The news broke yesterday that Three Weavers the fast growing brewery in Inglewood has joined forces with the CANarchy Collective.
Per Lynne Weaver, Three Weavers Founder and CEO. “Now more than ever, it is vitally important for craft breweries to band together to preserve our collective livelihoods and legacies and grow the overall industry. By joining the CANarchy collective, Three Weavers will continue to support our community – the craft beer industry, fellow craft breweries, independent beer, and of course, local craft beer drinkers. We are truly excited to partner with the entire CANarchy Craft Brewery Collective and look forward to what we will accomplish together in the coming years.”
The CANarchy portfolio includes Oskar Blues Brewery, Perrin Brewing Company, Cigar City Brewing, Squatters Craft Beer, Wasatch Brewery and most recently, Deep Ellum Brewing.
Now, YOUR view of this will be primarily colored by your trust level of Weaver and head brewer Alex Nowell. It will also be colored by the street cred of the brewers in the list above. I am no finance guy who can tell you about the Fireman Capital Partners that are in the background. But these “collectives” are fast becoming the norm. And they will include growing, in demand breweries in geographic sweet spots. Duvel Moortgat has their nationwide trio. Constellation realized after paying big for Ballast Point that they needed a group and not just one brewery. I would not be surprised in the least if there is an IPA collective, a sour collective and other niche groupings.
Remember, the best way to measure the impact of a sale is to taste the beer before and then after and then after again. Money is not evil. Big is not bad. But you do have to be watchful because it can change how things are done.
Personally, I will be granting Three Weavers a long leash on this.