5-20 IAN Barley and Beer

 As the beer market goes, so goes the barley market for farmers.

 In a discussion with Kelly Olson, administrator for the Idaho Barley Commission, she made a reference to the beer market having been down. I have been doing my share so I asked her if that was true? And if so why? “Oh yes. We saw pretty significant pressure during the great recession. Believe it or not, a lot of pundits always assumed that beer was recession proof. That is not necessarily the case. We saw beer sales decline nearly 1% in 2009, over 1% in 2010 and 1 1/2% in 2011. That is three consecutive years of declining beer sales in the US. In 2012 we saw a modest recovery, up 1.2%. So a good turnaround. What has driven those beer market dynamics are job markets, if you have a stagnant job market, particularly in blue-collar workers, then you have a problem in beer consumption. Changing demographics can work in beer’s favor but as the population ages, it tends to drink less beer and we have seen an increase in beverage competition so all of those factors have weighed on the market. There are segments of the beer industry in the US that have done quite well. The craft segment, albeit small, it is about 6 to 7% of all beer sales in the US, fall into this category.