• PorchDrinking.com Staff
• On March 28, 2017

The Brewer’s Association, the craft beer industry’s national not-for-profit trade organization released a look back on high level trends for 2016 craft beer this morning. The most notable of which, includes the fact that America now has a record 5,301 U.S. breweries in operation and 5,234 or 99% of them, falling under the small and independent craft brewers.

This total already shows a 300 brewery growth since the Brewer’s Association’s report in December 2016. More notably, these statistics show that while craft beer’s volume share continues to grow, the rate of growth has slowed considerably in comparison to the past five years, seeing just a 6% growth by volume and a 1% growth in total craft beer market share.

Other notable statistic include the fact that craft beer accounts for 128,768 jobs in the U.S. with as well as $23.5 billion in craft retail dollar value.