BOSTON – Craft beer makers are heading to Beacon Hill to oppose a law they say is choking off job growth in the industry.
The Committee on Consumer Protection and Professional Licensure are preparing to hear testimony from craft brewers from around the Commonwealth who claim updating one particular law, which has been on the books since 1972, is not only favorable, but necessary for the continued success and growth of their industry.
An Act relative to small brewers, or Bill H.267, would improve the flexibility of brewers regarding their distrubution deals, and is enjoying support from members of the Massachusetts Brewers Guild, who say they are unable to break away from wholesalers, regardless of the quality of their performance in distributing and marketing craft beers to restaurants, package stores and bars.
Breweries, ranging from Harpoon and Samuel Adams of Boston, to Southampton’s Opa Opa Brewery, will be represented on the Hill at 1 p.m. and Committee on Consumer Protection and Professional Licensure Chairman Representative John Scibak (D-South Hadley) anticipates an insightful afternoon of testimony from the brewers and several distributors alike.
“We’ll listen to a lot of testimony, and our staff will review the bill,” Scibak said. “The Committee could take a number of actions: we could study it, we could kill it, or we could ammend it.”
Scibak also said that there are still ongoing talks regarding brewers potentially being able to seek arbitration if they represent 20 percent or more of a distributor’s market share, but that he couldn’t go into any further detail.
“(This bill) has been kicked around for a couple sessions,” he said. “I’m hopeful we can come up with something… both sides have legitimate arguments.”
Scibak said that distributors claim that the bill works well, that a number of craft breweries have been able to change their distributors, and that the testimonies could potentially bring up some tricky questions for the committee.
“How exactly do you define a ‘craft brewery?’,” he asked, regarding the presence of Harpoon and Samuel Adams, both falling in between the small, hometown brewers such as Opa Opa and Westfield Brewing Company, and the giants such as Anheuser Busch and Miller Coors, which, according to Rob Martin, president of the Massachusetts Brewers Guild and the owner of the Ipswich Ale Brewery, control 84 percent of the market in the Bay State.
Martin says the laws are stifling growth in an industry that employs 1,300 people in Massachusetts.
“In 1972, when the original law was passed, there were 60 breweries in Massachusetts and 50 nationwide, and wholesalers invested in one beer,” he said. “And if that brewer decided to go to another wholesaler, you were most likely out of business.”
Due to vast consolidation, Martin says the landscape has shifted to favor the industry giants, but with around 2,500 craft breweries popping up around the United States, the times are slowly changing.
“We just want fairness and accountability,” he said. “If a brewer isn’t satisfied with their distributor, they should be able to go to arbitration and switch. And more brewers adds more jobs.”
Martin added that there are currently six states nationwide which allow brewers to move between wholesalers, and that the industry may never return to what it was, when companies such as Genesee and Narragansett stood toe-to-toe with the Midwest titans.
“I think that’s gone forever,” Martin said of the heyday of brewing. “But we live in a culture of fresh. Local is big, choice is big. I can’t imagine it going to a culture where people will say ‘I just want one restaurant choice, I just want one beer choice.'”
For now, Martin is optimistic that today’s hearing will get the ball rolling on a new era in the Commonwealth, one in which pilsners and ales can flow more freely and jobs can grow.
“I think the legislature will take a long, hard look at the bill,” Martin said. “I think there’s a good possibility that we’ll have a positive outcome.”
Westfield State Senator-elect Don Humason Jr. also sits on the Committee, and believes the bill makes sense for craft brewers in his new district and statewide.
“It’s a public hearing, and I expect it to be pretty well attended and to last a couple hours,” he said. “We have a lot of craft brewers in Berkshire, Hampden, and Hampshire counties. It’s been before us before, and I think the committee will be receptive to it.”
Humason remarked that he had recently attended a wedding in Vermont, and noted the booming craft and microbrew industry in the Green Mountain State as one the Commonwealth shouldn’t necessarily aspire to replicate, but one it can definitely take some cues from.
“We aren’t Vermont. We are our own state and our own region,” Humason said. “I think the bill is going to be great for craft brewers in this state, and I expect it to do well.”
