The nation’s beer wholesalers and beer industry executives will meet in Las Vegas this week for the National Beer Wholesalers Association’s (NBWA) annual convention, and the meeting’s arrival comes amid turbulence. Large wholesalers continue to consolidate within the middle tier, while at least one New England craft-focused wholesaler has thrown in the towel. The pace of consolidation chugs on even as President Joe Biden has tasked the Treasury with examining competition within the beer industry at large, and that’s led to comments from at least two trade groups calling into question these mergers’ effect on the competitive landscape.

The Brewers Association issued a second round of comments to the Department of Treasury laying out the competitive challenges facing craft brewers, focusing on wholesaler consolidation, market access issues and restrictive state laws.

Beer industry veteran Simon Thorpe has emerged as part of the team behind SUNiCE, a pouch-packaged alcoholic beverage brand for a generation of legal-drinking-age consumers who grew up on Capri Sun pouches, Kool Aid Jammers and Hi-C juice boxes.

Increased aluminum and steel prices continue to hurt beer manufacturers, and equalization efforts by spirits companies threaten the beer industry’s stranglehold of retail cold boxes.

Sheehan Family Companies has reached an agreement to acquire some of the assets of Everett, Massachusetts-based Night Shift Distributing (NSD), including the distribution rights to Night Shift Brewing’s portfolio in Massachusetts and Connecticut, beginning October 18.

Once tariffs are imposed, they’re difficult to repeal. That was one of the takeaways from a pre-recorded interview between Beer Institute president and CEO Jim McGreevy and Wendy Cutler, vice president and managing director for Washington, D.C.-based think tank the Asia Society Policy Institute.

Ball Corp., the leading U.S. manufacturer of metal packaging for beverages, will build a $290 million aluminum beverage packaging plant in North Las Vegas, Nevada, with plans to begin production in late 2022, the company announced Thursday.

Stone Distributing has picked up the distribution rights to four suppliers in Southern California. The new adds include Inglewood-based Crowns & Hops Brewing Co., Thousand Oaks-based Tarantula Hill Brewing Co., San Diego-based Village Spirits, and Santa Monica-based Bomani Cold Buzz.

The contentious legal battle between sparkling hard tea and canned cocktail maker Loverboy and Night Shift Distributing over the FMB maker’s attempt to terminate the Massachusetts-headquartered wholesaler without paying fair market value for its brand rights has ended with an amicable resolution.

A class action lawsuit has once again been filed against Molson Coors alleging the company’s marketing campaign for Vizzy Hard Seltzer promoting “antioxidant Vitamin C from Acerola Superfruit” was misleading to consumers,.

Boston Beer Company’s hard seltzer woes are spilling over into the legal system. The maker of Truly Hard Seltzer, the second best-selling hard seltzer on the market, is now facing a proposed class action lawsuit for allegedly failing to disclose the deceleration in sales of Truly to investors.

Reyes Beer Division’s Gold Coast Beverages has struck a deal to acquire “certain brand distribution rights” from Brown Distributing in West Palm Beach, Florida, according to an internal email seen by Brewbound.

A new aluminum can making and filling production facility is slated to begin operations in Salt Lake City during the fourth quarter of 2021. Co-packing facility Vobev will launch with a focus on the popular slim (sleek) can production of 12 oz. (355 mL) and 8.4 oz. (250 mL) in a beverage industry crunched by demand and shortages of aluminum receptacle.

As part of President Joe Biden’s “COVID-19 action plan” announced last week, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is developing an “Emergency Temporary Standard” that will require employers of 100 or more employees to be fully vaccinated or require unvaccinated workers to undergo weekly testing before going to work.