America’s Independents:
Tomorrow’s Classic Beers

by Timpthy Harper and Therese Mierswa

In the United States and Canada, new regional independents are the backbone of the craft brewing industry. While micros and brewpubs are under pressure, and the brewing giants scramble for market share, the regional independents occupy the healthiest niche in the industry. The successful independents share a remarkably consistent profile.

Britain’s New Independents

by Roger Protz

At a time of worrying turbulence in the British brewing industry, there is a quiet success story to be told. The arrival of several hundred new independents over the past 20 years has been vital in ensuring choice for drinkers. And it has been the new independents that have dared to break the mold and widen the beery horizons.

 

The New Brewers of Belgium: Eccentric Entrepreneurs

by Tim Webb

Newer Belgian breweries have a problem: the competition from dozens of well-established, well-respected breweries that produce marvelous beers. A case in point: a beer as unique to us as Duvel comes from a relatively large, established brewery. To break into the market, a new brewer has to make a product of distinction.

Independent Breweries in a Changing Germany

by Herbert Latz-Weber

Germany is a giant among brewing nations, topping the international list for beer production, numbers of breweries, and per capita consumption. It sounds like a brewer's paradise. Yet German beer drinkers' habits are changing, and the shape of the German beer industry has altered. And the independent brewer, sandwiched between the purely local brewpubs and the well-heeled conglomerates, may feel the pinch most keenly.

Czech Independents: from Marx to Markets

by Marshall Dunlap

With the collapse of communism in the “Velvet Revolution” of 1989, all of Czechoslovakia, especially the Czech Republic, moved towards a private, market-driven economy. With government purse strings severed, Czech breweries were forced to privatize. Profitability, investment, competition and marketing are the new watchwords as a classic industry plunges headlong into western capitalism. Will the beer suffer?