Marketwatch recently had a fun little video from the Great British Beer Festival about “U.S. independent beer brewers outpac[ing] their U.K. cousins and gain[ing] market share.” Interviewed in the video are UK beer writer Pete brown and also Bob Pease, COO of the Brewers Association.
Craft Beer Numbers Up Again Mid-Year
Good news again this year for craft brewers. The Brewers Association has released the mid-year numbers and they’re positive again this year despite a rocky economy. Volume sales grew 9% over the same period last year and sales dollars are up 12% for the first six months of 2010 as compared to 2009. Last year those same stats were 5% and 9% respectively.
From the press release:
Craft breweries continue to grow despite many challenges, and currently provide an estimated 100,000 jobs and contribute significantly to the U.S. economy. Barrels sold by craft brewers for the first half of the year are an estimated 4.6 million, compared to 4.2 million barrels sold in the first half of 2009.
“While craft brewer sales volume climbed 9 percent in the first half of 2010, overall U.S. beer industry volume sales are down 2.7 percent so far,” noted Paul Gatza, director of the Brewers Association. “There is a movement by beer lovers to the innovative and flavorful beers created by America’s small and independent craft brewers. More people are starting to think of craft-brewed beer first when they buy in restaurants, bars and stores.”
The other great news is the number of new brewery openings, which continues to rise, too. 100 new breweries or brewpubs have opened over the last year. Picking up the press release again:
The U.S. now boasts 1,625 breweries—an increase of 100 additional breweries since July of 2009—and the highest number in 100 years. A century ago in 1910, consolidation and the run-up to Prohibition had reduced the number of breweries to 1,498.
“Entrepreneurs across the land are creating jobs by opening new microbreweries and brewpubs, and we are also seeing many homebrewing hobbyists going pro by starting what have been referred to as nanobreweries,” Gatza added. “Super tiny microbreweries or brew pubs, that make beer for a very localized network of taverns and stores, are starting to become a trend, primarily in the states that allow self-distribution as a means of getting beer to market.”
Dry Counties Dwindling
USA Today ran an interesting story earlier this month about the dry counties dotting still the landscape, areas within eight states where despite alcohol being legal statewide, it’s still illegal in those counties (along with some specific towns). According to Dry America’s Not-So-Sober Reality: It’s Shrinking Fast, many of the remaining 328 may soon become wet, too.
From the article:
Today, 1 in 9 counties is still dry. But drys are losing ground on all levels, from the state — since 2002, 14 states have ended bans on Sunday alcohol sales — to the very local. In April, a 19-block section of western Louisville (the M-107 precinct) voted 89-41 to go wet.
The number of Tennessee communities that allow sales of liquor by the drink (in bars and restaurants) has increased 56% since 2003. In the same period, 22 of Texas’ 254 counties and more than 235 of its municipalities have gone wet (or “moist,” a nebulous category in which beer and wine might be legal, but not liquor).
Even in Kansas — the state that produced the ax-wielding saloon-wrecker Carry Nation; that passed the first state prohibition law in 1881; and that did not repeal it until 1948 — 16 counties have gone wet since 2002.
One interesting side note is that economics is one of the most popular reasons, with communities wanting the tax revenue from alcohol sales. But that’s also the way that neo-prohibitionists have been going after alcohol, by trying to impose more and higher taxes. An interesting dichotomy, I’d say. Below is a nice chart of where the dry counties are and their number as compared to the total counties in each state.
Brewery Openings Surge
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.
Beer In Art #83: Bob Kessel’s Charles Bukowski
Today’s works of art is part of a series of American Icons by Bob Kessel. It’s am abstract portrait of the writer Charles Bukowski, who was known to drink a little alcohol from time to time.
Kessel writes of the portrait. “Appropriately, Buk is shown drinking a bottle of beer.” I love its simplicity of both palette — just red, white and blue plus yellow — and the imagery, capturing the essence of Bukowski in the portrayal of him hoisting a beer to his lips at a bar. It reminds me of a cross between Piet Mondrian and Roy Lichtenstein.
Below, it’s show with a frame to better see the white space intended to be around the exterior of the artwork. Limited edition prints are available of this, and other portraits from the series, American Icons.
To see more of Kessel’s work, check out his website and also his WordPress blog.
Also, below is a poem entitled Beer by Bukowski, from my Beer Poetry database.
