Thursday, September 10, 2009

Craft Brewers Savagely Thrive In Slumping Economy

Interesting growth number for our industry. Keeping up with the economic stats of the industry gives me faith that the US Standard of living is going up and that Craft Brewing is a thriving industry. Although, it is true the sub-premium beer market(Busch, Shlitz, PBR, etc.) is booming while the US economy slumps. I shouldn't complain about this too much since my first sip of beer from my Grandfather Dziadzi's mug was Old Style formerly produced by G. Heileman. Tasty! Stats courtesy of The Brewers' Association.

* Growth of the craft brewing industry in the first half of 2009 was 5% by volume and 9% by dollars.
* Craft brewers sold an estimated 4.2 million barrels of beer in the first half of 2009, up from 4 million barrels in the first half of 2008.
* Overall US beer sales are down 1.3% in the first 6 months of 2009.
* Imported beer sales are down 9.5% in the first 6 months.
* Growth of the craft brewing industry in 2008 was 5.9% by volume and 10.1% by dollars.
* The craft brewing industry produced nearly 8.6 million barrels of craft beer in the US in 2008.
* The craft brewing sales share as of December '08 was 4% by volume and 6.3% by dollars.
* Total US craft brewing industry annual dollar volume is $6.3 billion.
* The US brewery count of 1,525 on July 31, 2009 is the highest total in 100 years. (2008 total includes breweries that closed during the year, and the July 2009 count is higher than at any time in 2008.)

Last updated on 8/17/2009

Lastly, here's a reply from IRI Data Guru Dan Wendel for a more local growth number(from Brewers' Association PowerHour teleconference in August):

8. I'm looking for annual craft sales trends for my home state of Florida. Can you give me some direction?

Answer: Craft Segment Dollar Sales are +8.6% vs. Year Ago. Case Sales are +2.4% vs. YA in Florida State Supermarkets based on YTD IRI Data Ending July 12, 2009.

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