US Beer Fans Remain Brand Loyal Despite Rising Beer Prices

With inflation in the US raging consumers getting increasingly cautious about how and where they are spending their available dollars. But one analytics firm has found that beer lovers aren’t abandoning their favorite brews in spite of recent price rises.

Here’s the latest…

Beer sales have long been a gauge of the economy. It takes a lot for beer lovers to abandon their brews.

But now with inflation near a 40 year high and the cost of brewing a beer (raw materials, shipping cost, etc.) on the rise, breweries are being forced to raise the prices of their products and increasingly consumers are buying less beer.

During the last 13 weeks of 2022, beer prices at retail rose “much higher than normal,” according to Bump Williams Consulting.

Using Nielsen data the Shelton, Connecticut-based alcohol industry analytics company also found, that while prices have risen across all alcoholic drinks categories in recent months, beer drinkers are not holding off on buying what they want, but are instead changing their buying habits.

Bump Williams Consulting vice president of analytics and insights Dave Williams said that, between October to December 2022, the average case price for beer leapt 7% to 8% which, compared to a typical year, would have normally seen an increase of between 3% to 5%.

Williams explained that the industry has done a good job at insulating consumers from a lot of the rising costs and pressures from manufactures and wholesalers but eventually, “it got to the point where a move had to be made.”

“Beer sales showed moderate gains, increasing 5.2% during the three final months of the year,” Williams said, however, volume of beer sold declined 2.3%. But while the insight firm found that people are absorbing the rising prices of beer in the US by buying less beer, they are continuing to purchase it for all their drinking occasions and are remaining true to their favorite brands.

“Consumers will always find a way to meet a beverage alcohol occasion that they want to meet” Williams added, noting that their recent survey found that as the Drinks Business reported “people were maintaining their beer consumption, but more inclined to buy in smaller package sizes, and cutting back on the number of trips they are making to the shops.”

Bottom line…

In the face of continuing inflation, consumers are becoming increasingly cautious about how, where and why they spend their available dollars, but still buying the beer brands that they love…just less of it.

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