The growing landscape of independent U.S. craft breweries now in the hands of corporate owners has a Colorado-size hole.
The past year has seen megabrewer Anheuser-Busch InBev and private equity firms either take over or purchase stakes in a number of smaller breweries outside.
More moves are expected, and Colorado is a lucrative target with well over 225 craft breweries, with scores more in planning and with serious street cred as one of the centers of independent American brewing.
Sooner or later, will we see a local brewery born in a garage or dreamed up on a cocktail napkin snatched up by one of the big boys?
“I think it’s likely that we will,” said Kim Jordan, president and CEO of New Belgium Brewing in Fort Collins. “My sense is, with A-B anyway, they are probably looking at a regional strategy. They have a brewery here (in Fort Collins). They have a distributorship here. It makes sense to me we would see an announcement about a craft brewery as well.”
In interviews, representatives of Colorado’s five largest craft breweries said they have every intention of remaining independent.
Oskar Blues Brewery in Longmont went so far as to suggest it was a buyer and not a seller, looking to purchase smaller craft breweries suffering growing pains.
The growth of craft beer makes it an appealing target as overall beer sales have been relatively flat. Craft beer sales grew 17 percent in 2013 and accounted for 7.8 percent of the beer market, according to the most recent figures from the Boulder-based Brewers Association.
“Craft brewery”Qualifying as a “craft brewery” under the group’s definition depends on a brewery’s production volume, ownership status and other factors.
To get this out of the way quickly, New Belgium is extremely unlikely to sell out. The state’s largest craft brewery by a large margin — and the third-largest in the country — made a pair of business moves a couple of years ago to solidify its independence.
In 2013, New Belgium announced Jordan and her family had sold their controlling stake to the company’s employee stock ownership program, making the brewery 100 percent employee-owned. New Belgium also became a certified B Corporation, or benefit corporation, meaning its board can be guided by more than the bottom line.
Jordan said New Belgium has not been approached to sell.
“I think, for the most part, people feel like we have a plan, and we are pretty committed to that plan and we are not a likely candidate,” she said.
Jordan had a front-row seat for the latest sellout drama last month, when Anheuser-Busch announced it was purchasing Seattle-based Elysian Brewing. Jordan and Elysian co-owner Dick Cantwell — who opposed the sale and was outgunned by his two fellow owners — have been dating for years.
While Jordan said she is not happy about the pending Elysian sale, she is also stunned by the viciousness of the reaction. Selling out is seen as the end goal for most startup industries — consider high-tech — but not so in craft beer.
“I find myself wanting to remind people this is beer,” Jordan said. “We are not solving big-world problems.”
As Jordan and others have noted, Anheuser-Busch’s shopping spree appears to be regionally strategic and targeting breweries with brewpubs, which can be more immediately profitable and serve as valuable brewing testing grounds.
Jordan said the purchases also seem motivated by a desire to stake a claim to the entire three-tier alcohol distribution system in place since after Prohibition — production, distribution and retail.
Of the three recent A-B acquisitions, Blue Point Brewing in New York state and Elysian are about the same size, producing about 50,000 barrels a year, followed by 10 Barrel Brewing in Bend, Ore., at about 40,000 barrels.
Given that, breweries in Colorado north of 40,000 barrels a year are the most likely candidates to receive an overture from big beer. That would put six or seven Colorado breweries in play. A barrel equals 31 gallons.
Oskar Blues’ size, reputation, name recognition and restaurants surely make it an attractive target. But spokesman Chad Melis said the Longmont-based company, which opened a second production brewery in North Carolina in 2013, has other designs.
“Right now, we’re looking at potentially buying some smaller breweries that are going through some of the growing pains we have been able to persevere through,” he said.
Melis noted that craft beer is a relatively young industry, is going through a boom “and there is not a ton of super-experienced people out there.” An acquisition makes sense, he said, because Oskar Blues has the personnel who have navigated challenging industry waters.
Money and supportJennifer Litz-Kirk, senior editor of the industry publications Beer Business Daily and Craft Business Daily, said such mergers provide a “halo effect” for the bigger brewery and money and support for the smaller one.
“It’s another way for the bigger craft brewers to stay more relevant,” Litz-Kirk said. “Everything is local — uber-local. With 4,000 breweries now, how local is local? A square block?”
Litz-Kirk said the biggest surprise on the acquisitions front involves private equity firms looking to pick up breweries and later turn them for profit. Both Lakewood, N.Y.-based Southern Tier and Atlanta-based Sweetwater Brewing struck private equity deals in 2014.
Odell Brewing has followed a conservative path of what founder Doug Odell calls “managed growth.” The company has five shareholders: Odell; his wife, Wynne; sister Corkie; and two managers with the company for 20 years.
In an e-mail response to questions, Wynne Odell was emphatic about the fate of the 107-employee company, which shipped 99,517 barrels to 11 states in 2014: “Odell is not on the market and has no intentions of selling to big beer.”
She said Odell does not have a transition plan but is actively discussing one that will “retain our cultural legacy, maintain our financial stability and ensure internal control.”
Longmont-based Left Hand Brewing has been approached frequently about selling out, said CEO Eric Wallace.
Wallace said 100-employee Left Hand is already half employee-owned and will be “making announcements later this year” about steps to strengthen its position as an independent craft brewery.
“We have every intention of staying fiercely independent,” he said.
Wallace is not surprised by corporate beer’s thirst for craft breweries, given the segment’s growth. To him, the bigger question is why would independent breweries want to sell. He mentioned a few economic reasons: breweries that find themselves either upside-down, having grown too quickly or weighed down by a heavy debt load.
“We like doing what we’re doing,” Wallace said. “Being in the beer business is really fun. It’s always a challenge and never boring, and we’re working with great people. Why get out of that?”
No intention to sellTodd Usry, brewmaster and general manager of Breckenridge Brewery, which is preparing to move its operations from Denver to Littleton, said the company has not been approached to sell out and has no intention to do so.
“The big thing to me is (that) the craft beer industry was built on individuals and their stories,” he said.
When craft breweries sell out, he said, “I think there is some serious authenticity that is lost, and that the brand loses. We’re not corporate. We are entrepreneurial and individual.”
Usry, like others, is concerned about the business ramifications of big-beer buyouts. “It’s going to be harder and harder to get our voices heard at the wholesale level,” he said. “It’s hard enough for craft beer in general to get meetings with big-chain buyers.”
A MillerCoors spokesman said the company will look at merger and acquisition opportunities, as well, if they are priced right and “provide entry into a new style or geography where we feel underdeveloped.”
For craft breweries, selling to big beer provides access to lucrative distribution networks. But the megabreweries have found acquisition can also muddy the distribution waters, said Craft Business Daily’s Litz-Kirk.
When MillerCoors bought a Minneapolis-based hard-cider company, it acquired a patchwork of differently aligned distributors — some carrying mostly Miller Coors, some carrying mostly A-B and some independent, she said. The process of aligning distribution networks can prove costly and difficult, she said.
So there you have it — a lay of the land and statements from Colorado’s big five craft breweries expressing a desire to remain independent.
Does that mean the state will not factor in the next big-beer or private equity acquisition announcement? Of course not.
If the recent industry upheaval shows anything, it’s this: Don’t be surprised by anything.
Eric Gorski: 303-954-1971, egorski@denverpost.com or twitter.com/egorski
