While the rest of the world obsessed over Comey, Russia, and massive document dumps in May, the craft beer world http://www.teamcardinalsprostore.com/buy-2017-discount-chris-johnso... followed its own completely separate soap opera. First, on May 3, Anheuser-Busch InBev bought Asheville, North Carolina’s Wicked Weed Brewery, a highly regarded regional brewery known for sour beers. The next day, Lagunitas—already half-owned by Heineken—sold the other half of its business to the Dutch mega-brewer. The rest of the month, craft beer purists worked to outdo each other in displaying their contempt for AB InBev: Brewers pulled out of Wicked Weed’s annual sour beer festival (leading to the event’s postponement and reconfiguring), hops suppliers cried foul when AB InBev kept the entire South African hop harvest for themselves (and the 10 craft breweries they’ve purchased) and a guy in San Diego decided to rain on the grand opening of a new 10 Barrel Brewing Company brewpub by pointing out the company is actually owned http://www.00fenrir.com/shop-nfl-san-francisco-49ers-cheap-colin-ka... by AB InBev—an aerial banner reading “10 BARREL IS NOT CRAFT BEER” flying over their block party was his medium of choice. He asked for $900 on GoFundMe, and raised almost $5,000.
By contrast, the most serious response to the Lagunitas sale was some major eye-rolling at founder Tony Magee’s over-the-top blog post (where he compared himself to Jonah being eaten by the whale).
This past month of beer news was like a Rorschach test for beer lovers—reactions were strong and served to sort folks into oppositional camps. There was even a beer blog that published a blacklist of breweries and other beer blogs owned or funded by AB InBev called “The Cut Off.” That list made no mention of Lagunitas or any other breweries recently purchased by companies other than AB InBev like Ballast Point, Firestone Walker, or Cigar City. For a certain segment of beer enthusiasts, animosity Arthur Brown Youth Jersey toward Anheuser-Busch is at an all-time high.
Perhaps we’re seeing the seeds Samuel Adams founder Jim Koch planted in his April op-ed in The New York Times begin to sprout. Under the provocative headline, “Is It Last Call For Craft Beer?” he laid out a case the case that AB InBev’s anti-competitive practices could spell the end of craft beer as we know it. His argument centered on its merger with SABMiller and unfair distribution practices. Though derided by some at the time as a way for Koch to justify Sam Adams’ sagging sales figures, the past two months have probably caused some of Koch’s critics to change their tune.
No matter how AB InBev makes you feel about C.J. Prosise Authentic Jersey your beer, chances are there’s something you would like in this month’s Pick Six. I can, however, guarantee you that AB InBev owns zero percent of these breweries as of June 1, 2017.