Beer, by Charles Bukowski, from Love is A Mad Dog From Hell (1920 – 1994)
I don’t know how many bottles of beer
I have consumed while waiting for things
to get better
I don’t know how much wine and whisky
and beer
mostly beer
I have consumed after
splits with women—
waiting for the phone to ring
waiting for the sound of footsteps,
and the phone to ring
waiting for the sounds of footsteps,
and the phone never rings
until much later
and the footsteps never arrive
until much later
when my stomach is coming up
out of my mouth
they arrive as fresh as spring flowers:
“what the hell have you done to yourself?
it will be 3 days before you can fuck me!”
the female is durable
she lives seven and one half years longer
than the male, and she drinks very little beer
because she knows it’s bad for the figure.
while we are going mad
they are out
dancing and laughing
with horny cowboys.
well, there’s beer
sacks and sacks of empty beer bottles
and when you pick one up
the bottle fall through the wet bottom
of the paper sack
rolling
clanking
spilling gray wet ash
and stale beer,
or the sacks fall over at 4 a.m.
in the morning
making the only sound in your life.
beer
rivers and seas of beer
the radio singing love songs
as the phone remains silent
and the walls stand
straight up and down
and beer is all there is.
Beer In Art #79: Jasper Johns’ Field Painting
I found today’s work of art wandering around the National Gallery of Art in D.C. this afternoon, taking a day to recover from SAVOR before heading to Philly Beer Week. The second artwork that I featured in this series was by the same artist, Jasper Johns, a sculpture of two Ballantine Ale cans bronzed over, called Painted Bronze. This work, entitled Field Painting, was completed about four years after Painted Bronze, in 1964.
It may be difficult to see, but the work includes many elements Johns used in his art, including a can of Ballantine Ale. You can see it more clearly in the detail below.
Here’s what the National Gallery has to say about Field Painting.
Field Painting, for example, pivots references both to art-making and Johns’ own career. The primary colors red, yellow, and blue are spelled out in letters hinged perpendicularly to the canvas, where they also appear in stencil-like doubles. Attached to them are various studio tools. The Savarin coffee tin and Ballantine beer can both allude to Johns’ studio paraphernalia and to his appropriation of them as motifs in his work. Passages of smeared and dripped paint, a footprint, light switch, and a neon “R” collude with other visual codes to multiply the possibility of associations.
Actually, the best way to see this painting is from an angle, on the side, where its three dimensions are more obvious.
To learn more about Jasper Johns, Wikipedia has a good overview of Jasper johns, as does Answers.com. Also, the overview at Area of Design includes a few of his representative works throughout his career.
From Beer To Eternity
Here’s an interesting read about the tourism of breweries, From Beer to Eternity, focusing on the history of American brewing and the places that one can still visit.
Beer City USA Poll 2010
Charlie Papazian is doing another poll this year during American Craft Beer Week to determine BeerCity USA. Last year’s winner was a tie between Portland, Oregon and Asheville, North Carolina. So far, after just one day, Asheville is out in front with Portland a close second. Everybody else, including the San Francisco Bay Area, is woefully behind. We are all the tortoise to Portland/Asheville’s hare. The poll closes just before midnight on May 23.
Let’s go Bay Area people, get out there and vote. Let’s see if we can win this year. Let’s declare the San Francisco Bay Area to be Beer City USA!
The Top 50 Annotated 2009
This is my fourth annual annotated list of the Top 50 so you can see who moved up and down, who was new to the list and who dropped off. So here is this year’s list again annotated with how they changed compared to last year.
- Anheuser-Busch InBev; #1 last year, no surprises
- MillerCoors; ditto for #2
- Pabst Brewing; ditto for #3
- D. G. Yuengling and Son; Moved up 1, over Boston Beer again
- Boston Beer Co.; Moved down 1 to behind Yuengling, where they’d been the 2 years prior to 2008
- Sierra Nevada Brewing; Same as last year
- New Belgium Brewing; Moved up 1
- Craft Brewers Alliance; Moved down 1
- Spoetzl Brewery (Gambrinus); Moved up 1
- High Falls Brewing; Moved down 1
- Minhas Craft Brewery; Up 3 over last year
- Pyramid Breweries (IBU); Down 1, after two years moving up
