After a year-long search, Dogfish Head has hired marketing veteran George Pastrana as the brewery’s new president and COO.

Three days after sales of recreational cannabis began in California, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions issued a memo calling for a stricter enforcement of federal marijuana laws and, in the process, rescinded Obama-era Department of Justice protections for legal cannabis that was included in the 2013 Cole Memorandum. Brewbound polled beer industry professionals from all three tiers, and most suggested that legalized recreational marijuana would have little impact on beer sales.

Constellation Brands reported its third-quarter fiscal 2018 earnings Friday, which were highlighted by 9.1 percent growth in beer depletions (sales-to-retailers) and a 5.9 percent increase in shipments over the comparable three-month period.

Former First Beverage Group director JB Shireman has joined Arlington Capital, the Alabama-based investment bank announced today. Shireman, who departed First Beverage at the end of 2017, will serve as a director with Arlington and “further bolster” the firm’s craft beverage advisory business, a press release noted.

In this week’s edition of Press Clips: Maryland distributors vow to fight Comptroller’s changes; brewers hail tax reform savings; MillerCoors ends Coors Light NASCAR sponsorship; Mitch Steele’s Atlanta brewery sets an opening date; and Bell’s releases Hopslam.

Ten months after Pabst Brewing Company terminated agreements with three Washington wholesalers, an arbitrator has determined that Columbia Distributing — which was awarded the distribution rights to several Pabst brands last February — owes a combined $21.2 million to The Odom Corporation, Craig Stein Beverage, and Marine View Beverage.

Starting this month, Dogfish Head Craft Brewery will begin selling its beer in Louisiana, extending its footprint to 38 states and Washington, D.C.

MillerCoors today announced that Blue Moon founder Keith Villa will depart the organization on January 5.

After slashing 10 percent of his workforce at the end of last year, Summit Brewing founder Mark Stutrud said his company is heading into 2018 with an increased focus on selling more sessionable core products while simultaneously strengthening its local presence in Minnesota.

Two years after selling her startup to Anheuser-Busch InBev, Meg Gill, the co-founder of Los Angeles-based Golden Road Brewing, can’t imagine life without the support of the world’s largest beer company. “There’s a lot of complexities involved with a big partner, but it’s been an amazing journey for us,” she recently told BevNET’s Taste Radio podcast.

Last month, San Diego’s Novo Brazil Brewing was named the winner of Startup Brewery Challenge 9, held during the Brewbound Session conference in Santa Monica, California. But the business pitch competition – which gives entrepreneurs four minutes to showcase their brands for a chance to win $5,000 and an all-expenses-paid trip to Portland, Oregon – also featured four other emerging brands.

In this week’s edition of Last Call: Summit downsizes its workforce; A-B reconsiders its 3.2 beer portfolio; Nebraska looks to tweak its come-to-rest provisions; and more.

A task force formed earlier this year to examine Massachusetts’ decades-old alcohol laws has unveiled a lengthy report that offers 37 recommendations to “improve the operations” of the state’s Alcohol Beverages Control Commission (ABCC). The suggestions — which the task force made after reviewing laws in other states and meeting with ABCC officials, alcohol industry members and consumers — include modernizing franchise laws, increasing excise taxes and clarifying pay-to-play rules.

New Belgium will finish 2017 “flat to slightly up,” which newly appointed CEO Steve Fechheimer considers a victory in a crowded craft beer industry that has slowed to single-digit growth.