NC names left off list of nation's top-selling breweries
North Carolina didn't have any local names on an annual list of the nation's top-selling craft breweries in 2016.
Posted — UpdatedPennsylvania's D.G. Yuengling & Son, Inc. and Boston Beer Company, which owns Samuel Adams, held down the top two spots among craft brewers. Sierra Nevada Brewing Co., New Belgium Brewing Co. and Gambrinus from San Antonio rounded out the top five.
California owned 12 of the top 50, Colorado claimed five and Alaska landed one.
Margo Knight Metzger, executive director of the North Carolina Craft Brewers Guild, attributed the absence of Tar Heel breweries among the top 50 to two things: high excise taxes and distribution laws.
Currently, breweries that make less than 25,000 barrels per year can also distribute their own product. Breweries that make more than 25,000 limit, though, are forced by state law to use a distributor.
"We have a handful of really fast-growing, well-respected breweries that could make that list over the next few years," Metzger said.
Increasing the limit has public support, too.
Metzger said public support along with bi-partisan work in the state legislature would help improve craft beer's standing nationally.
"Our bottom line is that (beer) is a positive industry for North Carolina, and as it evolves, we need the regulations to evolve along with it," Metzger said.
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