Michigan’s Founders Brewing Company has cut eight jobs as it restructured its business to focus on the on-premise channel, a spokesperson confirmed to Brewbound.
“A few months ago we redirected to a new business model that is more heavily focused on on-premise sales to meet the new market landscape we found ourselves facing post COVID,” Kristen Veverka, Founders director of public relations and communications, told Brewbound. “In order to support this plan, we conducted a small internal restructure which included moving some individuals to new positions, hiring a few additional roles and reducing eight existing positions.”
The move comes as Founders has undergone a leadership change earlier this year. In February, Elton Andres Knight was appointed CEO, taking over for former CEO and co-founder Mike Stevens, who announced in January that he would step down as CEO and transition to a board role in order to “pursue other personal ambitions and spend more time with his family.”
Founders’ business has historically been more off-premise driven. In a late February interview, Knight told Brewbound that among his goals was increasing Founders’ on-premise footprint.
Mahou San Miguel-owned Founders (and Avery Brewing in Boulder) ranked as the 12th largest overall beer company by volume in 2021, according to the Brewers Association.
Year-to-date through March 20, Founders ranked as the 19th largest off-premise vendor, with nearly $23.9 million in sales in multi-outlet and convenience stores. Year-over-year, Founders’ off-premise sales of $23.85 million were down -18%, a decline of $5.25 million, compared to the same period in 2021.
Sales this year of Founders’ top-selling beer in the off-premise, All Day IPA, were down -15.1% (a decline of about $2.47 million), IRI reported. Still, All Day IPA is the tenth best-selling craft beer brand, holding a 1.42 share of craft beer dollar sales in the off-premise, according to IRI. The brand’s price per case of $30.05 as of March 20 reflected a $.99 price increase for the year.
According to IRI, Founders’ overall dollar share of the beer category through late March was 0.27, down -0.05 share points year-to-date. Off-premise sales is only part of the overall sales picture for a company, with craft brewers typically over-indexing in the on-premise channel.
The job cuts at Founders followed news last week that New Belgium and Bell’s cutting less than 3% of its combined workforce following the post-acquisition integration of the Michigan craft brewery into Lion Little World Beverages’ U.S. platform.