Does it seem to anyone else like the craft beer thing has peaked already and is maybe on a slight decline? Richmond has seen several craft breweries close, and hardly any new ones have opened. I feel like the problem continues to be the distributors, who favor the bigger players like Devil’s Backbone (owned by Anheiser-Busch) and the various breweries owned by Boston Beer Company. Smaller operations are left to struggle to do their own distributing or rely solely on sales at their taphouse locations. I think there was a bill in the VA legislature not long ago that would’ve cleared away regulator hurdles for the smaller operations, but that bill didn’t go anywhere.
Bubble started popping ~ 5 years ago on the West Coast. As is practice for any industry, one large corps see there is a buck to be made, the throw ungodly amounts of money to acquire, co-opt, or duplicate the value. This diminishes established players and as a broader consumer market emerges that can’t tell the authentic from the megacorp mimics, the smaller orgs of course start to feel the pinch first, and can weather the change for less time. Then the megacorps of course offer to buy them at a discount, there is massive consolidation, and then you have a few large players left.
Luckily craft beer can be small/local enough and be sustainable, but yeah, the 2010s of every brewery needing 8 different IPAs is over. If you don’t have a solid plan and are just hoping to underwear gnomes to profit?? you’re in trouble.
That’s the report from Portland anyway.
It’s a national trend. Basically the market got saturated with breweries, and the large corporations bought the biggest ones, so small breweries have well-funded direct competitors. Besides being able to afford huge facilities, get better prices on ingredients and build fancy taprooms, they also have better access to distribution, like you say.
Distribution is one of those businesses that’s heavily tied up by regulators, leading to oligopolies and corruption. I was living in Colorado and there were a ton of local beers and ciders I enjoyed, as well as the same from Oregon. Then I moved to a neighboring state and I they don’t carry anything at all from Colorado or Oregon… only local products, which is cool, and major brands. There’s apparently a hot beer scene here but I can’t actually drink regular beer due to Celiac disease. There’s a bunch of GF beer in other states but none made here and the only one I can get is from Belgium. I asked at a liquor store and they said basically there’s one distributor they can deal with, and if they don’t like the selection or want something different, oh well. By law they can’t buy it anywhere else.
Distribution is one of those businesses that’s heavily tied up by regulators, leading to oligopolies and corruption.
Incorrect, corporate capture of regulators is what leads to oligarchies and corruption.
Yeah, so being highly tied up by regulators, it leads to corporate capture and oligarchies and corruption.
That would be lack of laws preventing corporate capture and the breakdown of internal regulations to prevent it. Are you implying that if there was no regulation it would be a different story?
No, I’m sure not. It’s not even clear that we mean the same thing by “regulation”. The market I’m speaking about is in a small state with a lot of “good ol’ boy” type deals and they’ve granted regional monopolies to certain companies. Lighter regulation to the tune of opening the market to competition would be quite beneficial for consumers, which is not even remotely the same thing as no regulation.
Well I’m glad to hear that you’re not intentionally calling for deregulation, but I think you are missing the potential downsides. “Opening” the market to competition will only invite even larger distributors, which would outcompete whatever local monopoly is currently there by driving down initial prices and inflate them later once it is again a monopoly. You’d be looking at the same issue again, now with less regulation. How would that be beneficial? Why wouldn’t, say, a regulation for requiring more options for those that have illnesses be a better option? Again, this seems like a corporate capture issue where the solution is to add a regulation requiring more than 1 distributor, or a rewriting of the regulations, not to just have less.
Also, I’m curious, I looked into gf beer and saw warnings about not being celiac safe still. Do you know how its differentiated?
Whatever system they could come up with that increased the variety in the state would be welcome. Prices aren’t bad but I’d like some other products in the aforementioned areas and the store managers I talked to felt the same way, but there’s no way for them to get them. I feel like if there’s going to be regional monopolies we might as well let the state operate the distribution like in some eastern US states.
Yes, there are two kinds of beer in that regard. Some companies make something called “gluten removed” or reduced which is not safe for people with celiac. It means they brewed the beer using regular grains (barley, wheat etc) used a clarification enzyme in large amounts to break down the gluten. This it leaves fragments of gluten protein that may or may not be immunogenic. We’re trying to avoid .002% gluten, also. Technically these beers should not be called “gluten free” but some people make that error.
Actual gluten free beer is made from non-gluten grains and, like gluten free bread, is safe for people with celiac as long as the grains aren’t accidentally contaminated with wheat/barley/rye. Common grains are millet, buckwheat and rice. Examples of breweries that make GF beer are Holidaily, Evasion, Glutenberg, Ground Breaker and Ghostfish.
I totally understand your frustration with lack of celiac support. I work in the bread industry and so many just turn their nose up at even the idea of gluten free bread; they can’t imagine even caring about people who suffer from celiac and it disgusts me. Obviously you’re well aware of the problems that have arisen since the gluten-free fad, but I just want to say I’m sorry that its made it even worse for yall. I watched it happen with bread, people trying to skirt regulations to have “gluten-free bread,” which I can say for certain didn’t meet standards.
Have you considered homebrew? It’s a weekend project these days (and another later on), but that isnt to say its not an undertaking. I met a guy at a party that has celiac and they brew their own after an incident (it was right around the GF fad but the details weren’t well relayed).
I’m going to throw an alternative that it’s generational trends driving this.
Craft beer was originally a very millennial-centric taste and we’re all getting to an age where we can’t or don’t want to drink as much. Gen Z simply doesn’t drink at all, or when they do it seems to be a preference to hard seltzer.
That’s how I see it at least.
I’m unfamiliar with the challenges with VA law that breweries have to contend with, but I’ve noticed that some breweries really overextended themselves a bit too quickly.
Badwolf in Manassas comes into mind – they tried to expand beyond their original strip-mall location to a warehouse and partner with a restaurant but encountered growth issues then had to sell off their operation.
Why drink beer? It doesn’t taste that great, and hard alcohol is cheaper and doesn’t contain a shit ton of carbs.
I’ve enjoyed tons of craft beer, a lot of it tastes pretty damn good to me. Hard stuff just tastes like battery acid.
wHy DriNK bEeR?
Because quality beer tastes great. And it doesn’t burn going down like liquor. Carbs don’t matter, but the sugar you need to make the liquor that’s cheaper than beer palatable does. If you don’t wanna drink beer then fine, but let the rest of us have our fun.
