Brookston Beer Bulletin

Jay R. Brooks on Beer

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Some Beery Trends

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trends
Over the weekend, I got the latest newsletter from Michael Kuderka of the DBBB, the book of Domestic Brewers and their Bottled Brands, published by MC Bassett. One highlight was some interesting trends from recent IRI data.

If you’re not familiar with IRI data, it’s one of the two major data reporters, along with Nielsen, of sales trends along a variety of products. IRI is short for Information Resources, Inc., though the company is now known as the Symphony IRI Group. IRI data only covers certain kinds of retailers that sell beer, primarily grocery stores and convenience stores, and usually only chains at that. So it’s of limited use, but because the sales data is collected from consistent sources, it is fairly reliable and can show trends. I used to see it all the time, when I was a beer buyer, because most package brewers subscribe to one or the other service and usually bring carefully mined data to show their own positive trends. Anyway, here’s the interesting bits.

Fat Tire, from New Belgium, apparently “made more gains than any other brand when considering both year-over-year case sales and total dollars,” with case sales up 26% and total dollars just under $50 million. What that doesn’t take into account, of course, is that New Belgium opened several new states and a good portion of that bump may have been from being in new markets that weren’t in the data last year. But that does catapult them into the number 3 spot, making the top three best-selling craft beers as follows:

  1. Samuel Adams Boston Lager
  2. Sierra Nevada Pale Ale
  3. New Belgium Fat Tire

And here’s some additional trends and brands to watch, at least according to IRI:

  • IPAs: Trending up 29%!
  • Sierra Nevada seasonals: Up 23%
  • Magic Hat #9: Up 22%
  • Alaskan Brewing seasonals: Up 21%
  • Amber Ale & Pale Ale also trending up

Lovin’ The Ladies: Beer Ads

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women
My wife pointed this one out to me, and it’s pretty funny despite highlighting some fairly ugly trends in beer advertising by the big breweries and imports towards women. From the Current TV show InfoMania, the clip is introduced as follows:

Everybody loves beer — men, women, children with fake IDs. But beer companies don’t want one of these groups to enjoy their beer: women. Modern Lady Erin Gibson is on the case of how beer companies like Miller, Budweiser, and Heineken have gone from depicting women in commercials as eye candy hanging out with Spuds MacKenzie to the target of aggression and humiliation.

Beers & Queers

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rainbow
Drawing on the USA Today article Dry America’s Not-So-Sober Reality: It’s Shrinking Fast, Wayne Besen, the founder of Truth Wins Out, a non-profit organization that debunks anti-gay lies and myths, has an intriguing piece on the Huffington Post comparing anti-gay activist tactics to those of neo-prohibitionists. It’s called Beers and Queers, and is worth reading, regardless of how you feel about either issue.

Brewery Openings Surge

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The Brewers Association had an interesting little item yesterday, A New Brewery Nearly Every Day, in which they detailed the recent numbers of new brewery openings. It’s a pretty remarkable jump.

  • Last Year: 110 confirmed openings
  • So Far This Year: 155 confirmed openings
  • Total U.S. Breweries Now: 1,625

If that pace continues, we’d see roughly 250 open this year, which is more than in any other year I can recall. From the work of brewery detective Erin Glass, most of these are not nanobreweries, either — not that there’s anything wrong with nanobreweries or even picobreweries.

This is made even more impressive given the state of our economy. I’d be curious to know where the financing for these new businesses is coming from, whether traditional small business loans or from more creative sources.

Here’s where that leaves us:

Where does that put us for brewery counts? We believe there were 1,625 U.S. breweries as of the June 30 count. While the brewpub roster is climbing a little, up to 993, as we see some closings to offset the growth somewhat, the number of microbreweries is at 520 now.

Will it continue for the rest of the year? Here’s a stat. One year ago we had 260 projects on our breweries-in-planning list. Today we have 389.

