Distribution

San Francisco’s Fort Point Beer Company has signed with eight wholesalers in California, expanding the craft brewery’s distribution footprint statewide. “For six years, Fort Point has pretty much been sold in nine counties around the Bay Area with a couple of things being sold here and there outside of that,” Fort Point co-founder and CEO Justin Catalana told Brewbound. “But we just flipped the switch to sell through the rest of California.”

The Reyes Beverage Group, the largest beer wholesaler in the U.S., announced today its third California wholesaler acquisition of the year, with the planned purchase of W.A. Thompson. The acquisition of Bakersfield-based W.A. Thompson will add 7.1 million case equivalents and 2,500 accounts to Reyes subsidiary Harbor Distributing, according to a press release. The deal is expected to close in early December.

Although the pace of dealmaking among breweries has slowed in recent years, consolidation in the middle tier continues, as wholesalers in New York and Colorado recently struck deals. In New York, Buffalo-based Certo Brothers Distributing has sold to Wright Beverage, and in Colorado, RMC Distributing announced Friday that it had sold to KEG 1.

California’s beer distribution system is being shaken up once again. Anheuser-Busch InBev announced Friday evening the planned acquisition of “key assets” from Markstein Beverage Co. in San Marcos, California. The company will add those assets to its existing wholly owned distributor, Anheuser-Busch Sales of San Diego.

Eighteen days after Texas’ new beer-to-go law went into effect, manufacturing brewers are reporting high levels of consumer enthusiasm for the opportunity to buy and take home packaged beers from taprooms.

Dogfish Head Craft Brewery is just five states away from completing national distribution. The Milton, Delaware-based craft brewery, which merged with Boston Beer Company earlier this year, announced Monday the addition of its 45th state — Mississippi — via Capital City Beverages.

In a deal that will make it the largest wholesaler of Anheuser-Busch products in Massachusetts, Quality Beverage announced today an agreement to acquire Williams Distributing. Financial terms of the asset purchase, pending supplier approval, were not disclosed. The transaction is expected to close in October. Speaking to Brewbound, Quality Beverage president and CEO Conrad Wetterau said the company will add 2.8 million case equivalents (CEs) in the transaction from Williams Distributing.

In this week’s Last Call: Breakside Brewing Implements Employee Stock Ownership Plan; The Brewers Association Shares Brewery Employee Diversity Data; Guns N’ Roses and CANarchy Settle Lawsuit; Anheuser-Busch Rolls Out Bud Light College Branded Packaging.

In the competition for active lifestyle consumers, MillerCoors believes its found an answer to Anheuser-Busch’s popular Michelob Ultra brand. The United States’ second-largest beer company announced today plans to begin nationally distributing Saint Archer Gold — its 95-calorie, 2.6 carb light lager — beginning January 1, 2020.

In this week’s edition of Last Call: Pyramid owner FIFCO USA settles a lawsuit with its Alehouse staff; Manhattan Beer Distributors and its delivery drivers battle over alleged ‘wage theft;’ Left Hand enters the CBD-infused, non-alcoholic drink market; New Delhi bans A-B InBev for three years; and more news bites.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court last week overturned a lower court ruling that would have allowed retailers to offer discounts on alcoholic beverages purchased in bulk. The order comes two years after Maryland’s Total Wine & More (doing business as Massachusetts Fine Wines & Spirits LLC) successfully challenged the law.

The nearly decade-long debate over Massachusetts’ controversial franchise laws resumed Monday, as the state’s craft brewers and beer wholesalers packed a meeting of the Joint Committee on Consumer Protection and Professional Licensure. Brewers and wholesalers remain divided on how to reform strict franchise laws, which brewers claim lock their businesses into nearly unbreakable relationships with wholesalers. Each side presented revised proposals, which they argued would benefit each other.

In this week’s Last Call: Budweiser becomes the ‘official beer’ of the National Women’s Soccer League; California revises the definition of ‘beer’; A-B back away from its Asia Pacific IPO; Founders Announces the end of CBS; and more news.

The largest beer wholesaler in the U.S. has made another big acquisition in California. Reyes Holdings today announced that subsidiary Harbor Distributing LLC has reached an agreement to acquire DBI Beverage Inc.’s assets in Northern California. The news comes one week after Reyes sold its Reinhart Foodservice division to Performance Food Group Company for $2 billion.