• 😃 New Belgium Invests in Open Beer
• 🏃‍♀️ 5 Athletic NA Beers Among Top Growth Brands
• 🎙️ Podcast: Ding Dong, Drizly is Done
• 🥃 Report: Craft Spirits Reach $7.9B in U.S. Sales
• 🌊 Absolut and Ocean Spray Vodka Cranberry RTDs

Los Angeles-based Open Brewing has begun rolling its lager out in Southern California thanks in part to a business partnership with New Belgium Brewing.

In addition to a minority investment, New Belgium contract brews Open’s beer, consults the brewery’s team and offers other “shared resources,” a New Belgium spokesperson told Brewbound. 

Open Beer managing director Keir Dillon said in a press release: "Collaborating with New Belgium Brewing is a game-changer for us. It allows us to blend their brewing and operational excellence with our vision to bring something completely new to the beer and lifestyle community.” 

Dillon, a former professional snowboarder and ESPN analyst turned entrepreneur, has led Open since 2022, according to his LinkedIn profile. The brand was founded by “multi-disciplinary creatives and skateboarding legends” Don “Nuge” Nguyen, Tino Razo and Ako and Atiba Jefferson.

Open’s flagship is a “highly drinkable, light-bodied, crisp pilsner-style lager,” according to the brand’s website. An image of Open’s current batch of cans reads 4.4% ABV.

Six-packs of 12 oz. cans of Open are available at grocery and convenience stores in Southern California. The beer officially launched on December 1, according to the brand’s Instagram account. 

Each batch of Open features art by “a rotating cast of artists” that will refresh biannually, Open wrote on Instagram. The first three artists are Meryl Smith, Joe Roberts and Katsu Sawada, who have designed three different cans, all sold in the same 6-packs. 

Insiders can read more about Open’s head brewer and how craft pilsners performed in 2023.

Seven of the top 25 craft growth brands in 2023 were non-alcoholic (NA) offerings, according to full-year NIQ data shared in Bump Williams Consulting’s 2023 craft review. 

Five of those brands belong to dedicated NA brewer Athletic Brewing Company, including Run Wild IPA (No. 5 growth brand and No. 25 overall craft brand), Free Wave Hazy IPA (No. 10), Upside Dawn Golden (No. 12), Cerveza (No. 22), Athletic Lite (No. 25). 

Athletic capped a big year as the No. 15 craft brand family in sales, which increased +80.6%, as volume measured in case sales increased +79.2%. Athletic was the No. 2 craft growth leader in 2023, increasing sales by more than $35.4 million, to $79.3 million, trailing only New Belgium Brewing Company, which increased sales +18.2%, to $514.8 million, adding more than $79.3 million in sales last year. 

The other NA beers to make the cut as top growth brands in 2023 were Boston Beer’s Samuel Adams Just the Haze IPA (No. 15) and Lagunitas Hoppy Refresher assorted pack (No. 18).

On the other end of the ABV spectrum, New Belgium’s high ABV Voodoo Ranger Juice Force and Fruit Force offerings ranked as the top two craft growth brands in 2023. Off-premise sales of Juice Force in its second full-year reached nearly $116.7 million, while Fruit Force sales topped $45 million in its first full year. 

Five other New Belgium-owned brands made the top craft growth brands list, including:

• No. 4 Voodoo Ranger Imperial IPA;
• No. 11 Bell’s assorted IPA pack;
• No. 14 Voodoo Ranger Hoppy pack;
• No. 17 Bell’s Hazy Hearted IPA;
• No. 20 Bell’s Two Hearted IPA.

Voodoo Ranger Imperial IPA closed 2023 as the No. 2 overall craft brand, growing sales +8.8%, to nearly $160 million. The brand trailed only Molson Coors-owned Blue Moon Belgian White, whose sales declined -3.1%, to $283.9 million.

New Belgium finished 2023 as the top craft brand family, with overall dollar sales increasing +18.2%, to $514.8 million. 

🌑 Molson Coors Top Craft Vendor, But New Belgium Gaining 

Fort Collins, Colorado-headquartered New Belgium also trailed Molson Coors as the top craft vendor. However, adding sibling brand Bell’s, whose data is kept separate from New Belgium, into New Belgium’s sales totals surpasses Molson Coors. Bell’s alone ranked as the eleventh largest craft vendor, with nearly $112.4 million in sales.

