Recent studies have shown that the demands for craft beers are have been increasing daily, for the last eight years, and the trend is going to continue rising in the years to come.
Reports showed that there was a slight 0.2% drop in volume for the global beer market in 2015, but craft beer volumes increased up to 13% in the same year.
And whilst these small breweries go up against larger breweries like MillerCoors or ABI, they achieved up to 12% market share of the total beer market as of 2015. There is a clear sign that the growth will continue and could take up to 20% of the total beer market by the year 2020, says Bart Watson, chief economist of Brewers Association.
The motive which causes such growth is the demand for fuller flavored craft beer due to the variety of styles that craft brewers have on offer and the consumers’ willingness to spend more money on these beers. Large breweries focus on volume but small breweries score bigger on price.
With higher sales and increasing market share each year, comes the merger and acquisition activities where larger breweries scoop up tiny brewers. This causes concerns for some consumers who are afraid their local craft beer would be taken over, but that will not put a halt to the increase sales of craft beer.