B.C. craft beer industry in flux as some close and others rebrand

At least a dozen B.C. craft breweries closed their doors for good last year, and industry insiders say rising costs – and not poor sales – are to blame.

"It's the cost of all the business, whether it be the input costs for grains and aluminum cans, or rent,” said Ken Beattie of the BC Craft Brewers Guild.

“So, that's what the challenge is. The challenge is cash flow."

In the central Okanagan, three breweries closed in December alone.

Vice and Virtue Brewing, the Kelowna Brewing Company and Lake Country Brewing are all out of business.

Beattie says some of the breweries that closed last year have been sold and will reopen under new branding, but some are gone forever.

He says the losses are offset by the fact that eight newcomers to the industry recently opened their doors.

In some cases, existing businesses have simply chosen to pivot.

Calister Brewing recently moved from East Vancouver to Port Coquitlam.

The company had been making beer since 2015, and added craft soda a few years later.

Now, it has ditched craft beer altogether and makes soda exclusively, rebranding as Calister Craft Soda.

"The market in Vancouver with the pressures of real estate and property taxes and leases for commercial just became untenable,” said owner Diana Mckenzie. “So, we had to kind of figure out another solution for ourselves and become a bit more flexible."

Craft beer sales traditionally see a bump when the restaurant business is thriving, but that’s not the case right now.

"We are still dealing with the financial fallout from the pandemic. I know no one wants to talk about that, but overall the economy is still not firing on all cylinders,” said Jeff Guinard, executive director of the Alliance of Beverage Licensees. “Customers are going out less often. They haven't got as much money to spend."

With some customers choosing to drink less alcohol, or even forgo it altogether, many breweries have added lighter beers and non-alcoholic options to their lineups in an effort to bolster the bottom line.