Just five of the remaining top 15 craft vendors, beyond Molson Coors and New Belgium, increased dollar sales in 2023. The top 15, in order of dollars sales, included: 

3. Anheuser-Busch InBev’s craft portfolio ($464.6 million, -1.5% dollar sales);

4. Sierra Nevada ($357 million, +4.3%);

5. Boston Beer ($310.9 million, -4.3%);

6. Tilray Brands ($211 million, -4.8%);

7. Heineken/Lagunitas ($178.8 million, -7.5%);

8. Gambrinus/Shiner ($135.59 million, -0.7%);

9. Founders ($125.9 million, +2.2%);

10. Firestone Walker ($122.1 million, -2.9%);

11. Bell’s Brewery ($112.4 million, +6.5%);

12. Monster Beverage/CANarchy ($97.1 million, -5.6%);

13. Artisanal Brewing Ventures ($92.3 million, +2.7%);

14. Sapporo/Stone ($87.98 million, -1%);

15. Athletic ($79.6 million, +81.4%).

The only top 15 craft vendors to increase both dollars and volume outside of New Belgium were Bell’s (+7.1% volume), ABV (+1.8%) and Athletic (+80.1%).

💀 New Belgium Top Craft Brand Family

Zeroing in on craft brand families, Sierra Nevada ranked second to New Belgium. Although Blue Moon Belgian White remains the top-selling craft brand, the Blue Moon family ranked as the third overall craft brand family in off-premise sales, with dollars declining -8.5% and shedding nearly -12% in volume. 

Brewbound Insiders can go deeper into the top 25 craft brand families, craft growth and loss leaders, and the overall craft picture in 2023. 

U.S. craft spirits topped $7.9 billion in sales in 2022, growing 5.3% in value and 6.1% in volume, but slowed considerably from the year prior, according to a new report.

The data comes from the 2023 Craft Spirits Data Project, released by the American Craft Spirits Association (ACSA) and Park Street yesterday.

While there was still growth in 2022, the numbers dipped from 2021 when U.S. craft spirits volume grew by 10.4% and value by 12.2%. But the craft spirits market share of total U.S. spirits maintained a 4.9% share in volume and increased value share to 7.7% in 2022, up from 7.5% in 2021.

While there is no legal definition of a craft distillery, the data project defines them as licensed U.S. distilled spirits producers that have removed 750,000 proof gallons or less from bond, market themselves as craft, are not openly controlled by a large supplier, and have no proven violation of the ACSA Code of Ethics.

Insiders can read more from BevNET spirits editor Ferron Salniker.

Drizly will be no more as of March. The week started with Uber announcing plans to shut down the e-commerce alcohol delivery platform. Brewbound editor Justin Kendall and weekend newsletter writer Sean McNulty discuss the decision and why it’s another blow for brewers. (Co-hosts Jess Infante and Zoe Licata are on the road this week.)

Plus, the duo discuss full-year 2023 craft beer scan data, the narrative (or lack thereof) for craft heading into 2024, and why the early read isn’t great. 

Other topics include: New Jersey finally giving the state’s craft breweries a break, Tilray wilding out with new products and Lawson’s trying to get the low-ABV Beach Party started.’

Listen here and on all popular podcasting platforms. 

Another legacy non-alcoholic beverage maker has teamed up with a spirits brand to launch a ready-to-drink canned cocktail. This time, the match made in Cape Codder heaven is between Ocean Spray and Absolut, who have teamed up to produce a line of vodka cocktails with cranberry juice and sparkling water.

The RTDs are available in 8-packs of 4.5% ABV 355 mL cans, featuring two cans each of four flavors: Vodka Cranberry, Vodka Cran-Grape, Vodka Cran-Pineapple and Vodka Cran-Raspberry. Single-serve cans are also available.

Last fall, Absolut’s parent company Pernod Ricard announced a partnership with Coca-Cola for a line of Absolut and Sprite RTDs, which will be available in Europe in 2024.