Will Mergers Help Small Breweries Compete with Big Beer.
By now it’s a familiar story. AB InBev, MillerCoors, and Heineken continue to grab headlines with their ongoing quest to assimilate prominent craft breweries into their respective portfolios. Meanwhile, another controversial phenomenon in the beer business is attracting far less fanfare: small to midsize breweries purchasing each other, with increasing frequency.
At the end of 2014, Green Flash Brewing Company surprised the San Diego scene with its acquisition of nearby Alpine Beer Company. The two breweries shared a common county as well as a penchant for hop-forward IPAs, so their union wasn’t that much of a stretch, but in hindsight, it seems like a turning point. Less than two years later, upwards of a dozen such mergers and acquisitions have gone down.
What does it mean for the breweries involved? And more importantly, what does it say about the future of craft brewing?
This story is from the #116 (September 2016) edition of BeerAdvocate magazine.
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This story is from the #116 (September 2016) edition of BeerAdvocate magazine.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
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