Top 10 Brewery Industry Trends and Statistics in 2025

For a while, it seemed like there was a new brewery popping up every week. Though the boom in local and small breweries has slightly slowed, the consumer demand for craft brewing is still high and consumers love going to breweries for great beers and great food.

Now, in 2025, independent brewers and their teams are continuing to get back onto steady ground, but they’re facing new challenges. 

We’ll get into everything you need to know about the beer and brewing industry today.

Key Takeaways

• Brewery Industry Trends and Statistics: Craft brewing remains highly popular, with independent brewers adapting to steady demand while facing challenges like supply chain disruptions and rising costs.

• Brewery Industry Market Analysis: The U.S. beer industry revenue hit $129.3 billion in 2024, with major corporations holding 46% of global market share. Despite this, local and craft breweries thrive by offering unique experiences and brews.

• Emerging Brewery Industry Trends: Supply chain disruptions have led to rising prices and limited offerings for many breweries, making recipe costing and inventory management crucial.

• Events and Local Food Partnerships: Breweries are leveraging their spaces for events and partnering with local food vendors to enhance customer experiences and boost sales.

• E-commerce and Social Media: Online beer sales, a necessity during the pandemic, continue to drive revenue. Social media remains essential for breweries to connect with their audiences and market new offerings.

• Taproom Popularity: Taprooms, minimalist brewery spaces focusing solely on beer, are becoming increasingly popular for on-premise consumption.

• Labor Shortages and Staffing Challenges: Breweries are combating staffing challenges by offering higher wages and better benefits, though these measures increase operational costs.

• Consumer Beer Trends: From hazy IPAs and sour beers to non-alcoholic and CBD-infused options, consumers continue to seek innovative and diverse beer styles. Sustainability and eco-friendly practices are also shaping the industry.

• Technology and Automation: Breweries are embracing new technologies like POS systems, QR code ordering, and loyalty apps to enhance efficiency and customer experience.

Brewery industry market analysis

The market segmentation in the beer industry includes two distinct camps: off-trade, which means beer purchased for consumption at home, and on-trade, which refers to beer consumed on-premise at a brewery, bar, or restaurant.

Overall, in 2024, the US beer industry revenue grew to $129.3 billion. 

The vast majority of the beer industry market share is still held by major corporations. The top five companies, including Annheuser-Busch Inbev, a brewing company and distributor, account for around 46% of global beer sales. Despite this, local and craft breweries continue to open everywhere and provide beer drinkers with fun and interesting brews to try beyond what they can find at the supermarket.

The number of breweries have been booming since the 90s, with the craft beer industry craze really picking up around 2006. But before then, over the course of the second half of the 20th century, brewpubs became legal around the US, one state at a time, as they surged in popularity. Then, in 2013, microbreweries would overtake brewpubs in popularity. 

What’s the difference between breweries, brewpubs, and microbreweries? Brewpubs are restaurant-brewery hybrids, with at least 25% of their onsite brewed beer sold and consumed onsite. Microbreweries, on the other hand, sell at least 75% of their brewed beer to other retailers, but they often have a small area at their large facilities for onsite consumption. Some offer food, some don’t.

Steadily, beer consumption continues to shift towards drinking out of the house instead of at home: Out-of-home revenue (e.g., revenue generated in restaurants and bars) amounted to US$51 billion in 2024. 

Brewery industry trends emerging

Supply chain concerns

Beer production can encounter roadblocks after roadblocks. Agriculture has been heavily impacted, so barley, wheat, and other critical raw materials for beer have been delayed, unavailable, or at a vastly higher price than usual.

This has meant that regional breweries everywhere are raising their prices, and in some cases, limiting their offerings to a smaller range of beers. If an ingredient has become prohibitively expensive, and a brewer would have to charge $20 for a beer to bring in their target profit margin, it’s not worth keeping on the menu.

Recipe costing is especially important for large-scale beer operations, so an inventory platform can be a big help instead of tackling the job manually.

Events and local food partnerships

Breweries are often perfect spaces for hosting events, from weddings to craft fair pop-ups to Dungeons and Dragons meetups to trivia nights and concerts. They’re typically open spaces with big tables and they lend themselves well to hosting large groups. 

Some breweries choose to partner with local restaurants and food trucks to provide food for their patrons. It’s a nice-to-have during normal weekly service, but it’s necessary on days when they’re hosting events, as guests will be sticking around for many hours if all goes well. And drinking great beers can certainly make patrons hungry — so it’s a good idea to provide a way to feed the crowds and increase average check size. 

E-commerce and social media

Thanks to the pandemic, breweries had to up their ecommerce game, offering beer sales online, either for local pickup or delivery, or even nationwide delivery. Luckily, beer is relatively easy to ship locally or even globally, especially when compared to what restaurants go through when offering meals to go.

