Where are we headed?

Interesting. I believe "better" is kind of a subjective term but I do agree that there are some discontinued beers from highly respected breweries that have been 'replaced' with something else perhaps due to trends. It doesn't mean the stellar beers of yonder couldn't or wouldn't be brewed/revisited again but coin is really the bottom line for breweries. Cost and availability of consistent ingredients is another factor. We just have to dig a bit deeper to find stuff. You're not alone brother. Cheers to your thread!!

 

Craft beer hobbyists are a very jaded lot. There is just so much to parse to be able to make big generalizations. There is no shortage of great beer to be had. I don't buy, Stone, Firestone Walker and others, but Sierra Nevada through its line-up is just fine by me. I would like to see them do more dark beers. I really liked their stout a while back. We're very lucky these days. Things always change.

 

Breweries are businesses. the beers you descibed obviously werent selling that well. so the bigger guys will focus on the market trends and hopefully the smaller local ones will fill in the ESBs, Pale ales, Milds, Brown ales, etc. If there is a market somebody will fill that niche. and if not, we are left to brew our own i guess. But as much i miss some of the beers you describe at least here in NJ im inundated with top brews from many markets that never sold here before. So for me overall the void has been filled cheers

 

@JBogan I pretty much agree with your OP.

It seems like the distributing breweries are 'chasing trends' now vs. providing a variety of different sorts of beers.

I recently posted: "Maybe soon Sierra Nevada will change their name to "Just another IPA brewery like Stone - Brewing Co."?"

FWIW I prefer to the 'old' days when a brewery such as Sierra Nevada, Stone, etc. provided more than just hoppy beers.

Cheers!

 

IMO, the whole artificial partitioning of "large breweries" vs, smaller, newer ones is, well, artificial and of no consequence. I really don't care if some of the previously mentioned large CA brewers are no longer making beers that were favored by some in BA, because for every discontinued beer there have been two or more really outstanding new beers that have been created and sold in the same marketplace, even if those new beers are made by brewers other than the big boys that the OP mentioned. I don't give a hoot who makes the outstanding beers, as long as they continue to be available. I also don't care that the big brewers probably had wider distribution than the small breweries who make the excellent beers I now drink instead, because I would venture a guess that the far away locations who don't have access to the excellent substitute beers subsequently made in CA DO have access to equally excellent, but different, beers made by their own local small brewers.

 

I guess the problem is that in the "old" days Sierra Nevada, Stone etc did not have to compete with 7,000 small local breweries cutting into their market.

 

I dont know about that. I still drink stuff like Brooklyn, Long Trail, and Harpoon all of whom I first had a decade ago. They still do around 10 dollar six packs. I prefer their old beers because they werent as hop forward but if they have something new out I will try it. I just had Brooklyn Black Chocloate Stout the other day and its still 10% abv and in 6 packs and its still good. Brooklyn Lager is also still good as is Long Trail Double Bag. Harpoon IPA still a classic, not overly hoppy and bitter.

 

Maybe innovation is reaching its end, but the breweries are finding out the hard way that new offerings just aren't working i.e. the replacement offerings by Sierra Nevada that were cited above.

Founders seems to be taking a slightly different approach to keep the customer base interested by re-releasing well-defined beers. Nemesis came back earlier this summer, Frootwood is coming back, and so is Mosaic Promise (Michigan only). I think Blushing Monk was retired, but it's back, and Frangelic Mountain Brown made a showing this year.

They're also adding new flavor variants to the Mas Agave series that has been so popular. So old is new for some of their beers.

 

I feel like we’ve had this same conversation with different specifics and precursors several times over the last couple of months and the consensus seems to be from both old members and new, experienced and inexperienced; nothing is forever. Your favorite beers from 5 years ago have been replaced with a new set of buyers’ favorite beers of today. The trends have changed and continue to do so. I can’t tell you if the selection is better than 5 years ago. I can almost guarantee it’s more expansive though.

Cheers.

 

I agree with everything you’ve said here Bill. The only problem with it is that I can see for someone who has been drinking these beers for 20 years (I haven’t), is that this model drives the price up of his favorite beer styles and potentially makes finding the styles he wants hard to find depending on the market you find yourself looking at. Cheers, my friend.

 

I have a similar perspective to @Shanex in terms of involvement in craft (was primarily a whiskey drinker, with gin in the summer and Bud /Michelob with a meal, outdoors or at a sports game).

I really like the four you mention, but would also add Bells and Founders more readily available here who have made changes adding beers I have no interest in and pulling other great ones.

The primary two considerations are led by markets maturing with solid alternatives. Before the big brewers would enter a new market with little competition, and likely be the best option for many styles. That’s simply no longer the case, and their share continues to drop as newer nascent markets begin to mature (thinking Vegas from personal experience).

