According to a report from the Brewers Association, the beer industry has faced economic difficulties in the past two years. Total U.S. beer production and imports will fall by 1% in 2024, and craft beer sales will fall by 4% in 2024 and approximately 5% in 2025.
According to Beerbound, the Brewers Association said domestic beer shipments also fell by 5.9% in 2025, with a loss of more than 8.68 million barrels of beer.
Shipments in 2025 will reach 139 million barrels, a tenfold decrease from 147.7 million barrels in 2024.
The Brewers Association reports that the main reasons for this downturn include declining consumer demand and declining alcohol consumption rates among younger generations.
Brewers cited several other causes of economic problems, including rising product and labor costs due to inflation and rising rental rates.
According to the 2026 North American Craft Beer Market Report released by Mordor Intelligence, “Raw material costs have become a significant constraint for the North American craft beer market, with prices for basic ingredients such as barley malt and hops, and packaging materials such as aluminum cans rising significantly.”
“The impact of increased costs is particularly severe on production economics, forcing breweries to revise their pricing strategies and operating models,” the report said.
A downturn in the beer industry over the past two years has led breweries across the country to close their breweries, disappointing beer-loving consumers.
Anheuser-Busch, which announced in December 2025 that it would close three breweries across the country, will close its brewery in Fairfield, Calif., on February 22, following the sale of the Newark, N.J., plant in December and the closing of the Merrimack, N.H., plant at the end of January.
The brewer plans to sell its 170-acre Fairfield property as it has hired commercial real estate brokerage Cushman & Wakefield to market the property, the San Francisco Business Times reported, SFGate reported.
“We will be moving production from these three facilities to other facilities in the United States,” Anheuser-Busch said in a December email to the Fairfield Daily Republic. “These changes will allow us to make additional investments in our remaining operations and our growing portfolio of industry-leading brands.”
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Fairfield Brewery in the San Francisco Bay Area will lay off 238 employees when it closes, according to a worker adjustment and retraining notice issued by the company on December 12.
“We will support the approximately 475 full-time employees currently working at these three facilities with full-time positions elsewhere in our U.S. operations,” Anheuser-Busch said in December.
More closures:
The December report said the city of Fairfield would lose an estimated $1.2 million in annual water revenue and up to $559,000 in property taxes, depending on the status of unencumbered assets on the property.
The closure is expected to cost the city $10.7 million annually, as well as about $8.9 million in annual state taxes and $3.3 million in federal taxes, according to the report.
Anheuser-Busch closed another Bay Area plant in 2022, when it closed its Oakland distribution center and laid off 142 employees, SFGate said.
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Newark, New Jersey
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Merrimack, New Hampshire
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Fairfield, California
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This article was originally published by TheStreet on February 18, 2026, and first appeared in the Retail section. Click here to add TheStreet as your preferred source.