Millennials ‘destroying’ core beer brands: ‘Bar Rescue’s’ Jon Taffer
Americans aren’t drinking booze like they used to.
Millennials are disrupting the beer industry, according to Jon Taffer, the host of the Paramount Network’s “Bar Rescue,” who said sales in the beer industry are declining as millennials turn to other options.
“What’s happening to the beer companies is, they are losing all their craft beer sales but the core brands are getting destroyed,” Taffer told FOX Business’ Stuart Varney. “So light beers -- Coors Light, Miller Light, Bud Light -- they are consumed later in the evening after people have one or two craft beers and they move into a light beer direction.”
Craft breweries in the United States make up 98% of the brewing industry as a whole, according to a trade group representing small and independent American craft brewers, and account for roughly 23% of the overall U.S. beer market.
Taffer added that they are willing to shell out up to 30% more on craft beers to quench their palates.
The craft wine and spirit industries are also heating up, he said.
“Spirits are hot now, craft spirits are hot now, flavored spirits are hot now,” he said, adding that more distilleries are popping up all over the U.S.
Spirits gained market share versus beer with sales rising to 36.6% of the total beverage alcohol market, according to a national trade association representing producers and marketers of distilled spirits sold in the U.S.
Supplier sales of whiskeys, rums, vodkas and other spirits rose 4% last year increasing $1 billion to a new high of $26.2 billion.