Brewers Association (BA) president and CEO Bart Watson entered the Brewbound Podcast studio last week fresh off stage from giving his State of the Industry speech at the 2025 Craft Brewers Conference (CBC).
Not that long ago, the idea of buying cannabis online – especially in a drinkable format – would have seemed like an unlikely pipe dream. Now, order-by-mail has become a primary mechanism for distributing intoxicating hemp beverages.
Despite recent headwinds, craft beer continues to have the largest share of beer sales at Total Wine & More stores. But “it won’t stay that way” if industry trends continue, according to the chain retailer’s senior director, merchandising, Andrea Starr.
In this exclusive quarterly deep dive curated for Brewbound Insiders, 3Tier Beverages breaks down the latest trends shaking up the beverage industry.
The craft segment’s dollar sales and volume declines have accelerated to start the second quarter, traditionally the lead-up to beer’s all important summer selling season, according to the most recent off-premise report from market research firm Circana.
Ball Corp. chairman and CEO Daniel W. Fisher has once again called on major beer manufacturers to deploy “more aggressive pricing” strategies to “push volume,” suggesting those strategies have worked for energy drink companies and other non-alcoholic (NA) beverage producers.
Under new leadership for the first time in more than a decade, the Brewers Association (BA) is “relentlessly focused on members and what their needs are,” CEO and president Bart Watson said last week.
The U.S. beer industry generated $470.96 billion in economic output in 2024, holding 1.58% of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP), according to the biennial Beer Serves America study commissioned by the Beer Institute (BI) and the National Beer Wholesalers Association (NBWA).
Rhinegeist is ghosting alcohol. The Cincinnati craft brewery will add its first non-alcoholic (NA) beer to its portfolio later this summer. Ghost is an “affiliated brand” that plays on the “geist” name, meaning ghost or spirit, Rhinegeist CEO Adam Bankovich told Brewbound. The NA beer is one of two big portfolio additions for Rhinegeist this year, with Cincy Light’s first line extension, Cincy Light Lime (4.2% ABV), rolling out now on draft.
Tom Holland, actor and co-founder of non-alcoholic beer Bero, discussed the brand’s growth during last week’s Beverage Forum.
The story of slowed import sales and the impact of Hispanic consumer shifts, is not a story unique to beer, according to the latest monthly report from Bump Williams of Bump Williams Consulting (BWC). Total bev-alc (TBA) imports have declined 0.5% year-to-date (YTD), to nearly $11 billion, in NIQ-tracked, off-premise channels (total U.S. + liquor + convenience). In the same period last year, bev-alc imports were growing 1.3%, to $11.05 billion.
Wholesalers purchased fewer cases and kegs in nearly every segment of the beer category in April, according to the most recent Beer Purchasers’ Index (BPI) from the National Beer Wholesalers Association (NBWA).
Anyone looking for an answer to when craft’s current era of compounding hurdles and declines will come to an end received a reality check Wednesday during Brewers Association (BA) president and CEO Bart Watson’s state of the industry address, held at the start of Day 2 of the Craft Brewers Conference (CBC) in Indianapolis.
Margaritas will be the order of the day on Cinco de Mayo, according to a new study from consumer insights firm Numerator. More than three-quarters (78%) of respondents who plan to purchase alcohol for the holiday told Numerator they will be drinking margaritas, followed by beer (51%).
