Beer wholesalers in Idaho are asking the state’s Alcohol Beverage Control Bureau to clarify a law enabling small brewers to operate as both producers and retailers with multiple locations. As written, Idaho law permits breweries that produce fewer than 30,000 barrels per year to manage retail fronts and brewpubs.
With an expansion into nine new states, the Craft Brew Alliance-owned Kona Brewing brand will be sold nationwide in early 2015. In a press statement, the company said it plans to enter Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Oklahoma and West Virginia next January.
Ninkasi Brewing has expanded distribution throughout Colorado, tapping C.R. Goodman Companies for statewide coverage. The brewery, headquartered in Eugene, Ore., will launch in the market today with offerings including Total Domination IPA, Believer Double Red, and Oatis Oatmeal Stout.
Founders Brewing has received an additional boost from the state of Michigan to help expand its production facility, this time in the form of a $250,000 performance-based grant. According to MiBiz.com, the Michigan Economic Development Corporation approved the grant last week to assist the brewery in its effort to build out a $40.4 million expansion.
We’re less than 24 hours away from a sold out winter edition of the Brewbound Session, being held on Dec. 4 at the Paradise Point Resort & Spa in San Diego, and we’ve still got some final program notes to announce. Grab a beer – this one is jam-packed with updates.
Craft Brew Alliance today announced it has signed a letter of intent to form a strategic partnership with Appalachian Mountain Brewery, a publicly traded craft brewery based in Boone, North Carolina. Although specific terms of the deal were not disclosed, CBA told Brewbound the two companies will explore ways to “drive business growth and shareholder value through sharing resources in key strategic areas.”
Maui | Stone Craft Beverages, the Hawaiian distribution arm jointly owned by Stone Brewing and Maui Brewing, has built out its portfolio and is now selling 21 craft brands throughout the island of Maui, the company announced today. The company, which launched in February, sells a curated lineup of beers and ciders from California, Hawaii, Colorado and Oregon, refrigerated “through every link of the distribution chain.”
Acclaimed San Diego brewer Tomme Arthur is launching yet another brand of unique craft beers. Already lauded for his popular Port Brewing and Lost Abbey offerings, Arthur and his team plan to launch a third distinct line products in 2015 under the ‘Hop Concept Brewing’ moniker.
What sets J.J. Taylor Distributing apart from other wholesalers is what president and general manager Jay Martin calls “the three P’s.” “It’s our people, it’s our portfolio, and it’s our planning process,” he says, while conceding “I guess you could say some of that sounds cliché-ish.” Perhaps, but it’s helping the Florida distributor move beer in a growing, albeit underdeveloped market.
Brewbound is pleased to invite all Brewbound Session attendees to the official Brewbound Session welcome reception on Wednesday Dec. 3, the evening before Brewbound’s bi-annual business conference at the Paradise Point Resort & Spa in San Diego. Sponsored by Davis Wright Tremaine LLP and Moss Adams LLP, this year’s welcome reception will be hosted at Modern Times Beer, located at 3725 Greenwood St., San Diego, Calif.
Perhaps the most startling fact from the Wall Street Journal’s recent report on the state of Budweiser is that, by Anheuser-Busch InBev’s own admission, nearly half — 44 percent — of 21- to 27-year-old drinkers have never even tried the beer. To bring young drinkers back to the brand, A-B InBev, the article adds, plans to trot out some “distinctly un-Budlike” marketing in the next year to appeal to the highly sought after millennial demographic.
A U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) ruling that requires chain establishments with more than 20 locations to list caloric information on their menus may have left a significant gray area for craft beer. The new ruling, announced Tuesday, affects both on-and-off-premise establishments, including chain restaurants, movie theaters, vending machines as well as grocery and convenience stores serving prepared foods.
Somehow, amidst all of the growth and excitement in cider, the category’s second-largest producer, Woodchuck, is suffering. Sales are in a downward spiral. In the six-month period ending Aug. 31, parent company C&C Group’s U.S. volumes fell 21 percent. Operating profit is down almost 90 percent and production of Woodchuck has declined 29 percent.
The state of Virginia and Loudoun County are together awarding $80,000 in grants to aid an effort to build the Mid-Atlantic region’s first ever commercial-scale hops processing facility. Black Hops Farm LLC will itself invest $1 million to convert a 15-acre pasture in Leesburg into the state’s largest hops yard to operate in conjunction with the processing plant.
