Is Gallo Saving the Wine Industry?
When your share of the pie is as big as Gallo’s and your outlook as long, shrinking almost certainly means a loss. So maybe Constellation Brands’ sale of more than 30 low-priced wines isn’t about Gallo needing more low-price bands, but about the industry needing entry-level brands to continue to bring consumers into the wine category. Perhaps this deal is about Gallo making a strategic move to save the wine industry for future generations of wine businesses? (Wine Industry Advisor)
Napa Staff Shortages Hurting Wineries
Housing costs and immigration laws are restricting workers despite the number of wineries needing staff. (Wine-Searcher)
St. Louis Drank the Breweries Dry: Celebrating End of Prohibition In 1933
More than 25,000 enthusiasts kept vigil outside Anheuser-Busch Inc., South Broadway and Arsenal Street, where a revived workforce had prepared 45,000 cases of beer and was busily brewing more. An additional 10,000 people crowded Forest Park Avenue at Spring Avenue, where Joseph Griesedieck’s new operation produced Falstaff, a brand name he had bought from former brewer William Lemp Jr. shortly after Prohibition began in 1920. Griesedieck had 40,000 cases ready for midnight’s stroke. In less than 24 hours, the city’s supply of beer was totally exhausted. (St. Louis Post-Dispatch)
Millennials Are Sick of Drinking. But they’re not giving up booze just yet.
In the past few weeks, I’ve heard from more than 100 Americans in their 20s and 30s who have begun to make similar changes in their drinking habits or who are contemplating ways to drink less. They have good company: Public-health efforts have helped drive down adolescent drinking rates, and American beverage manufacturers are beginning to hedge their bets on alcohol’s future. Media too have noticed that change is afoot. Recent months have seen a flurry of trend stories about Millennials—currently about 22 to 38 years old—getting sober.
What some have been quick to characterize as an interest in being sober might actually be more like a search for moderation in a culture that has long treated alcohol as a dichotomy: Either you drink whenever the opportunity presents itself, or you don’t drink at all. Many Millennials—and especially the urban, college-educated consumers prized by marketers—might just be tired of drinking so much. (The Atlantic)