Following months of turmoil, Green Flash Brewing Company has identified its next chief executive. The San Diego-based craft brewery, which was sold to a new investor group last month, today named former Anheuser-Busch executive Michael Taylor as its new CEO.
Yazoo Brewing Company plans to break ground in mid-June on its new, six acre, 30,000 sq. ft. destination brewery in the Madison neighborhood of northeast Nashville. In a conversation with Brewbound last month, Yazoo founder Linus Hall said he is targeting a spring 2019 opening for the new facility. He added that a development group is under contract to purchase the land where Yazoo’s current facility, in Nashville’s The Gulch neighborhood, is located.
In this edition of People Moves: Avery Brewing’s COO resigns, and the Boulder, Colorado-based craft brewery lays off six workers; Wormtown Brewery names a new general sales manager; Heineken USA forms an new sales operations team; and more industry personnel moves.
Less than one year after Coronado Brewing acquired a majority stake in nearby Monkey Paw Brewing, the San Diego-based regional craft beer producer today put the smaller outfit up for sale. The decision to sell its interest in the business comes about one month after Monkey Paw founder Scot Blair — an outspoken figure in the San Diego craft beer scene who also owns the popular Hamilton’s Tavern and South Park Brewing Company ventures — filed a lawsuit against Monkey Paw for breach of contract.
Taprooms and direct-to-consumer sales were hot topics during this year’s Craft Brewers Convention in Nashville, Tennessee. Two seminars — “Building Your Brand Through the Tasting Room” and “Defense and Promotion of Tasting Rooms” — focused on the phenomenon that has agitated some retailers and wholesalers, but the topic bled into other conversations throughout the week.
For the second consecutive year, production at half of the craft beer industry’s top 50 companies didn’t grow, according to new data released by trade group the Brewers Association. The organization, which published 2017 production figures for thousands of U.S. breweries in the latest issue of ‘The New Brewer,’ noted that 24 of the top 50 BA-defined regional craft brewing companies — those producing between 15,000 and six million barrels of beer annually — either declined or remained flat in 2017.
After about six months as CEO, David Pillsbury is leaving Canarchy Craft Brewery Collective — Oskar Blues’ and Fireman Capital Partners’ consortium of beer companies formed following investments in Cigar City Brewing, Perrin Brewing and Utah Brewers Cooperative — according to a press release.
Earlier this month, nearly 14,000 beer industry professionals traveled to Nashville, Tennessee, for the annual Craft Brewers Conference, hosted by trade group the Brewers Association. The BA used the gathering to further draw a line between the companies it represents — small and independent U.S. breweries — and those brands owned by larger, international beer conglomerates.
During its annual staff summit earlier this week, Great Lakes Brewing Co. owners Pat and Dan Conway announced that the company would be starting an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP), giving workers a minority stake in the company.
In the latest Legislative Update: Vermont approves franchise law reform; Kansas legalizes contract brewing; Colorado sets guidelines for full-strength beer sales in grocery and convenience stores; and more news from the states.
Jim Sabia, chief marketing officer of Constellation Brands’ beer division, has been promoted to a newly created role of executive vice president and CMO of the New York-based alcohol company. In a press release, Constellation Brands said Sabia, who joined the organization in 2007 as the vice president of the spirits division, would oversee all aspects of marketing across the company’s beer, wine, and liquor portfolios.
Nearly two years after the Department of Justice (DOJ) signed off on Anheuser-Busch InBev’s (ABI) $100 billion takeover of SABMiller, the government agency still has not completed its review of the merger. The DOJ and ABI filed a joint motion on March 15 asking U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan to approve the “proposed final judgment.” However, several groups have objected to the judgment, as it is currently written, and are now seeking a hearing in order to resolve anti-competitive concerns.
Earlier this month, Brewers Association CEO Bob Pease took the stage at the 2018 Craft Brewers Conference (CBC) in Nashville, Tennessee, and extolled the benefits of direct-to-consumer sales. Calling breweries with the ability to sell beer across the bar or to-go “ground zero for bringing new drinkers into the category,” Pease made his case for the continued expansion of the beer category via own-premise sales.
In a move that underscores just how quickly the craft beer segment has evolved, Shmaltz Brewing Company today announced plans to vacate an upstate New York brewing facility that it built just five years ago. The company — which launched in 1996 as a contract-brewed, Jewish-themed craft brand – has sold its brewery equipment assets to Queens-based Singlecut Beersmiths for an undisclosed sum.
