well.
Most-clicked link in last week’s email: InsideHook’s story about the increasing number of brewery taprooms that are banning kids from visiting.
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