This month marks the beginning of another 10 years of this column. In the last decade, craft beer experienced substantial expansion, its customers and methods grew in sophistication, and new commercial challenges emerged, as chronicled monthly here.
As craft brewing weathers a contraction and pivots, the industry is different than it was a decade ago; it is nevertheless resilient and poised to become even more in the next decade. The ride is just beginning.
Since 2019, craft beer has faced two existential threats, eroding core pillars of its success: COVID-19 and White Claw.
The first threat, the novel coronavirus, still roils our nation and the strain gnaws at the social underpinning and economic trajectory of the maturing craft beer industry. Fundamentally, the dynamism that organically evolves from people gathering as homebrew clubs and tasting room patrons collapsed this spring in the face of executive government orders closing social spaces. Craft beer’s success was borne and has been buoyed by how it gathers people, from beer festivals to beer halls, to share and celebrate brewing artistry and local identities. Though regulations eventually enabled outdoor service opportunities, many patrons have yet to come back to local watering holes.
Pragmatically, suspending taproom revenues abruptly in March also meant a brewery’s lowest cost sales avenue dried up. Suddenly, taproom managers faced dark halls, and breweries scrambled to maintain staff and operations ahead of the normally thirsty summer season. The economics of operating a brewery changed.
Marketwise, craft brewing is also still adjusting to the “White Claw effect” — the InBev-affiliated hard-seltzer surge that deflated craft beer’s summer in 2019. This second threat arose from a natural shift in demand, as the transition between drinking generations trended toward low(er)-calorie and -carb fermented beverages. Add to that an influx of interest in gluten-free craft alternatives to traditional malted barley beer, and White Claw triggered a seismic market drift. Newer of-age consumers likely did not recall the rise (and fall) of Zima, which phoenix-like is reborn in the diluted form of hard seltzer — basically, carbonated water, sweetened flavor essence and up to 5% fermented neutral cane alcohol.
In the face of these threats though, craft beer has shown resilient stripes. Two signs of market strength especially demonstrate the immutability of craft beer: new business in 2020 and craft hard seltzers.
Craft breweries not only pivoted for off-site consumption sales in the wake of social space restrictions, more than half of Boulder County’s established brands released new beers during COVID. While their motivation may have been partially anxiety-fueled, brewers took the opportunity to create and expand consumer choice beyond flagship labels, even while consumer access was restrained. Local consumers now have a richer craft beer landscape, from refreshed branding and labels to new mixed-pack bundles.
In 2020, craft beer also invented new ways to generate and respond to consumer demand. New breweries like those in Windsor and Lakewood even opened, despite social distancing. And while openings and new beer releases were surely planned before COVID, they were not stopped by COVID. The embodiment of that solid market confidence is reflected in the Root Shoot Malting and Traverse Image “100 Year Lease” documentary, highlighting the importance of family farms and craft brewing’s contribution to conserving Colorado agriculture. There are local faces and hearts behind every craft beer, from field to can, and those bonds are persistent.
Another bright commercial sign for local and creative craft breweries is their espousal of hard seltzer. The low barriers to entry, ubiquity of fermentable cane sugar and gluten-free grains allowed savvy breweries to join the hard seltzer conversation. Thereby, brewers met a consumer demand that InBev may have ignited, but only craft brewing ingenuity could satiate, and expanded their own market beyond traditional beer drinkers. From Oskar Blues to Avery, “craft brewing” now includes local craft hard seltzer.
Myriad other threats still loom — canned cocktails, consolidation of western region liquor distribution and agricultural blights. Still, craft beer is more than a commercial product; its roots spread beneath our communities, and its spirit is a derivative of a shared civic passion to connect with neighbors in celebration and art.
Today’s craft brewing industry is more diverse and broader than it was a decade ago. Since 2010, this column has documented the progressive education and sophistication of beer consumers, brewers and brewing equipment manufacturers. The next 10 years for the market, to be chronicled here and in industry periodicals, will contain further innovation, consolidation and product diversification, i.e. “business as usual”. And the beer will flow on.
Cyril Vidergar is a homebrewing lawyer roaming Northern Colorado looking for fermented malt gold. He welcomes comments and leads at beerscoop@gmail.com.
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October 21, 2020 at 08:54AM
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Cyril Vidergar: A new decade of craft beer - Longmont Times-Call
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