according to this new NY Times piece, twentysomethings now get anxiety from leaving credit card tabs open, and yes, that sound you hear in the background is Gen X rolling our eyes at you big time. Instead, a lotta kids today pay with their credit cards and close out every time they go up to the bar to order a … HIGH NOON, even if they’re drinking several during a bar visit. What’s that? Cash? Yeah, not so much, boomer.
So, June is the month beer sales turn around … right? Asking for a friend. But hey – maybe the beer biz just needs an energy boost to change its fortunes! Thankfully A-B has ya covered with its new drink line called PHORM ENERGY, created in partnership with UFC CEO Dana White.
🍻 A Round With Meli Founder Samara Oster; 😮 RNDC Rocked By Brown-Forman Exit; 🤝 Two Roads, Yards & Bald Birds Partner; 📰 CBC 2026 and a Michigan Distro Deal; 🗣️ Almanac CEO: ‘I Hate the Word Taproom’; 🌵 Beer Mail: AriZona Hard with Vodka
We may still have a week to go until Memorial Day weekend … but you know we’re getting close when you begin to smell the #bigbeer BBQ promotions rolling out!
If you’re reading this newsletter on the day it comes out (please tell me I’m not the only reader 🤞), there’s still time to get mom a thoughtful present for tomorrow! Otherwise, uh, you’ll have to roll the dice on finding one of these MILLER LITE “gold” cans, which were only made in 24 oz. cans for c-stores, and as part of the oh-so-popular 16 oz. can 12-pack format, so hopefully mom loves her tallboys.
Remember the days when the biggest gripes around tax and trade matters was that the TTB wasn’t approving new beer labels quick enough? Well, at least #TrumpTariffs are not holding Ryan Reynolds back – he’s now looking to dominate the boxed wine business (gin, it’s been real) and teaming up with the GALLO folks to create an Ugly Estates wine line, whose initial rollout will be in Texas.
Well, I hope your 1,461 pack of MOOSEHEAD beer arrived in time. Welcome to … “The Tariff Era” – a far less beloved (and self-induced) economic period than the “0% Interest Era” of yore. The 2010s really were Camelot.
In Wednesday’s Brewbound Newsletter: 🍀 St. Patrick’s Day Off-Premise Dollars -3.9% YoY; 💰 Oregon Proposes 8% Sales Tax for Beer & Wine; 🏟️ Allagash Joins the Mets and Tilray’s Stock Issues; 🌎 The No. 1 Centennial Hop Buyer; 🍊 Sierra Nevada Revamps Big Little Thing IPA.
Let’s of course start with a happy March Madness 🏀 to you all, with lo and behold – some nice support for the beer biz so far! B-DUBS is of course out in full force (even though the weird big buffalo at the bar ads still don’t do it for me), and COORS LIGHT, MODELO, CORONA, MICH ULTRA and STELLA have been spending as well already. 👏
Well, with the president jacking the tariffs on Canadian aluminum – what better way to kick off the St. Patrick’s Day weekend newsletter than with a pint of GUINNESS in a nice #DraftClean 20 oz. glass! Besides, it’s probably best to get that pint in now before any 200% EU alcohol taxes start making that pint $14.
Ya gotta love when the CPG industry listens to the demands of the people, and finally cuts out the middleman to make all of our lives that much easier and more fulfilling. Yes, Zoe’s darty crowd will no longer have to mix their CRYSTAL LIGHT and vodka themselves, as the KRAFT HEINZ people have indeed read all of your letters (Zoe, please tell Donny to cool it on the postcards), and finally giving us 3.8% ABV Crystal Light Vodka Refreshers!
📉 January 2025 Shipments -8.7% YoY; 🫧 Jiant Wants to be Hard Tea’s Olipop; 🌑 Blue Moon Denver Brewpub to Close; 🍹 A Round With Austin Cocktails Founders; 📰 WellBeing Deal; Saugatuck Closures;🥉 Circana: 3 of 10 Segments Post Growth; 🚫 ‘You Can’t Fucking Make Beer Legally in DE’; 🖐️ Constellation’s Rule of Five Hard Punch
With the aluminum & steel tariff situation due to the new Trump administration, it looks like it may be time for the beer biz to get creative. Well, at least with packaging – gonna make the leap and say the brewing equipment market may have plenty of existing options.
Tilray Ceases Large-Scale Production at Revolver; Boston Beer Boosts Executive Pay +3%-8%; DISCUS: 2024 Spirit Sales Flat; People Moves at the BA and Mass Brewers Guild; Circana: Bev-Alc in Red Ahead of Super Bowl; ‘We’re Confusing the Hell Out of Shoppers.’
