craft

Well, we may have only one retailer in the near future — AmazonWholeFoods. But we sure have a lot of beer to choose from.

This jumped out at me when looking at beer approvals from a recent 10 day period in 2017. I saw no less than 720 new brands/approvals — just for beer — in this small and recent time period. Most of them seem like just about the opposite of Budweiser and Coors.

• 10 days in June, 2017
• 10 days in June, 2007

By contrast, I looked at the same 10 day period, 10 years prior. The landscape is altogether different. In the 2007 period I see a relatively puny 175 approvals. The overwhelming preponderance of those labels are from big or very big companies:  Miller, A-B, Sam Adams.*

In the 2017 period I see almost no mega-brews. If this is not a revolution, it seems to be a radical change at least, in just half a generation or less.

Amazon has well proven they can stock and sell a lot of books and other SKUs, without losing a bunch of money. Let’s see how they do with a few hundred thousand beers.

On Tuesday, January 12, 2016, a federal district court in New York granted in part and denied in part Tito’s “Handmade” Vodka’s motion to dismiss several claims brought against it by a class of consumers in the case Singleton v. Fifth Generation, Inc.

Judge Brenda K. Sannes of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York issued the opinion, holding that federal approval of Tito’s labels does not provide Tito’s with a “safe harbor” from litigation, and that Tito’s use of the term “handmade” and the phrase “crafted in an old fashioned pot still” “could plausibly mislead a reasonable consumer to believe that [Tito’s] vodka is made in a hands-on, small-batch process.”

Judge Sannes’ decision to allow Singleton to move forward marks yet another instance of a federal judge finding merit in false labeling claims against Tito’s. Singleton joins Hoffman v. Fifth Generation, Inc. and Cabrera v. Fifth Generation, Inc. (both federal cases in California) as well as Pye v. Fifth Generation, Inc. (a federal case in Florida) and Terlesky v. Fifth Generation, Inc. (a federal case in Ohio), which have all survived motions by Tito’s to cut the cases short. Singleton is more akin to the two California cases, as the judges in all three refused to apply the safe harbor and held that the...

Last week, a federal judge in California tentatively dismissed a class action suit against MillerCoors. Yesterday, the judge made that dismissal final.

The case, Parent v. MillerCoors LLC, began in March when plaintiffs—a class of Blue Moon purchasers—alleged that Miller misled consumers into believing that Blue Moon is a craft beer. Plaintiffs argued that Miller’s reference to “Blue Moon Brewing Co.” on the beer’s label and use of the phrase “artfully crafted” in the beer’s advertising led consumers to purchase Blue Moon believing it was craft. Miller defended that the practice of listing its assumed name, “Blue Moon Brewing Co.,” on its label instead of its full business name is specifically permitted by state and federal law, and that consumers could not reasonably rely on the phrase “artfully crafted” as a guarantee that Blue Moon is craft beer.

Judge Gonzalo P. Curiel of the United States District Court for the Southern District of California tentatively agreed with Miller on both points last week, pending a hearing on the matter last Friday. Apparently, plaintiffs’ oral argument at the hearing failed to change Judge Curiel’s mind, as he issued an order yesterday dismissing the case.

Regarding TTB’s approval, Judge Curiel noted that TTB regulations “specifically permit a beer bottle and outer packaging to show, by label or otherwise, the name...