This year's Beer Insights Spring Conference features a strong distrib focus. Come hear Columbia Distributing ceo Chris Steffanci bluntly discuss his co's advances with a total bev portfolio and many other hot topics. Plus, don't miss a presentation from Paragon Beverage Advisors' managing director/owner Randy Jozwiakowski on the picked up deal pace and rapidly evolving M&A outlook.

Hulk Hogan's Real American Beer continues its rapid expansion, headed to Walmart in 8 states - FL, IL, ID, MI, MO, NY, OH, and WI - less than a year after launch. The 2nd-fastest growing light beer in US (off a small base) is "moving nearly twice as many dollars per point of distribution as the competition" and "flying off shelves fast," per company release. The "200% American" beer, avail in 23 states, is official beer of WWE w/several sports partnerships including dirt-track World Racing Group, signed this week (see April 15 issue).

Pernod Ricard saw solid topline turnaround in US for its fiscal Q3 thru Mar 2025, tho that was partly driven by wholesaler orders coming in ahead of tariffs, and volume remains soft. After US revs dropped 7% in its fiscal first half thru Dec including -10% in FQ1 (Jul-Sep), suddenly sales grew 2% in its latest qtr. US revs outperformed global trend (-3%) in FQ3. Yet Pernod's US volume still declined 5% in FQ3 even as wholesaler orders came in "ahead of tariff announcements," co acknowledged. That's a sizable price/mix increase for the qtr too. Its volume declined mid singles thruout its latest fiscal yr, -5% in FQ1, -7% in FQ2 and -5% in FQ3. And that's following volume down low double digits in previous fiscal year (Jul 2023 thru Jun 2024).

AB's NUTRL vodka seltzer continues to make live music a focal point, partnering with country music star Tucker Wetmore to become the official vodka seltzer of his summer tour, co announced this morn. "NUTRL has had a strong presence in music over the years" at various festivals and concert venues and co's lookin' to "dive deeper into the music scene" thru the Tucker Wetmore tour, noted AB beyond beer mktg veep Steve Wolf. NUTRL will be at big music fests thruout the year again in 2025, including Lollapalooza in Chicago, Gov Ball in NYC, and CMA Fest in Nashville, AB highlighted. And while on-prem and live music venues remain a core strength for NUTRL, sales continue to grow solid double digits off-premise too: $$ up 35% to more than $19 mil YTD thru Mar 23 in Circana MULC data.

As RTD vodka teas continue to come in hot, competition is heating up for vodka lemonade canned cocktails too. Today Boston Beer's Sun Cruiser officially announced the addition of its new RTD vodka lemonades, available in an 8-count variety pack featuring 4 flavors with "real fruit and premium vodka": lemonade, pink lemonade, strawberry lemonade and lemonade + iced tea. The latter was already available in individual 4pks and as part of co's initial variety 8pk that launched about a yr ago. Both lemonade + iced tea and original lemonade flavors are also available in resealable 24oz cans, as Boston Beer previously noted.

MC's Simply Spiked (licensed from Coca-Cola) is launching its 4th variety pk, Simply Tropical Variety Pk, and adding a new flavor to its #1 variety pk as previous Simply flavors and packs are struggling to hold ground. Tropical variety pk features two new pineapple-forward flavors, Signature Pineapple and Mango Pineapple. And Lemonade variety pk will swap in Raspberry Lemonade flavor in time for summer.

With Tilray stock at risk of being delisted from the Nasdaq exchange, co gave notice of a special meeting of stockholders to be held virtually on June 10 where it seeks to approve a reverse stock split to stay in compliance. Recall, Nasdaq requires that listed securities maintain a minimum price of $1/share. Tilray's stock fell below that threshold in Feb and is now down to just $0.44 per share, down ~7% today and nearly 70% yr-to-date, receiving notice last mo that it had 180 days to get back above the $1 mark (see Mar 27 issue). Co's mkt cap is now below $450 mil, about the aggregate price it paid for its sprawling craft beer acquisitions.

Union delivery drivers reached a tentative agreement with Manhattan Beer Dist to end their 2-day strike around 4am this morning. "I am pleased to announce that the Company has reached an agreement with the union, the strike is over!" president/ceo Simon Bergson wrote employees early today. A union rep told local News 12 that the agreement "will need to be ratified by the members, but our pensions are safe." No word yet on details of where MB and union drivers settled on a new contract.

Dry Atlas, the avid chronicler of alc-alternatives, offers interesting take on new wave of NA beers that aren't content just to mimic alcoholic beer but to layer on either THC or caffeine as an added function.