- Deschutes Brewery; Down 1
- F.X. Matt Brewing; Moved up 1, after dropping down 1 last year
- Magic Hat Brewing (IBU); Up 3 from #18 last year
- Boulevard Brewing; Same as last year, as others move all around them
- Harpoon Brewery; Up 3 from #20 last year
- Alaskan Brewing; Up 1 from #19 last year
- Bell’s Brewery; Up 2 from #21 last year
- Goose Island Beer; Up 2 from #22 last year
- Kona Brewing; Up 2 from #23 last year, after Shooting up 14 the previous year
- Full Sail Brewing; Down 5, primarily from removing contract beers from their total to give a more accurate figure of their own brands
- Stone Brewing; Up 5 again this year from 28, same jump as last year
- Dogfish Head Craft Brewery; Shot up 9 from #33, after being up 5 and 4 the two previous years
- Iron City Brewing; Plummeted 12, after a Chapter 11 bankruptcy and moving production out of Pittsburgh
- August Schell Brewing; Down 1 from last year
- Brooklyn Brewery; Up 4 from #31 last year
- Abita Brewing; Up 2 from #30 last year
- Summit Brewing; Down 2 from #27 last year
- Anchor Brewing; Down 6 from #24
- Shipyard Brewing; Down 5 from #26 last year
- New Glarus Brewing; Same as last year
- Great Lakes Brewing; Up 4 from #37 last year
- Rogue Ales/Oregon Brewing; Up 2 from #36, canceling being Down 2 last year, and Up 2 the year before that
- Long Trail Brewing; Down 1 from #34 last year
- Lagunitas Brewing; Up 2 from #38 last year, after being up 3 for the prior 2 years
- Mendocino Brewing; Down 8 from #29 last year
- Gordon Biersch Brewing; Down 3 from #35
- Sweetwater Brewing; Up 1 from #40 last year
- Firestone Walker Brewing; Down 1 from #39 last year
- Victory Brewing; Up 5 from #46 last year
- Flying Dog Brewery; Down 1 from #41 last year
- BJs Restaurant & Brewery; Down 1 from #42 last year
- Odell Brewing; Up 1 from #45 last year
- Rock Bottom Brewery Restaurants; Down 2 from #43 last year, a reversal of the year before
- Straub Brewery; Up 1 from #47 last year
- BridgePort Brewing (Gambrinus); Down 3 from #44 last year
- Lost Coast Brewing; Not in Top 50 last year
- Big Sky Brewing; Up 1 from #50 last year
- Stevens Point Brewery; Not in Top 50 last year
Two breweries are new to the list this year, Lost Coast and Stevens Point (who’ve transitioned to primarily all-malt brewing), while two dropped off the list; Cold Springs Brewery (fka Gluek Brewing) and Mac and Jack’s Brewery.
If you want to see the previous annotated lists for comparison, here is 2008, 2007 and 2006.
Top 50 Breweries For 2009
The Brewers Association has also just announced the top 50 breweries in the U.S. based on sales, by volume, for 2009. This includes all breweries, regardless of size or other parameters. Here is the new list:
- Anheuser-Busch InBev; St Louis MO
- MillerCoors; Chicago IL
- Pabst Brewing; Woodridge IL
- D. G. Yuengling and Son; Pottsville PA
- Boston Beer Co.; Boston MA
- Sierra Nevada Brewing; Chico CA
- Craft Brewers Alliance (Widmer/Redhook); Portland OR
- New Belgium Brewing; Fort Collins CO
- Spoetzl Brewery (Gambrinus); Spoetzl TX
- High Falls Brewing; Rochester NY
- Minhas Craft Brewery; Monroe WI
- Pyramid Breweries (IBU); Seattle WA
- Deschutes Brewery; Bend OR
- F.X. Matt Brewing; Utica NY
- Magic Hat Brewing (IBU); Burlington VT
- Boulevard Brewing; Kansas City MO
- Harpoon Brewery; Boston, MA
- Alaskan Brewing; Juneau AK
- Bell’s Brewery; Galesburg MI
- Goose Island Beer; Chicago IL
- Kona Brewing; Kailua-Kona HI
- Full Sail Brewing; Hood River OR
- Stone Brewing; Escondido CA
- Dogfish Head Craft Brewery; Lewes DE
- Iron City Brewing; Pittsburgh PA
- August Schell Brewing; New Ulm MN
- Brooklyn Brewery; Brooklyn NY
- Abita Brewing; New Orleans LA
- Summit Brewing; Saint Paul MN
- Anchor Brewing; San Francisco CA
- Shipyard Brewing; Portland ME
- New Glarus Brewing; New Glarus WI
- Great Lakes Brewing; Cleveland OH
- Rogue Ales/Oregon Brewing; Newport OR
- Long Trail Brewing; Burlington VT
- Lagunitas Brewing; Petaluma CA
- Mendocino Brewing; Ukiah CA
- Gordon Biersch Brewing; San Jose CA
- SweetWater Brewing; Atlanta GA
- Firestone Walker Brewing; Paso Robles CA
- Victory Brewing; Downington PA
- Flying Dog Brewery; Frederick MD
- BJs Restaurant & Brewery; Huntington Beach CA
- Odell Brewing; Fort Collins CO
- Rock Bottom Brewery Restaurants; Louisville CO
- Straub Brewery; Saint Mary’s PA
- Bridgeport Brewing (Gambrinus); Portland OR
- Lost Coast Brewing; Eureka CA
- Big Sky Brewing; Missoula MT
- Stevens Point Brewery; Stevens Point WI
Here is this year’s press release.
Also, the Annotated List is now up.