Congress passed the $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package, which now advances to President Joe Biden for an expected signature.

“We obviously had grown so quickly that I just knew there was going to be an extent at how much we could realistically scale the business on our own, just due to our existing infrastructure, our own resources, and, quite frankly, even our kind of experience,” Far West Spirits founder Katie Beal Brown told Brewbound.

The May 1 launch of a line of hard seltzers branded with fast-food chain Sonic’s name and proprietary beverage flavors has the potential to make Oklahoma City craft brewery COOP Ale Works a player in the $4 billion hard seltzer segment, president Sean Mossman told Brewbound.

Eight in 10 regular craft beer drinkers believe breweries should be allowed to ship beer directly to consumers in more states than the 13 where the practice is legal, according to a study published by the Brewers Association (BA) and Sovos ShipCompliant.

Stone Brewing has hired former wine, spirits and cannabis executive Erin Smith as its next vice president of marketing. Smith’s arrival comes several weeks after the Escondido, California-headquartered craft brewery announced a reorganization of its sales and marketing teams.

Diageo has acquired fast-growing hard seltzer maker Far West Spirits LLC, which produces the Lone River Ranch Water brand.

Beer category dollar sales at off-premise retailers increased 11.3% during the four-week period ending February 20, according to market research firm NielsenIQ. At present, scan data is cycling the period in 2020 before COVID-19 pandemic shutdowns began and the on-premise channel was operating at full capacity. Consumer spending shifted almost exclusively to the off-premise channel in mid-March.

No- and low-alcohol offerings as a “potential market disruptor” for the beer category, growing retail sales to $3 billion by 2025, according to a new research report from Goldman Sachs analyst Bonnie Herzog.

Sarasota, Florida-based JDub’s Brewing is alive and about to launch a new flagship offering, following its April 2020 Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing thanks to a partnership with Orlando-based contract brewer Brew Theory.

On the latest edition of the Brewbound Podcast, Blind Tiger Design founder and creative director Oceania Eagan and and CODO Design co-founder and partner Isaac Arthur join the Brewbound team to discuss how to pull off a rebrand without making your fans angry and how to rally them behind it.

Deschutes Brewery has made the first acquisition in the 32-year-old craft brewery’s history. Bend, Oregon-headquartered Deschutes has acquired another Bend craft brewery, Boneyard Beer.

Global cannabis sales grew by nearly half in 2020, according to BDSA, a cannabis market research firm based in Boulder, Colorado. Sales increased 48%, to $21.3 billion, compared to $14.4 billion in 2019.

After the Firestone Walker Invitational Beer Fest was canceled for the second consecutive year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, brewmaster Matt Brynildson was inspired to finally pull the trigger on his goal of creating a special release bottle club at the Paso Robles, California-headquartered craft brewery.

Oregon lawmakers are considering a tax hike on alcoholic beverages that would increase taxes on malt beverages by $70 per barrel. The U.S. House of Representatives passed the American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion pandemic relief bill in the early hours of Saturday, February 27. The bill includes a $25 billion fund for grants for bars, restaurants and breweries.