A new report by the CBRE Group, a California-based real estate and investment firm is shedding new light on how Ohio’s surging craft beer industry is impacting the state’s real estate landscape.

According to Crain’s Cleveland Business, CBRE’s 2018 Update: Ohio Craft Beer Taking Flight reported that “73 craft breweries in the Northeast Ohio market occupy more than 713,000 square feet of real estate, 29% of the statewide total.”

Cincinnati breweries currently occupy the most real estate square footage in Ohio followed by Cleveland and Columbus…

And as Crain’s Jeremy Nobile notes “Columbus breweries claim 21% of the market (with 53 breweries occupying more than 508,000 square feet) while Cincinnati leads the way with about 35% of the market (44 breweries occupying more than 864,000 square feet).

CBRE’s study, which looked at craft breweries over a three year period (2015 through 2017), included 238 Ohio breweries that combined occupy a total of 2.4 million square feet of real estate.

And CBRE detailed that in two-and-a-half years, the number of breweries in Ohio grew 72%, while the space they take up increased 57%…

“In Northeast Ohio, while most of the breweries are still centered within the urban core, a number are now starting to open outside of the metro area among historic suburbs…Long-established breweries continue to experience success, which has encouraged growth not just in distribution, but in physical presence as well.”

CBRE senior research analyst Demetri Sampanis sees the craft beer industry accelerating in Ohio and revitalizing neighborhoods as it does…

“The movement is still picking up steam…The business is very local and each brewery has a story to tell. That bodes well for neighborhood development as the breweries attract people to the neighborhood. It’s all about the experience and the taproom is the draw.”

CBRE also noted that that brewery taprooms where beer could “be sold to the public on margins three- to four-times greater than selling to a distributor,” remain the most profitable opportunity for Ohio’s brewers.

Bigtime H/T To Crain’s for their and of course CRBE for their helpful analysis