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A New Brewery Nearly Every Day

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Senior Vice President of Professional Brewing Division

Paul Gatza is the Senior Vice President of Professional Brewing Division at the Brewers Association. Paul’s origin in the beer community started when he took up homebrewing in 1990. He worked on the bottling line at Boulder Beer and would sneak over to the brewhouse when opportunity allowed. He owned a pair of homebrew supply shops in Boulder and Longmont, Colorado from 1994 to 1998. He served as director of the American Homebrewers Association for seven years and is in his 23rd year as Brewers Association director. Paul is ranked as a National Beer Judge by the Beer Judge Certification Program. Paul is also a former judge director of both the Great American Beer Festival and World Beer Cup, before moving to the judge panels for these elite competitions.

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July, 16, 2010

Erin Glass is the Brewers Association Membership Coordinator and Brewery Detective. She is busy busy these days. The part of Erin’s job that involves tracking down leads for new brewery openings is increasing in demand. For all of 2009, she confirmed 110 new brewery openings. Erin has uncovered 154 brewery openings in her work this year. We could approach 250 new brewery openings this year. Gulp! Wait, make that 154 into a 155. She found another one as I type.

Things are moving fast out there. It isn’t just an increasing number of nanobreweries, either. We are seeing strong growth in the traditional brewery openings–you know, a business plan for a microbrewery or brewpub that gets out of the  planning phase and into operation. 

Where does that put us for brewery counts? We believe there were 1,625 U.S. breweries as of the June 30 count. While the brewpub roster is climbing a little, up to 993, as we see some closings to offset the growth somewhat, the number of microbreweries is at 520 now. 

Will it continue for the rest of the year? Here’s a stat. One year ago we had 260 projects on our breweries-in-planning list. Today we have 389. Let’s hope all of the people behind these breweries understand that quality has been a major driver of segment growth and prioritize bringing great beer to the beer drinkers.

Paul Gatza

Link to author biography
Senior Vice President of Professional Brewing Division

Paul Gatza is the Senior Vice President of Professional Brewing Division at the Brewers Association. Paul’s origin in the beer community started when he took up homebrewing in 1990. He worked on the bottling line at Boulder Beer and would sneak over to the brewhouse when opportunity allowed. He owned a pair of homebrew supply shops in Boulder and Longmont, Colorado from 1994 to 1998. He served as director of the American Homebrewers Association for seven years and is in his 23rd year as Brewers Association director. Paul is ranked as a National Beer Judge by the Beer Judge Certification Program. Paul is also a former judge director of both the Great American Beer Festival and World Beer Cup, before moving to the judge panels for these elite competitions.

See Paul Gatza's Articles