Craft has been mighty blustery, facing a litany of headwinds from ever-increasing competition within alc bevs, shifting societal and consumer behavior, claims of reduced alcohol consumption, messy and expensive supply chains, historically low consumer confidence, so on and so forth. It's a familiar list, Brewers Assn prexy/CEO Bart Watson reviewed during his State of the Industry talk closing the Craft Brewers Conference in Philly this afternoon. But all the doom and gloom, the negative narrative around craft beer represents its own kind of headwind for the segment, he suggested. The reality isn't nearly so bad, he argued.

No one ever said that family businesses are easy. But a panel of cross-generational beer distribs discussed the dynamics that have defined their longstanding companies, as well as their drive to keep going, to kick off the NBWA's BREW Forum this week in DC. Titled "Honest Dinner Table Talk," the segment was filled with insightful comments and playful jabs, featuring Gulf Dist's Elliot and Rebecca Maisel, Matesich Dist's Jim Matesich and Sarah Matesich Schwab, and Doll Dist's Mark Doll and Lauren Doll-Sheeder.

With band members having fulfilled their mandatory military service over past 4 yrs, the K-pop band BTS is ready to start filling up stadiums again, following up some preliminary shows in Korea and Japan with tour commencing in Tampa, Fla, later this month. Good time for group to launch its own bev brand, right? And noodles too! That's what seems to be afoot as Walmart teases pending launch of new brand called Arih that's described as "inspired by BTS" on Walmart pre-order site. It was previewed at recent popup site in Westfield Century City near LA too. Walmart's development partner on launch is LA Libations, judging by shoutout in LinkedIn post this week by gigaretailer's svp for pantry, Melody Richard.

Following 4 straight quarters of decline, Constellation's beer division returned to growth in its fiscal fourth qtr thru Feb 2026 across depletions (+0.6%), net sales (+1%) and shipments (+1.1%), co reported last wk. Yet even amid those improved trends, this marked the first time in 16 yrs Constellation's beer biz declined for the full fiscal yr. Recall, it was same period yr ago when Constellation's 59 qtr growth streak suddenly came to an end. Could Constellation — the consistent growth engine of recent decades — decline for a 2d straight year?

Motor vehicle fatalities fell a sizable 7% in 2025, an acceleration of steady downward progress following sharp pandemic increases, preliminary findings from NHTSA suggest. At the same time, the agency added more color to 2024 results, including a 4% reduction in alcohol-impaired driving fatalities, in line with the overall decline. So a stable 30% of total motor vehicle crash deaths in 2024 were caused in part by a driver impaired by alcohol, the federal agency reported this month. That's in line with figures from a decade ago, though still well above lows seen before the pandemic. Encouragingly, preliminary 2025 figures suggest the overall rate of traffic deaths per miles traveled returned to historic lows.