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Small Businesses Ask For Alcohol Fee Postponement

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If you’ve been following the Marin Institute’s efforts to have San Francisco enact an alcohol fee, then you know that there was a Small Business Commission hearing last night at City Hall. Item 5 on the agenda:

Discussion and possible action to make recommendations to the Small Business Commission on Board of Supervisors File No. 100865 [Establishing an Alcohol Mitigation Fee.] Ordinance amending the San Francisco Administrative Code, Chapter 106, by adding Sections 106 through 106.28, to impose a fee on alcoholic beverage wholesalers and certain other persons who distribute or sell alcoholic beverages in San Francisco to: 1) recover a portion of San Francisco’s alcohol-attributable unreimbursed health costs, and; 2) fund administration costs. Presentation by representatives of the Marin Institute. Explanatory Documents: BOS File No. 100865 and report titled, “The Cost of Alcohol to San Francisco: Analyses Supporting an Alcohol Mitigation Fee.”

Yesterday, the Marin Institute also issued a press release, ‘Charge for Harm’ Alcohol Mitigation Fee Deserves San Francisco Small Business Support, in which they demonstrated how out of touch with reality they are by suggesting small businesses must support higher taxes, higher prices and the very real possibility of a loss of revenue. In case you missed it, I also wrote about that yesterday, too. Presumably, the Marin Institute thought last night’s meeting was a mere formality, but San Francisco business owners were a lot smarter than the Marin Institute gave them credit for.

The result of the hearing was that the Small Business Commission strongly asked supervisor John Avalos (sponsor of the alcohol fee ordinance) to delay a vote on the AMFO until after the August break, which is after Labor Day. Avalos has agreed and so we’ll all have more time to build our case against the AMFO and the faulty nexus study that does not support it. It will also afford an opportunity to spread the other side of the story and correct the propaganda, since so far most of the mainstream media coverage has been very one-sided, giving most people a false impression of the AMFO and its impact.

While it’s far from over, this is a great first round victory for the forces of reason and common sense. It will interesting to see how the Marin Institute spins this. Drink a toast tonight, perhaps in San Francisco or at least with a beer brewed in San Francisco.

Marin Institute Declares Small Businesses Deserve To Go Out Of Business

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marin-institute
In a press release issued today, the Marin Institute — who’s pushing a mandatory alcohol fee in San Francisco — stated that their bogus ‘Charge for Harm’ Alcohol Mitigation Fee Deserves San Francisco Small Business Support. Yes, by all means, every business should support more taxes and higher prices, that’s just good business.

A hearing is scheduled for this afternoon at 5:30 by the Small Business Commission and will take place at San Francisco City Hall. If you own or run a small business that involves alcohol, be sure to tell them what you think you deserve. Do you deserve to pay more taxes, even though roughly 46% of the price of every beer goes to taxes, which makes it the most heavily taxed product in America? Do you deserve to have higher prices than the rest of the state? Do you deserve to make less money? Do you deserve to have fewer customers? Do you deserve to lay off good employees?

Here’s another brilliant piece of logic from the press release:

The proposed ordinance is supported by a “nexus study” commissioned by the San Francisco City Comptroller’s Office. The study found $17.7 million in direct city and county unreimbursed expenses for alcohol-related problems addressed by community behavioral health services, fire department emergency medical transport, San Francisco General Hospital, and the Sheriff’s department.

Bullshit. The nexus study is titled The Cost of Alcohol to San Francisco: Analyses Supporting an Alcohol Mitigation Fee. It’s whole purpose is to present only one side of the story, ignoring anything and everything that might oppose it or show it for the farce it is. It didn’t “find” anything, it just totaled up some questionable expenses and claimed they were due to alcohol. You can read more detail about the truth of nexus study here.

More tortured logic:

“All San Francisco residents and small businesses unfairly bear the burden of government costs for alcohol-related problems,” said Michele Simon, JD, MPH, research and policy director for the alcohol industry watchdog, Marin Institute. “This relatively small fee will ensure alcohol wholesalers and importers — not bars, restaurants, or retailers — will pay their fair share to mitigate the tremendous economic costs of alcohol harm in San Francisco.”

If, and that’s a big if, “All San Francisco residents and small businesses” share these costs supposedly, but not proven to be, attributable to alcohol, then why shouldn’t all residents and businesses pay for them, equally, like all other taxes? Why single out out alcohol manufacturers, wholesalers, retailers, bars, hotels and the people who drink alcohol. Because the fee as it’s been proposed targets alcohol, and by extension the people who drink it. But the vast majority of people who legally drink alcohol do so responsibly and in moderation, and do not burden the city’s resources.

And it’s not a “relatively small fee” because they conveniently keep ignoring the fact that it will be marked up before being passed on to consumers.

