What no one wants to say

[user 348755]

Hey now... Why do you have to go bringing facts and reason into his circular reasoning fallacy and dogmatic dialog?

You have to define "micro" and "macro" first. Then maybe we can get to the part where we over-interpret the rounding

Nevermind. All is good. I'll show myself out.

 

[bwible]

Everyone without skin in the game is an expert lol.

The reason the macros sell more beer than micros by an exponential factor is that it's just beer for most people. It goes with a shared experience ( BBQ etc ), it's not the sole reason for the experience. Not everybody worships at the altar of Budvar or whatever beer is your pinnacle.

I support craft breweries here locally, but i still drink macro lagers, because they're everywhere, and they're consistently good beers. Not great maybe, but drinkable and enjoyable.

Maybe the title should've been "What someone doesn't want to hear?"

Yeah this sums it for me as well. “It’s just beer to most people.” Out of how many who drink beer, how many are brewers at any level? The average Joe doesn’t know centennial from mittelfruh or 2 row from carapils and doesn’t care. They just want a beer to drink with their burger off the grill or watching the game. My wife will occasionally drink one of my darker brews like a stout or we’ll share a barleywine. But she 99% drinks Ultra and often White Claw during summer. She listens to me blather on about brewing but she’s never going to brew. There was a comment I laughed at in another post about the guy lying face down in the gutter at Octoberfest in Germany who wasn’t talking about the perfectly balanced and crisp lager with no acetaldehyde.

I buy beer probably almost as much as I brew. Mostly seasonal releases but sometimes I still buy High Life or something. Right now I have Kona Big Wave. I got 18 cans for $21.

 

[bwible]

Man..... This sounds so surreal. I am able to go to Aldi and buy as many half a litre cans as I want since I'm 16 years old for a price below 60 cents per can.
Germany ftw!

It wasn’t wierd to us because we grew up with it that way. It’s only when you get out of this area and see how things are in other places that you realize.

 

[day_trippr]

That graph shows the rise of craft, which corresponds to the decline of home brewing which started around 2011...

 

[MaxStout]

Yeah this sums it for me as well. “It’s just beer to most people.” Out of how many who drink beer, how many are brewers at any level? The average Joe doesn’t know centennial from mittelfruh or 2 row from carapils and doesn’t care. They just want a beer to drink with their burger off the grill or watching the game. My wife will occasionally drink one of my darker brews like a stout or we’ll share a barleywine. But she 99% drinks Ultra and often White Claw during summer. She listens to me blather on about brewing but she’s never going to brew. There was a comment I laughed at in another post about the guy lying face down in the gutter at Octoberfest in Germany who wasn’t talking about the perfectly balanced and crisp lager with no acetaldehyde.

I buy beer probably almost as much as I brew. Mostly seasonal releases but sometimes I still buy High Life or something. Right now I have Kona Big Wave. I got 18 cans for $21.

Sounds like my household. My wife will occasionally drink my beer--the ones that are low ABV and low IBU. But mostly, she would rather have an Angry Orchard or hard seltzer.

I do buy a lot of beer, too. Wife asks, "Why do you buy beer when you have a fridge full of home brew?"

I like to buy styles I might want to brew, to get an idea what characteristics to aim for. "It's research!" I also buy styles that are out of reach of my abilities. Like NEIPA. I also like to buy some non-craft beers that are good to have around as easy-drinkers.

 

[FloppyKnockers]

Sounds like my household. My wife will occasionally drink my beer--the ones that are low ABV and low IBU. But mostly, she would rather have an Angry Orchard or hard seltzer.

I do buy a lot of beer, too. Wife asks, "Why do you buy beer when you have a fridge full of home brew?"

I like to buy styles I might want to brew, to get an idea what characteristics to aim for. "It's research!" I also buy styles that are out of reach of my abilities. Like NEIPA. I also like to buy some non-craft beers that are good to have around as easy-drinkers.

Same... I don't call it the beer isle. I call it the R&D isle.

 

[MaxStout]

Out back with a Brain Melter.

 

[bwible]

Sounds like my household. My wife will occasionally drink my beer--the ones that are low ABV and low IBU. But mostly, she would rather have an Angry Orchard or hard seltzer.

I do buy a lot of beer, too. Wife asks, "Why do you buy beer when you have a fridge full of home brew?"

I like to buy styles I might want to brew, to get an idea what characteristics to aim for. "It's research!" I also buy styles that are out of reach of my abilities. Like NEIPA. I also like to buy some non-craft beers that are good to have around as easy-drinkers.

 

[Brockness Monster]

This thread.

 

[Bobby_M]

No it's not anecdotal. The same source you cite shows that there a 4% drop on total consumption and that 13% of that is from micros. So that means that people that used to buy from micros just aren't drinking at all, or the macros are increasingly gaining that share.

But you all are right. I should have titled this thread "what no one wants hear".

I'm tempted to stop participating in the dead horse thread but as long as you keep getting this wrong....Craft volume dropped 4%. The 13% number you saw is the craft market share of the total sales.

A 4% drop isn't an apocalypse. I think everyone was so used to unfettered growth that a plateau looks like a free fall.


This is really the important part.

Here's why stuff is optically hitting the fan. Look at the production growth through 2015. It flatlined starting in 2016 and aside from 2020's 12% drop off, it's been mostly flat since then (the average production growth 2016 through 2024 is -1%).

Ok, now slide your eyes over on 2015 to the right. With 42% demand growth logged the year before, we see 41% growth in the number of breweries.
The VERY next year saw flat production but now it was shared by an extra 900 breweries. Look at the average BBLs per year per brewery; a drop from 6495 down to 5100.

