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Sunday, March 27, 2016

Deschutes in Virginia

While I was in Dublin, Deschutes announced it would be opening a new production facility in Roanoke, Virginia. Three east coast states were wooing the brewery, but Virginia got the call.
[Virginia Governor Terry] McAuliffe met with Deschutes executives in Oregon last fall and company officials recently visited Richmond, where they enjoyed Deschutes beer in the Executive Mansion kegerator before telling the governor that Virginia won the bid, said Todd Haymore, Virginia Secretary of Agriculture and Forestry.
... Deschutes is getting a $3 million state grant for the project and will be eligible for additional state aid, officials said.
It's going to be a very slow process--Deschutes doesn't even plan to break ground until 2019. There doesn't seem to be any suggestion that this augurs a future change in ownership, so it looks like Deschutes is going to try to compete with AB InBev, MillerCoors, Constellation Brands, and Heineken on its own terms. That could be some tough sledding, but it certainly adds some intrigue to the market as it shapes up.

Interesting times. Anyone have any hot takes on this news?


1 comment:

  1. I'm rather interested in the one upsmanship of the "large regional to national" breweries. With Oskar/Sierra/Stone/New Belgium leading the way, long term projections for breweries like Deschutes feels like it almost *needs* to have this kind of business plan to capitalize on the East Coast. Seems to be a natural progression of how the American beer industry started: West Coast leads the way, but East Coast has to be addressed when capacity allows.

    If you're not selling and betting on your own growth, this kind of actions seems to be an important, if not necessary, step.

    (or, on the flipside, see Russian River, who is perfectly happy maintaining its small, regional footprint. Or New Glarus, which continues to capture minds and make big money by never deviating from their plan.)

    Flipside #2: Short's, which committed to not leaving Michigan, but here we are, with their massive expansion.

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