Lucid Brewing of Minnetonka, Minn. has acquired American Sky Brewing of Hudson, Wis. in the latest deal involving two small craft breweries. Terms of the buyout were not disclosed.

Seven years ago, Michael Kiser became obsessed with beer. As a brand strategist who led large-scale innovation platforms for companies like Nike, Hewlett-Packard and Samsung, Kiser was incredibly drawn to how upstart craft brewers were presenting themselves when he first encountered their products.

Northwest hop acreage increased 16 percent in 2015, as nearly 44,000 acres have been strung for harvest across Washington, Oregon, and Idaho, according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). Broken down by state, Washington strung 32,205 acres for harvest this year, accounting for 73 percent of total hops acreage across the United States.

Just in time for Father’s Day, Illinois-based Small Town Brewery today announced the nationwide rollout of its signature Not Your Father’s Root Beer line of soda-inspired beers. In a press statement, the company said it signed a distribution agreement with Pabst Brewing Company, which began selling the product earlier this year. Specific terms of the arrangement were not disclosed and representatives from both Pabst and Small Town Brewery were unavailable for comment.

It’s Throwback Thursday and we’re tossing it all the way back to last week, when we hosted nearly 200 beer industry professionals for a jam-packed day of learning and networking at Brewbound Session Chicago. Held on June 11 at the Moonlight Studios in Chicago, the 2015 Brewbound Session highlighted the growing challenges of scaling a brand in today’s ultra-competitive craft landscape.

Bookending Brewbound Session Chicago last week, the high end portfolio chiefs from both Anheuser-Busch InBev and MillerCoors were on hand to discuss their view of the craft space and their respective approaches to acquisition.

Alcoholic beverage suppliers don’t have to reinvent the wheel to provide top tier national account and category development services. On the contrary, emphasizing the fundamentals should be enough to land a supplier in the good graces of their on-premise partners. That’s the takeaway from the latest CM Profit Group survey, in which nearly 70 operators of 150 bars and restaurants responded.

Drizly isn’t here to disrupt the three-tier system. Rather, as Cory Rellas, the COO of the booze-to-your door delivery app tells it, the company operates in the name of “accelerating the status quo.”

Idle Hands Craft Ales, a small Boston-area microbrewery that got its start on a 1 ½ barrel nano-brewing system in 2011, today announced it has been forced to vacate its facility in Everett, MA. Idle Hands’ current space sits just blocks from the proposed site of a new $1.3 billion Wynn Everett resort and casino. In order to make room for a construction access road, Idle Hands and a handful of small businesses must be out by June 30.

The empire has sprung a leak. That was the first message First Beverage Group managing partner Townsend Ziebold had for a crowd of nearly 200 beer industry professionals at last week’s Brewbound Session business conference in Chicago. But the familiar narrative of a rapidly evolving beer landscape and the image of the “leaky bucket” served… Read more »

With an expansion to its North Carolina brewing facility underway, Oskar Blues is continuing to grow its footprint throughout the eastern half of the U.S. The company, which just last week revealed plans to increase production capacity at its Brevard outpost, has announced plans to add distribution in West Virginia and Arkansas.

Scottish craft beer company BrewDog has unveiled plans to establish a U.S. beachhead, last week announcing that Columbus, Ohio, will become the company’s stateside brewing headquarters. On its blog, BrewDog wrote that it has “provisionally agreed” to acquire 42 acres of land in Columbus and said it intends to build a 100,000 sq. ft. brewery complete with a 100-barrel brewhouse, canning machine and bottling line to serve markets across the U.S.

After years of debate over how to best reduce the federal excise tax rate on brewers, two of the beer industry’s leading organizations — the Brewers Association and the Beer Institute — have finally come together in support of a single bill. At a press conference hosted at Hopworks Urban Brewery in Portland, Ore. on Friday, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) addressed industry and media members and unveiled the Craft Beverage Modernization and Tax Reform Act, a comprehensive tax reform bill aimed at modernizing “outdated regulations” imposed on craft brewers and other alcoholic beverage manufacturers.

We’re less than 24 hours away from Brewbound Session Summer ’15, being held on June 11 at Moonlight Studios in Chicago, and we’ve still got a few program notes to announce.