SKU management is the other primary factor. There are simply way to many skus. Between new local breweries, all breweries expanding their current lineup, and alternatives to craft (seltzer), there is limited space and breweries are forced to consolidate their offerings to the top sellers. Many of the bigger ones pulled one or more other styles for NEIPAs to attempt to maintain overall market share. In the Midwest, Founders and Bells are also trying to chase the wheat craze (312, White, Oberon which is a seasonal) in addition to the NEIPA.

Between these two factors, and the fact beer consumers have historically held the same percentage of population over time, that great XXXXX beer you loved before isn’t selling with the glut of offerings. People are turning to a fresh good, possibly better, local version. The big boys replace these beers with a NEIPA, or Wheat, in an attempt to tread water.

Boston Beer has just about abandoned beer at this point, with beer under 1/4 of their sales with continued sales losses. Don’t hear anything from New Belgium these days. The best the top ten sellers can hope for is to prevent further erosion.

 

Every time I walk into my beer store and see the never ending walls of 16oz cans I just shake my head and think to myself “how can this sustain for long?” Hopefully most of the brewers putting the 16oz cans in stores are making most of their profits from their taprooms, because the retail store sales can’t be paying the bills.

 

FIFY

And I don't know I'd agree with expansive. Are there more beers on the shelves, yes. Are less styles represented, likely yes. Too many average and overpriced local options, in lots of instances yes.

 

I think that’s representative of the particular market you live in. As most of these answers here are bound to be. I’m speaking in a general sense. It is all but certain that more “craft” lagers and IPA varieties are made today than there were 5 years ago. Whether you can find them or not, I couldn’t say.

Cheers.

 

The different considerations that an internationally distributed brewery with multiple large facilities like Sierra Nevada has to make vs the small draft only local brewery in my town is exactly why I could stop in this evening and get a Vienna lager (not an expert but I give a b+) and a Duesseldorf Alt on tap.

Those beers would represent massive opportunity cost losses for these largest craft brewers. For the small local joint they represent nice filler bathces between the hoppy . things that move the fastest

 

Hmm... checking back issues of The Beer Institute's Brewers Almanac, they never listed that particular stat but they have long noted Per Capita Beer Consumption in the US. Just within the last 3 decades, consumption has gone down dramatically:

1993 - 32.3 gallons per person (of Legal Drinking Age)
2018 - 26 gallons per person (LDA)

Spirits and Wine Per Capita are both up over the same period.

US Domestic beer production peaked in 1990 with 203 million barrels (181 M bbl. for 2018) and total beer (domestic + imports) sold in the US peaked in 2008 at 213.3 million bbl. (2018 =202.6 M bbl)

Coincidentally, both breweries are mentioned in the latest BMI newsletter:

You can see the beer in 16 oz. cans over the stacks of 6 and 12 pks and cases of hard seltzers and RTD beverages?

 

I'm looking at different statistics over time. I'm thinking your number is the average gallons of beer consumed by beer drinkers vs. the average gallon + beer consumed by the entire population.

https://apnews.com/article/public-h...-ap-top-news-f1f81ade0748410aaeb6eeab7a772bf7

The graph in the article linked above shows per capita consumption of 1.17 gallons at the end of WWII (1945), and 1.06 the last year charted (2017). It's not a straight line, and beer consumption peaked in the 1980s, but it remained in a relatively consistent range over time. Alcohol consumption increased overall over this 75 year window, with wine and spirits the primary drivers.

In terms of Boston Beer, the IRI data scans and short term blips are primary grocery store / big box driven, usually by roll outs of new offerings (or degradation of said offerings).

When they talk about "beer" on their earning call, they include Truly as "beer", and hope to increase their "beer" (i.e. Truly) penetration to one day overtake Bud Light. CEO Dave Burwick has led the "Beyond Beer" charge since coming over from Peet's Coffee and Tea 3 1/2 years ago.

https://seekingalpha.com/article/44...k-on-q3-2021-results-earnings-call-transcript

Additional Boston "Beer" Company info can be found on Beer Hard Seltzer Advocate.

 

Well, that graph is "Gallons of ethanol consumed" so if the "average" beer is 5% ABV at that rate that 26 gallons of beer per capita (LDA) would equal 1.3 gallons of ethanol. (Right? Somebody check my math.) But, of course, given that the light beers, all under 5%, now make up most of top 10 largest selling beers, average alcohol content is ... (Oh, damn - calculator battery just died! ) ..probably difficult to figure.

Gotta wonder how the source, the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, figured total ethanol for beer historically given the increasing spread of ABV's in the past few decades or, for that matter, wine and spirits. That's why I like the Brewers Almanac stats, since they are based on actual industry numbers, usually. (Of course, "per capita" even of LDA is gonna be off, since not every adult drinks alcohol and some of that beer - and seltzer - is consumed by the non-LDA crowd).

Yup, which is why BMI specified "Sam Adams family" vs "total Boston Beer". Sure it's a blip, but it's still news, however temporary. Granted, maybe says more about Truly and their other non-beers slowing down than anything else.