While Colorado remains one the largest and most developed craft beer markets, its breweries have struggled to bring back their draft beer business post-pandemic. Many breweries, wholesalers and retailers alike have focused their attention on combating off-premise declines, but “as a beer community, we’ve got to fight for draft,” Holidaily Brewing founder Karen Hertz said on stage in Denver last month during Brewbound’s Brew Talks meetup.
Nationwide, sales of distributed draft beer have stalled at the same levels reached in 2021, as the on-premise reopened following COVID-19 pandemic-driven closures.
How do you innovate at scale beyond the IPA juggernaut? With the various IPA sub-styles accounting for nearly half of off-premise craft beer sales, leaders from Dogfish Head, Sierra Nevada, Atrevida Beer Co. and 3 Tier Beverages explore where the opportunities for growth are in other beer styles and how they’re building their product mix during a Brew Talks conversation in Denver. Plus, we break some news.
In this Brew Talks replay, Sam Calagione of Dogfish Head, Dan Kenary of Harpoon’s parent company Mass. Bay Brewing and Suzanne Schalow of Craft Beer Cellar share their views on the evolution of the beer category with the addition of fourth category offerings such as hard seltzers, spirits-based canned cocktails, hard kombuchas, hard teas and more.
Several Massachusetts craft breweries have added own-premise taprooms and retail spaces to grow their brands. White Lion founder Ray Berry, Castle Island founder Adam Romanow, Medusa Brewing director of business operations Sarah Lee and Boston Beer Company senior director of local brands and taprooms Scott Hempstead shared their experiences during Brewbound’s Brew Talks meetup.
Cryptocurrency and NFTs (non-fungible tokens) are slowly seeping into beer culture. Two early adopters of the Web 3.0 tech — Kurtis Cummings, founder and CEO of Switchyard Brewing in Indianapolis, and Daniel Paul Wellendorf, co-owner and head of marketing of Modist Brewing in Minneapolis — shared their experiences during Brewbound’s Brew Talks meetup in Minneapolis last week during the Craft Brewers Conference.
Leaders from Boston Beer Company and Target discussed their companies’ efforts to welcome more upstart brands into the beverage-alcohol industry during Brewbound’s first Brew Talks meetup of 2022 last week in Minneapolis during the week of the Craft Brewers Conference.
Leaders of Chicago-based Moor’s Brewing Company explained how their participation in a residency program for Black-owned breweries helped grow their fledgling business during the first Brew Talks meetup of 2022 last week in Minneapolis during the week of the Craft Brewers Conference.
Gen Z consumers care less about who you are, and more about what you do. And any form of inauthenticity or surface-level activism will be called out immediately, the second round of Brew Talks panelists agreed.
Craft beer doesn’t need a complete reset in strategy, but rather a re-focus on what consumers care about to stay relevant, the panelists of Brewbound’s first in-person Brew Talks meet-up of 2021 said earlier this month.
Brew Talks video replay is now available. Beyond beer offerings continue to be the growth driver within the beer category. Boston Beer’s Dave Burwick, Lone River Beverage Company’s Katie Beal Brown and Manhattan Beer’s Ed McBrien discuss the opportunities within the so-called “fourth category” of offerings.
Video replay is now available for the first Brew Talks event of 2021. A year into the pandemic, beer industry leaders discuss the pathway to recovery. Panelists include Dogfish Head’s Sam Calagione, BevMo’s Amy Gutierrez, the Winking Lizard Tavern’s John Lane and the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Julie Verratti.
Today we pause and take the opportunity to talk about the impacts of COVID-19. Presented by Dogfish Head, Brew Talks Virtual is live today, April 2nd from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. ET. Learn how fellow small breweries, retailers and industry leaders are working through the crisis and have the opportunity to ask your own… Read more »
Brewbound, a leading trade publication covering the beer business and beyond, is hosting another round of Brew Talks industry meetups in 2020. The event series designed for beer industry professionals travels to San Antonio, Texas; Denver, Colorado; and Orlando, Florida, this year.
