Firestone Walker has reached a deal to acquire the Cali-Squeeze brand from SLO Brewing Co. Firestone Walker added that it has been “historically reluctant to develop beers outside the traditional footprint.” Nevertheless, the company has toyed with fruited beers but ultimately “recognized that Cali-Squeeze already had everything we were looking for.”

The Brewers Association (BA) ended 2020 with an operational net loss of $3.5 million, according to its 2020 stewardship report, which the organization released today. “No one was immune to hardship in 2020, including the Brewers Association,” president and CEO Bob Pease wrote in a note opening the report.

Amid rising competition in the ever-expanding hard seltzer segment, Mark Anthony Brands is adding two line extensions and one new variety pack to its White Claw franchise ahead of peak summer seltzer selling season. The company has finally announced the launch of long-rumored White Claw Surge, the 8% ABV version of the best selling hard seltzer, as well as a third variety pack.

Sales velocities at bars and restaurants have more than tripled year-over-year (+325%) now that the calendar is cycling the strictest lockdown period in 2020, according to Nielsen CGA, market research firm NielsenIQ’s on-premise arm. “Across all states, value velocity remains strongly positive compared to last year, when on-premise decline was at its height,” Nielsen CGA reported.

Brewers Association (BA) chief economist Bart Watson this week delivered his annual state of the industry report virtually for the second time, due to the 2020 cancellation and 2021 postponement of the Craft Brewers Conference, now slated to take place this fall. In 2020, the nation’s 8,764 craft breweries posted a 9% decline in beer volume, so Watson delved into the market forces and consumer trends that led to the first volume decline recorded in BA history during a webinar for members.

Atlantic Beverage Distributors’ fight to keep Jack’s Abby Craft Lagers from terminating their wholesaler relationship hit a roadblock this week when a judge denied the distributor’s motion for a preliminary injunction against a pending arbitration hearing.

Continuing to cycle the tough comps of 2020’s pandemic stock-up period, off-premise dollar sales of alcoholic beverages declined 1.3% for the week ending March 27, compared to the same week last year, according to market research firm NielsenIQ.

Regional cideries grew at more than triple the rate of the total cider segment at off-premise retailers in 2020, American Cider Association executive director Michelle McGrath shared during the trade organization’s annual CiderCon event earlier this year.

“Off-premise channels grew 9% for total cider — regional brands grew 33%,” she said. “Off-premise chains don’t capture all of our members, but they do provide a useful measuring stick.”

The Brewers Association (BA) released its annual craft brewery production report, which showed a 9% decline in 2020, in large part due to the COVID-19 pandemic. BA chief economist Bart Watson cautioned that the decline is not a perfect representation of the year for the nation’s 8,764 craft breweries.

The COVID-19 pandemic put hard times on the U.S. craft brewing industry in 2020, as production declined for the first time in the modern craft era, the Brewers Association (BA) announced today. The number of barrels produced by craft breweries had steadily grown in recent years, from 24.3 million barrels in 2016 to a peak of 26.3 million barrels in 2019.

Heineken-owned Lagunitas Brewing has named Tony Amaral head of sales, following the departure of Tom McReavy, who formerly led the Petaluma, California-based craft brewery’s sales division before taking the top sales role at Stone Brewing last month.

What appeared to be an April Fool’s Day joke about the creation of the Brewers Space Guild — “protecting breweries in the frontier without tiers” — was actually the announcement of the formation of the Association of Brewers Guild Professionals (ABGP), a trade organization for the employees of the nation’s state and local brewers guilds. Brewers guilds aren’t preparing for liftoff, but they are linking up to form an association of their own.

To break down the “significant roadblocks” facing the state’s 200 craft breweries, the Minnesota Craft Brewers Guild (MNCBG) has launched a political action committee, the MN Craft Beer PAC.

The Brewers Association (BA) released its annual top 50 rankings of craft breweries by beer sales volume in 2020. Although there was some jockeying for position, the top of the list remained largely unchanged, with D.G. Yuengling & Son, Boston Beer Company and Sierra Nevada holding down the top three spots again.