Beer News: Challenging Times For Oregon Brewers / Beer Fans Choose Buzz Over Taste

, Beer News: Challenging Times For Oregon Brewers / Beer Fans Choose Buzz Over Taste

The beer biz never sleeps at American Craft Beer. And here’s just some of what’s been happening in the beer world while you were drinking your way through the weekend.

Beer Fans Choose Buzz Over Taste

In spite of growth in the non-alcoholic beer segment, American Craft Beer has long contended that the primary reason that people drink beer is for mood-enhancement…And a Northwestern University study has come around to our position.

Researchers from the Northwestern University Feinberg’s School of Medicine in Chicago found that the taste preferences for bitter or sweet beverages aren’t based on variations in taste genes, but rather in genes that are involved with emotional responses according to NBC News.

The results of the study, which were published in the journal Human Molecular Genetics, strike us as confirming the obvious, that people drink beer and coffee primarily for their psychoactive qualities as does the cannabis consumer.

Yes, the buzzes are distinctly different, but the primary desired effect for coffee and beer drinkers is to “feel different” according to researchers at Northwestern University.

And according to Marilyn Cornelis the Assistant Professor of Preventive Medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine it’s about how these drinks make you feel…

“The genetics underlying our preferences are related to the psychoactive components of these drinks,” People like the way coffee and alcohol make them feel. That’s why they drink it. It’s not the taste.”

 

Words to Drink By

“‘It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is most adaptable to change.” Charles Darwin, English naturalist, geologist and biologist

 

Oregon Brewers Face Hard Times

“For nearly the first time this century, Oregon lost more breweries than new ones opened,” KVAL 13 reports. “US beer shipments for 2023 are at the lowest level this century after falling more than 5%.”

, Beer News: Challenging Times For Oregon Brewers / Beer Fans Choose Buzz Over TasteMaybe it’s the ongoing legalization of cannabis, the emergence of alternatives like hard seltzers and canned cocktails, or simply the growing sobriety movement. Maybe it’s all of these things to differing degrees, but whatever the reason beer drinking in America has fallen to the lowest level in a generation.

And Oregon, home to nearly 400 breweries, brewpubs, and taprooms which generate billions in output and income and tens of thousands of jobs, is facing its most difficult year in decades as a result.

For nearly the first time this century, Oregon lost more breweries than new ones opened.

“It’s a tough moment for Oregon’s craft brewers,” Ben Edmunds, brewmaster at Breakside Brewery and President of the Oregon Brewers Guild said….

 “Increased costs, changes in consumer preferences, and diminished on-premise consumption all made 2023 an especially challenging year. Oregon consumers have a long history of supporting independent, local breweries, and breweries across the state need that support now more than ever — especially as we head into the start of the year.”

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