And here’s how much they care about the small businesses they think deserve to support the fee:

The alcohol mitigation fee will not be allowed to exceed the costs as outlined in the nexus study, and will be imposed primarily on regional wholesalers and the portion of local brews consumed locally. Most beer is produced by foreign corporations who could easily bear some of the fee.

“[P]rimarily on regional wholesalers?” First of all, what about the distributors in San Francisco? I guess they don’t count. And the regional wholesalers, those are California businesses that would be targeted if they plan to do business in the city — which many of them do — and are located just outside the city in the Bay Area. And going after the foreign beer corporations — forgetting for a moment that they employ tens of thousands of American workers — ignores completely the more than 225 small family-owned breweries in California (eight of which are in San Francisco), along with the hundreds of small wineries and micro-distilleries.

And lastly, this:

“Small business in San Francisco should not let Big Alcohol scare them into opposition,” said Bruce Lee Livingston, executive director of Marin Institute. “We ask small businesses to be supportive, as the policy will charge alcohol wholesalers for harm instead of taxpayers and all taxpaying small businesses.” Livingston added, “We’ve all been paying for the emergency, detox and treatment costs of alcohol, but this smart fee shifts the costs to the Big Beer corporations and their wholesalers.”

Please, what planet does Livingston live on? How could he not realize that the fee will be passed along to “taxpayers and all taxpaying small businesses?” They will be paying. We all will be. He can’t possibly think otherwise, can he? He wants businesses to support their own demise? Because even businesses that don’t sell alcohol, but that benefit from it, will also be harmed by a loss of business in San Francisco. This stupid fee doesn’t shift any burdens whatsoever, though I suspect the Marin Institute knows that.

The Prodigal Fal Returns To Anderson Valley

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anderson-valley
Anderson Valley Brewing President Trey White announced today that Fal Allen would be returning to Boonville to become brewmaster again. Allen had been the brewmaster at Anderson valley for a number of years, but left four years ago to build a craft brewery in Singapore for Asia Pacific Breweries. His contract is about to end, and still having a home in Boonville undoubtedly made the decision easier, but I think it’s great news for both Fal and the Anderson Valley brewery. Allen’s expected to back at the Northern California brewery by Labor Day. Welcome back, Fal.

fal-al-5
Back when Fal was still with Anderson valley, launching Brother David at the Toronado in San Francisco. Clockwise from left: Fal, Mark Cabrera, David Gatlin, me and Dave Keene, the beer’s namesake and Toronado owner.

From the press release:

“Fal Allen is one of the top brew masters within the American craft beer industry” says Mr. White; “The beers created by Anderson Valley are amongst the premier craft beers available in the world. Fal’s superb craftsmanship combined with his environmentally conscientious approach fits perfectly with our strategy of maintaining and expanding Anderson Valley’s reputation as the maker of some of the world’s best craft beers.”

“As brew master, Fal will lead our efforts to provide delicious yet cutting-edge brews while simultaneously performing as a key brand ambassador for the Anderson Valley Brewery. In addition to his primary work in the brewery, Fal will work in the trade educating the public and our distributor partners on our products in particular and the benefits of craft beer in general.”

Fal has over twenty years of experience in the craft beer industry and is well regarded for his innovative and creative style. Fal has been published extensively on a wide array of craft brewing topics and serves frequently as a judge at the GABF and other top quality brewing competitions. Fal previously worked as head brewer and general manager from 2000 to 2004 at Anderson Valley Brewing during a significant growth phase for the brewery.

Fal Allen says: “I greatly enjoyed my previous work with the Anderson Valley Brewery. I love the brand and have tremendous respect for the brewing staff at Anderson Valley. I very much look forward to working with Trey White as I believe his vision for maintaining and enhancing the quality of Anderson Valley’s beers whilst expanding the brand’s marketing potential is truly exciting. I cannot wait to get back!”

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Fal in Singapore.

What (Pete) Brown Can Do For You

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Okay, I’m just having a bit of fun with UPS’ slogan and Pete Brown, UK beer writer. But today Pete has a nice overview of each of the big six beer companies that do business in the UK, entitled The Big Boys. It’s definitely worth a read. He talks primarily about their marketing efforts in the UK, but you get a sense of how he feels about the pros and cons of each company and the overall feeling that they’re not all the same.