Everyone knows the tale of Brand X getting bought out by some faceless global conglomerate and going to shit, but does the opposite ever happen?
Everyone knows the tale of Brand X getting bought out by some faceless global conglomerate and going to shit, but does the opposite ever happen?
Appalachian Mountain Brewery.
They paved the way for new breweries in a little mountain town in western North Carolina. They consistently gave significant percentages to charities, often local. They built a recognized brand and then sold to Anheuser Busch InBev. AB InBev helped them reach new craft beer drinkers with a huge corporate backing. The business ran the same as far as a local consumer could tell. They got a lot of new insight and opportunities.
And then two of the original founders bought it back from AB InBev. First time that’s ever happened. Really great guys too. Very happy to continue to see their journey.
That sounds a lot like Chipotle. Sold to McDonalds, exploded in popularity, and bought themselves back.
Now it’s time they sold it back. Those fuckers won’t let me order my precious queserito anymore :(
The beer bust is happening. Craft beer isn’t the darling it money maker it was a decade ago.
Sounds like this brewery navigated this well and sold high and bought low, but the amount of breweries closing by me is crazy
Another brewery in NC for bought out by AB, Wicked Weed.
I just checked and it looks like they recently bought themselves back from AB, nice.
Might be a similar story to Appalachian Mountain.
Dogfish Head is now owned by Boston Beer Company, and they have continued to put out great beers imo.
AB InBev does some great stuff with their craft owners. If it made sense for them to buy it back that’s awesome, but their mantra around craft really is: “you’ve got success, we’re just going to give you more tools”. A lot of the big folks like Duvall operate that way and you wind up with regional breweries shipping kegs around the world.