To help breweries, tourism boards, and visitors bureaus better distinguish their diverse beers and brewing scenes, we create fresh and compelling content that, with insightful and engaging writing, aims to gain more exposure for cities, regions, and breweries.
Ten years ago, there were roughly 1,600 breweries in America, and having just five or six in any given region was reason enough to celebrate with a fresh IPA or two. Forward-looking cities started Ale Trail programs, fertilizer for the early days of beer tourism. Visit all these taprooms, get a stamp and earn yourself a hat.
This approach was a novelty during the formative moments of America’s craft-beer boom, as taprooms introduced both tourists and residents to the charms and tastes of locally brewed beer. Times have changed dramatically, as have the beers. Today’s landscape is filled with hazy IPAs and stouts reminiscent of dessert, sour beers sprinkled with glitter and flavored with Fruity Pebbles. Breweries have evolved into idiosyncratic showcases of a brewer’s talent and native ingredients, a true taste of place in a world run wild with chain stores and restaurants.
Meanwhile, in the last five years, interest in beer tourism has grown exponentially.
In 2015, Travelocity surveyed more than 1,000 people about their interest in beer tourism. More than three-quarters of those surveyed said they would enjoy a trip that included visiting craft breweries and sampling local beer. Brewery hotels can now be found in nearly two dozen states and five Canadian provinces. An association of craft-beverage tour operators with 17 members now guides thousands of thirsty travelers to breweries every month. The Maine Brew Bus, for example, hosted close to 3,000 guests between January and June of 2019, and those beer tourists spent $24,505 on alcohol to go, brewery merchandise, and additional tasting samples.
On the other side of the country, California’s Sonoma County Economic Development Board conducted an Economic Impact Study about the celebrated release of Russian River Brewing Company’s Pliny the Younger Triple IPA. Visitors traveled from 42 states and 14 countries, spent an average of $289.78 per night on lodging, and averaged 1.8 nights in a hotel for the annual event. And Russian River is far from the only brewery appealing to tourists. According to TripAdvisor, breweries are top attractions in cities across North America. In San Francisco, Anchor Brewing is #6 of 775 things to do, while New Belgium is #4 of 166 things to do in Asheville, North Carolina. Steam Whistle Brewing is #6 of 536 things to do in Toronto, and both Allagash Brewing and Big Rock Brewery hold down the top slots in, respectively, Portland, Maine, and Calgary, located in Canada’s Alberta province.
With interesting beer everywhere, what compels people to travel to particular cities and regions?
Ben Keene, Kate Bernot, and Joshua M. Bernstein know. We have more than 50 years of combined expertise in covering the brewing industry on a local and national scale, delivering authoritative, deeply researched and timely articles for a wide roster of publications.
