Breweries

Industry Profile Report

Dive Deep into the industry with a 25+ page industry report (pdf format) including the following chapters

Industry Overview Current Conditions, Industry Structure, How Firms Operate, Industry Trends, Credit Underwriting & Risks, and Industry Forecast.

Call Preparation Call Prep Questions, Industry Terms, and Weblinks.

Financial Insights Working Capital, Capital Financing, Business Valuation, and Financial Benchmarks.

Industry Profile Excerpts

Industry Overview

The 9,700 production breweries in the US include about 155 national or international breweries producing over 6 million barrels per year. Around 260 are regional craft breweries producing between 15,000 and 6 million barrels annually. More than 2,000 microbreweries produce less than 15,000 barrels per year. An additional 3,400 brewpub restaurants and 3,800 taprooms also produce beer on-site.

Competition Among Breweries

The beer industry is highly competitive with an increasing number of new entrants.

Industry Highly Regulated

The beer industry is highly regulated at both the state and federal levels.

Industry size & Structure
Industry Forecast
Breweries Industry Growth
Source: Vertical IQ and Inforum

Recent Developments

Mar 13, 2024 - Producer Prices Eased in 2023
  • The producer price index for breweries, which measures prices before reaching consumers, rose 1.9% in December compared to a year ago after rising 6.4% in the previous annual comparison amid high food and beverage price inflation, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Price increases by producers have been supported by rising consumer spending in recent years. Meanwhile, employment by breweries, wineries, and distilleries grew 2% year over year, per the BLS.
  • Anheuser-Busch narrowly avoided a strike by reaching a tentative agreement with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, according to HR Dive. Five thousand union members at the nation’s largest brewery had threatened to walk out if a new contract wasn’t reached by the end of February. The new contract secured greater job security for brewers, packagers, and production employees at A-B plants, according to the Teamsters, the union representing its manufacturing workers. The agreement included wage increases of $8 an hour, a $2,500 ratification bonus, increased pension contributions, restored retirement benefits, and 8 weeks of paid vacation. “After a long day and a longer campaign, we’ve reached an agreement that sets a new high standard for the brewing industry,” Teamsters President Sean O’Brien said. Some 400 workers at Molson Coors’ brewery in Fort Worth, Texas, who walked out in mid-February, remained on strike in March.
  • Last year was a rough year for beer with US shipments expected to reach their lowest level in 25 years, The Wall Street Journal reports. In the first nine months of 2023 beer shipments fell 5.3% and by year’s end were expected to hit their lowest level in a quarter-century, according to industry tracker Beer Marketer’s Insights. A cocktail of factors, including changing consumer tastes and the Bud-Light boycott, conspired to depress beer consumption. Younger adults are consuming less alcohol than older consumers and when they drink prefer spirits to beer. Generation Z (born between 1997 and 2012) had the lowest alcohol consumption of any adult age group in the nation, with 58% of legal drinking-age respondents saying they had drunk alcohol in the past six months, a recent survey by MRI-Simmons found. Among those, 87% had consumed spirits while 56% had consumed beer.
  • Tariffs on aluminum continue to drive up costs for breweries, research conducted by market intelligence firm HARBOR Aluminum on behalf of the Beer Institute has found. Since the imposition in 2018 of a 10% tariff on aluminum imports under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act, the US beverage industry has paid more than $2.175 billion in fees, according to the Beer Institute. Imported primary aluminum and cansheet are critical to the domestic beer industry as more than 74% of all beer produced in the US is packaged in aluminum cans and bottles. In 2020, brewers bought more than 41 billion aluminum cans and bottles, making aluminum the single most significant input cost in domestic beer manufacturing, per BI.
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