Constellation Brands has raised its full-year operating income guidance for its beer brands to +7% to +8% (previously +6% to +7%), following another quarter of shipments and depletions growth, the company reported today in its Q3 earnings results.

The “misalignment” of growth strategies across the supplier, wholesaler and retailer tiers will continue to be a problem for bev-alc in 2024, according to Bump Williams in the first Bump Williams Consulting (BWC) Monthly Industry Update of the year.

Tree House co-owners Nate Lanier and Damien Goudreau are denying allegations against them, filed in November by a minority shareholder, including claims they have misused company funds, failed to offer shareholder dividends, withheld tax documentation and more.

While the amount of bars and restaurants in operation has recovered to pre-pandemic levels, beer’s on-premise business has yet to bounce back, with keg volume expected to be 2.5 million barrels below where it should be by the end of 2023, according to the Brewers Association.

New hard tea and hard lemonade brands continue to populate shelves, while the No. 1 hard tea brand continues to grow its share, despite being more than 20 years in the game.

Chief economists Bart Watson (Brewers Association) and Lester Jones (National Beer Wholesalers Association) spent much of the past couple years staving off fears of a recession and preaching about how beer is “economically resilient.”

Schilling Cider continues to grow, despite abstaining from adding new markets for the immediate future, and making just one distribution change in 2023.

In October, cider grew its share of beer dollars in Circana-tracked off-premise channels +0.25% month-over-month (MoM) – an improvement over the segment’s typical fall seasonal declines. The trend change is primarily due to the efforts of National Cider Month, according to leadership at Schilling Cider.

Two Massachusetts breweries – Dorchester Brewing Company and Aeronaut Brewing Company – will merge next year under a new parent company, Tasty Liquid Alliance, the two companies announced today.

As 2023 comes to a close, the teams at market research firms NIQ and CGA hosted a webinar Tuesday to give predictions for 2024 bev-alc trends, including shifting consumer behavior, changing demographics, and continued premiumization and flavor-forward trends.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) for beer at home in November increased +2.7% year-over-year (YoY), according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

October domestic tax paid shipments from U.S. brewers were down -10.8% versus October 2022, to an estimated 11.35 million barrels, marking a loss of 1.38 million barrels year-over-year (YoY), according to Beer Institute (BI) chief economist Andrew Heritage.

Total bev-alc recorded a +12% boost in off-premise dollar sales week-over-week (WoW) thanks to the Thanksgiving holiday, according to Circana’s Scott Scanlon in the market research firm’s weekly update (data ending November 26).

Data conversations around beer in 2023 have set off many alarm bells around the category’s health and place in a changing and blurring bev-alc world. But there may be a slight turning of the tide – or rather, more context that’ll ease industry members’ nerves – according to Bump Williams in his monthly update for… Read more »