The Brewers Association (BA) will increase the cost of membership for the first time in nearly two decades, the organization reminded members Wednesday.
New prices – which are tiered according to brewery size – will go into effect February 1. The increase was first announced in November.
“Like many, the Brewers Association has felt the impact of rising prices, and we are taking this step to bolster existing benefits and expand our efforts on your behalf – meeting needs with brewing and business resources and strengthening our advocacy efforts on the state level,” the BA wrote.
Members can lock in 2022 rates for one more year by renewing their membership and paying for the year in full before February 1.
“Any members paying dues monthly who want to take advantage of these savings are encouraged to switch to an annual payment,” the BA wrote. “We do not take the decision to raise dues lightly. With this change, we will be able to continue serving your brewery at the highest level.”
Annual dues will increase $30 for both breweries producing between 0 and 500 barrels, which will see their rate increase to $225, and breweries producing between 501-2,500 barrels, which will see their rate increase to $325.
Larger breweries pay both a flat fee and a per-barrel fee. Breweries with production volume between 2,501-60,000 barrels will see their flat fee increase by $30, to $325, and their per-barrel rate increase by $0.01, to $0.11 per barrel beyond 2,500.
The flat rate for breweries with annual output between 60,001-150,000 will increase $605, to $6,650. The per-barrel rate for those breweries will increase $0.0065, to $0.0715 per barrel beyond 60,000.
The largest breweries – those producing between 150,000 and 2 million barrels – will see their flat rate increase $1,200, to $13,200; the per-barrel rate will increase $0.0005, to $0.0055 per barrel beyond 150,000.
Only the 14 largest BA-defined craft breweries produced more than 150,000 barrels in 2021, according to the BA’s May/June edition of the New Brewer. They included D.G. Yuengling and Son Inc., Boston Beer Company (Samuel Adams, Dogfish Head), Sierra Nevada, Duvel Moortgat USA (Firestone Walker, Boulevard, Brewery Ommegang), Gambrinus (Shiner, Trumer), Bell’s Brewery, CANarchy (Oskar Blues, Cigar City, Deep Ellum, Wasatch, Squatters, Perrin), Artisanal Brewing Ventures (Victory, Southern Tier, Sixpoint), Stone, SweetWater, Deschutes, New Glarus, Brooklyn Brewery, and Matt Brewing (Saranac).
Of these, Yuengling is not a member, according to the BA’s member directory. Lion Little World Beverages’ 2021 acquisition of Bell’s may preclude the brewery from full membership moving forward.
The BA defines independent craft breweries as those who hold brewers licenses from the U.S Department of Treasury Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureaus (TTB), produce fewer than 6 million barrels annually, and are not more than 25% owned by another “beverage alcohol industry member that is not itself a craft brewer.”
In addition to professional brewery memberships, the BA offers memberships to allied trade businesses and organizations ($495), distributors ($395), craft beer retailers ($95) and individuals ($175). Dues for these memberships are not increasing in 2023, a BA spokesperson told Brewbound.
Membership dues make up the BA’s second largest source of annual revenue behind events. Membership dues in 2021 – the most recent year numbers were available – totaled $4,508,011, a decline of $345,347 from the $4,853,358 that the organization generated in 2020, according to the group’s 2021 annual report.
The 2021 membership revenue figure marks a five-year low for the BA, falling just below 2016’s membership revenue of $4,678,181, when the organization counted 8,882 total professional members.
Membership revenue has declined $640,676 in the five-year period since 2019, which represented a highwater mark for the BA with dues accounting for $5,148,687 in revenue. The BA counted 10,966 members across all classes that year. Membership revenue topped the $5 million mark for the first time in 2018, as the organization collected $5,122,013, with 10,739 members across all classes, the last year in which the organization shared membership numbers.
The news of membership dues increases follows the BA announcing in December that it has ceased one of its four signature events, the SAVOR beer-and-food pairing event that was held annually in Washington, D.C.
SAVOR along with the Great American Beer Festival (GABF), Craft Brewers Conference (CBC) and the American Homebrewers Association’s HomebrewCon made up the BA’s big four events. In 2019, the year before the COVID-19 pandemic forced the BA to cancel the in-person versions of its events, events generated $16,173,153 in revenue for the organization, more than double the events revenue from 2021 when the BA brought in $7,294,944.
In 2020, with the pandemic in full effect canceling in-person events, the BA’s events revenue dipped to $1,701,215, according to the group’s 2020 stewardship report.