Breweries used social media to reach their customers and target demographic, advertising sales and new beers, to make up for lost on-premise revenue over the course of the pandemic. Though on-premise consumption has now returned, nearly in full force, online beer sales continue to be a dependable revenue stream for breweries. 

Beer brands know that to reach their target audience online, it’s important to post where they are. If your microbrewery is full of young families and millennials, Instagram may be your best bet. If you’re in a college town and cater mostly to Gen Z, sharing TikTok’s about the brewing process is a great way to draw in both online and on-prem sales.

Taprooms are gaining popularity

As opposed to microbreweries and brew pubs, taprooms are a new, booming form of on-premise beer drinking spaces. Taprooms, which are breweries that have a small space for consumers to come drink their beers, don’t offer any food and are typically somewhat industrial in look and feel. Many sell their beers wholesale and direct to consumers to drink at home.

The labor shortage and staffing crisis

One of the biggest challenges still causing headaches among brewers is the labor crisis. Staffing has been more difficult than ever, as many bar industry workers left the field and have since found better pay in environments elsewhere.

This means it’s harder to attract great staff, so breweries are raising their wages and providing better benefits — which, along with a great company culture, works wonders. But this does mean that labor costs have also skyrocketed, so breweries have had to raise their prices to cover these additional costs.

Learn more about how hospitality businesses are embracing change and creating a work environment that attracts the best talent.

Beer industry consumer trends

There are dozens of beer styles, from the mainstream to the ultra-niche. While some beer trends come and go, others have shown real staying power. But among beer drinkers, especially craft beer enthusiasts, there’s always an appetite to try something new, high-quality, and exciting. 

Out of all the types of alcoholic beverages, beer is by far the most commonly consumed drink in the U.S., with the majority of drinkers opting for light beer. 

Here are some beer trends making waves at breweries these days.

1. Hard seltzers. Beer companies of all sizes adding hard seltzer to their roster of beverages, since the drink has become exceedingly popular among various demographic groups. 

2. Rosé beer. Since around 2019, rosé beer has been a popular type of beer made by craft brewers. They are typically in the realm of goses and sour beers, and have special ingredients like berries, grapes, or hibiscus to lend tartness and color.

3. Sours. Sour beers, including goses, have grown in popularity over the past several years, offering a very different drinking experience than a typical lager or ale. They range from slightly sour to mouth-puckeringly tart, and often feature ingredients like citrus and coriander, but they get the bulk of their tartness from the bacteria produced in the fermentation process.

4. Lager. A longtime easy-drinking, crowd-pleasing favorite, lager is a bottom-fermenting beer originally from Bavaria and the surrounding areas. Budweiser, PBR, Coors, and many other well-known beers are lagers. In fact, it’s the most popular type of beer worldwide.  

5. Hazy IPA. In the early 2010s, super hoppy double (or even triple) IPAs were extremely popular among craft beer drinkers. Today, hazy IPAs have gained popularity, getting their name from the fact that they are unfiltered and dry-hopped, lending their cloudy look and more delicate, often fruitier flavor.

6. Stouts. Dark, sweet, often chocolaty stouts are a go-to choice for a fall and winter beer. They’re heavier in feel, and sometimes even creamy, but range widely in alcohol content.

7. Pale ale. Brewed with pale malt and ale yeast, these amber-colored beers are bready and caramelly, with a moderate alcohol content. They’re a popular choice to pair with a wide variety of foods, so they’re a great choice for a brewpub.

8. Non-alcoholic beer. Every year more and more people choose to cut down their alcohol consumption to protect their long-term health, or cut it out completely. Beer companies of all sizes have caught on to this trend, brewing zero-proof beers that let the drinker enjoy the taste of beer without the hangover.

9. CBD-infused beers. With the rise of CBD’s popularity, breweries are crafting CBD-infused beers that combine classic beer flavors with the calming benefits of CBD, offering a unique option for wellness-focused drinkers.

10. Eco-Friendly Brewing Practices: Sustainability is now central to brewing, with eco-conscious consumers driving practices like renewable energy use and eco-friendly packaging. This shift, led by brands like Sierra Nevada, is becoming the industry standard.

Technology, innovation, and automation

Breweries, like restaurants of all kinds, have invested in updating their tech to make operations run more smoothly during the pandemic and beyond. From POS systems with built-in online ordering capabilities, to handhelds that let servers take orders easily all over the taproom, to QR codes that guide customers through the ordering process on their own, to loyalty apps, updated restaurant technology has helped breweries maximize revenue and get by during tough times.

Breweries continue to create great beer-drinking environments in their communities

Breweries continue to pop up in new neighborhoods, providing a fun environment for beer drinkers to relax and enjoy a few brews. Many partner with food trucks or restaurants nearby to provide food and snacks, while others have onsite full-service kitchens. Some are dog-friendly and family-friendly, while others are much rowdier.

But no matter what type of brewery you run, staying on top of industry issues and beer trends can help you stay flexible and keep customers coming back week after week.

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