Craft Brew News
05/01/20
(Courtesy of Brewbound.com)

Nearly Half of New York Breweries Say Their Businesses Could Close in 3 Months, According to Guild Survey

The majority of New York craft brewers have seen their sales drop by 75% or more and nearly half have stopped production entirely, according to a survey conducted by the New York State Brewers Association (NYSBA).

The survey’s conclusion read. “Without increased and consistent local, federal and state help, it is possible that nearly half of the breweries operating in New York state could shut down after three months,” Nearly half — 46% of breweries — said they could last between one and three months under current conditions. About a quarter said they could continue operating for three to six months. Ten percent said they could last for the next one to four weeks.

New York has been the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S., with nearly 300,000 cases and 17,000 deaths. Gov. Andrew Cuomo was among the first governors to mandate a statewide shutdown of on-premise sales at bars and restaurants shutdowns on March 16.
On Sunday, Cuomo announced that the order will likely extend beyond its planned expiration date of May 15, but he said some regions of the state could see a relaxation of restrictions based on infection rates, Reuters reported.

As breweries nationwide have lost taproom draft sales, they’ve pivoted to offer to-go sales, curbside pickups and home delivery. In New York, 37% of breweries are offering to-go sales, a quarter are offering curbside pickup and 8% are offering home delivery. Twenty percent are selling beer through their distribution network.


Brewers Association Lays Off 23% of Staff, Reduces Salaries of Management Team

The Brewers Association (BA) laid off 23% of its staff last week “in order to maintain the long-term viability” of the national trade group, which represents the interests of small and independent U.S. craft brewers.

The BA announced the job cuts on its website Monday.

In addition to the job cuts, the BA has enacted tiered salary reduction for its management team, in addition to operational budget cuts that were made earlier in April.
The BA was forced to cancel two of its signature events — the annual Craft Brewers Conference & BrewExpo America and SAVOR — as well as the World Beer Cup competition earlier this spring due to concerns caused by the spread of COVID-19 in the U.S. CBC was expected to draw more than 13,000 industry professionals to San Antonio, Texas, from April19-22.

Tickets are still on sale for the BA’s next event, the American Homebrewers Association’s Homebrew Con, which is slated to take place June 18-20 in Nashville, Tennessee.

Brewers Association, Bottleshare Introduce Fund for Breweries, Guilds

The Brewers Association (BA) today announced it has formed a partnership with nonprofit fundraising organization Bottleshare to establish the “Believe in Beer Fund” to support breweries and state brewers guilds across the country that have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Starting today, the BA and Bottleshare are accepting applications from guilds and breweries in need of financial support, as well as donations from consumers for the fund via GoFundMe, with a stated goal of raising $1 million, through Sunday, May 17. The goal of the fund is to provide financial support to pay payroll, rent and utilities.

Boston Beer Execs Discuss Keeping Up with Truly Hard Seltzer Demand, On-Premise ‘Devastation’

The story of Boston Beer Company’s Truly Hard Seltzer brand remains the same; the company can’t keep up with demand for the hard seltzer category’s second largest brand. The mid-March pantry stock up caused by the novel coronavirus shutting down virtually all on-premise sales led to a spike in Truly sales earlier than expected.

Executives from Boston Beer explained Wednesday that the inventory that they had built up for an expected summer rush of sales was instead depleted earlier than planned (Boston Beer reported Q1 depletions growth of 32% and shipments growth of 36%).

So Boston Beer’s summer inventory is smaller than anticipated, but the company believes it has enough capacity between its internal capacity and external production at contract facility City Brewery in Memphis.

Supplementing that capacity is two new full-time canning lines, Boston Beer founder Jim Koch said. The first came online within the last two weeks at Boston Beer’s Pennsylvania brewery, and the second at City Brewery in Memphis will be operational in May. Both of those lines will more than double Boston Beer’s production of Truly in order to meet demand in the summer months and the back-half of 2020.

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