You can trace down the right column and see how bleek it got. If in 2014 you were lucky enough to have an AVERAGE share of the market, you'd profit about $6M with would fund that expansion tap room downtown. Just 5 short years later, you'd be making half that.


In other words, craft isn't dying because of what beer they're making or not making. It's just that the number of craft consumers peaked in 2015 but the number of breweries peaked in 2023. The other thing the numbers don't cleanly show is that it only takes a few places to have strong game to steal that average BBL per year away from others. Those are the places closing up. Ah, to be a below average craft brewery in 2015 when you could still profit as if the beer was good.

Year	Craft Production (bbls)	Growth	Craft Breweries	Growth	BBLs per Brewery
2010​	10,133,977​		1759​
2011​	11,467,337​	13%​	1989​	13%​	5765​
2012​	13,235,917​	15%​	2347​	18%​	5640​
2013​	15,600,000​	18%​	2768​	18%​	5636​
2014​	22,200,000​	42%​	3418​	23%​	6495​
2015​	24,500,000​	10%​	4803​	41%​	5101​
2016​	24,600,000​	0%​	5713​	19%​	4306​
2017​	25,400,000​	3%​	6661​	17%​	3813​
2018​	25,500,000​	0%​	7618​	14%​	3347​
2019​	26,300,000​	3%​	8419​	11%​	3124​
2020​	23,100,000​	-12%​	8921​	6%​	2589​
2021​	24,800,000​	7%​	9210​	3%​	2693​
2022​	24,300,000​	-2%​	9675​	5%​	2512​
2023​	23,400,000​	-4%​	9761​	1%​	2397​
2024​	23,100,000​	-1%​	9796​	0%​	2358​

Edit: I just want to clarify that I'm not saying craft isn't on the downward slope of the cycle. We are and the 2025 numbers are probably going to be in the double digits drop if not close. What I AM saying is that the number of brewery closures is much more reflective of out of control supply and any contraction is going to look worse than it is until the number of breweries drops significantly to where good breweries can thrive.

 

[Bassman2003]

Nice post Bobby!

 

[Snuffy]

In my area, craft brewing was stymied by archaic blue laws. It took waiting out a generation of church-backed politicians until groups like Free the Hops were able to lobby for change in legislation that allowed brewing as an industry that wasn't crippled by stupid tax requirements and alcohol limits. Once that was cleared up, the craft scene went bonkers. There was good beer all over the place. Small brewpubs popped up everywhere there was warehouse space. Eventually, the investors got involved and some of the early players went to commercial production almost overnight. That transition came with upgrades in equipment, learning curves, moves to larger facilities, changes in process and ingredients and redistribution of talent. Brewers moved around. Beer quality suffered. Offerings became limited in the pubs because so much resources were being focused on getting beer packaged and into trucks. Beer prices in stores went up once they figured out people would pay $11.99 for a 6 pack. Once the initial fervor and elation wore off, the hard core pub patrons that were left got spread thin because there were just so many places to be. Some places made the transition and were able to keep both tap room and commercial production. They bought out competitors and added music venues. Others faded out because they didn't survive the leap to big overhead and burned out once the investors bailed. All of this happened here in a span of about the last 10 or 15 years. If you were to chart data on openings, closings, and sales volumes here, that data would probably reflect chaos and make it look as if the whole industry is in a tailspin. I will support craft and home brewing as long as the liver holds out. I don't think it's fading away or anything. Just reaching equilibrium.

 

[MaxStout]

In my area, craft brewing was stymied by archaic blue laws. It took waiting out a generation of church-backed politicians until groups like Free the Hops were able to lobby for change in legislation that allowed brewing as an industry that wasn't crippled by stupid tax requirements and alcohol limits. Once that was cleared up, the craft scene went bonkers. There was good beer all over the place. Small brewpubs popped up everywhere there was warehouse space. Eventually, the investors got involved and some of the early players went to commercial production almost overnight. That transition came with upgrades in equipment, learning curves, moves to larger facilities, changes in process and ingredients and redistribution of talent. Brewers moved around. Beer quality suffered. Offerings became limited in the pubs because so much resources were being focused on getting beer packaged and into trucks. Beer prices in stores went up once they figured out people would pay $11.99 for a 6 pack. Once the initial fervor and elation wore off, the hard core pub patrons that were left got spread thin because there were just so many places to be. Some places made the transition and were able to keep both tap room and commercial production. They bought out competitors and added music venues. Others faded out because they didn't survive the leap to big overhead and burned out once the investors bailed. All of this happened here in a span of about the last 10 or 15 years. If you were to chart data on openings, closings, and sales volumes here, that data would probably reflect chaos and make it look as if the whole industry is in a tailspin. I will support craft and home brewing as long as the liver holds out. I don't think it's fading away or anything. Just reaching equilibrium.

Sounds like the same trajectory of craft brewing here in MN. Sales of beer in taprooms was not allowed, due to the state's 3-tier system. Then in 2011 the so-called "Surly Bill" passed, allowing taproom sales.

Breweries popped up like mushrooms. Later, many converted to production-only, others closed entirely. Covid killed off some, as well. Then post pandemic consumer choices changed. Many people drinking other things, or less, or not at all.

I think you're right on the industry reaching equilibrium. There will always be beer, good and bad, just not as many sources, and craft beer drinkers back to its core market.

 

[BrewZer]

In SW Ohio, our LHBS shopportunities are a bit limited. Fortunately, the Dayton area has two close-in LHBSs -- between them, you should be able to find whatever you need. And Ohio became more homebrew friendly in 2022, when they made it legal to brew without a license as long as you aren't selling, transport to and hold contests, and to share your homebrew with your neighbors and friends.