The big Anheuser-Busch plant near Baldwinsville, the largest brewery in New York state, is set to receive a major share of a planned $1 billion company-wide corporate investment over the next two years.
The growth of the company’s hard seltzer brands is a major focus of its spending plan. Anheuser-Busch also says it want to help boost the national economy in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The $1 billion will be spread across 26 states and include A-B’s production and distribution operations. Of that, $400 million is earmarked for its 12 U.S. breweries.
The plant off Route 31 in the Radisson Business Park, a key player in A-B’s hard seltzer production, is expected to to see a big chunk of that spending. States targeted for major spending in the investment plan include New York, Georgia, California and Missouri, the company said.
The investment’s goals include “job creation and retention,” according to an A-B press release. The Baldwinsville brewery has about 500 employees.
The overall investment also include almost $100 million for what the company calls “sustainability projects,” including solar panel installments and water treatment. In 2019, A-B installed a 2.76 megawatt solar panel array off Kingdom Road in the town of Van Buren to generate power for the A-B plant.
Company-wide, the brewery spending plan for 2021 includes $50 million for new seltzer brewing operations, and more than $100 million for new canning lines. The company did not specify how much of the spending would take place at the Baldwinsville brewery, but said it may be able to share details at a later date.
The Baldwisville plant has been one of Anheuser-Busch’s major producers of hard seltzer, the drink that took the alcoholic beverage world by storm in the past few years. In January 2020, A-B launched its Bud Light Seltzer brand exclusively at the Route 31 brewery, before adding production at other plants, like Los Angeles.
It also makes other seltzers, including Bon & Viv (also launched in Baldwinsville), plus BL Lemonade Seltzer, Natty Seltzer, and the newest, Michelob Ultra Organic Seltzer, billed as the first hard seltzer to be certified organic by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Sales of hard seltzer nationwide have been doubling each year since the product debuted in 2016, led by brands like White Claw and Truly. Sales now exceed $2.7 billion per year, according to the Nielsen research company.
When they launched Bud Light Seltzer in Baldwinsville last year, A-B officials said despite the lead taken by White Claw and other brands, the company expected its resources to enable it catch up and perhaps surpass the others. Anheuser-Busch is the American division of Anheuser-Busch Inbev, the world’s largest brewer.
“Even if we weren’t there first, we have the resources to fast-follow,” Andy Goeler, an A-B executive who is Bud Light’s vice president, said during a tour of the Baldwinsville brewery last January. “This company has a long legacy of leading the market.”
The Baldwinsville brewery opened as a Schlitz brewery in 1976 before being sold to Anheuser-Busch a few years later. It is renowned as one of the most versatile plants in the A-B system, especially in packaging.
That’s important because part of the new investment will including upgrading and expanding A-B’s packaging lines for “sleek” cans, the type preferred by hard seltzer fans. The upgrades also includes expansion of lines to produce variety packs.
When it launched Bud Light Seltzer last year, the Baldwinsville brewery was producing 30,000 of the slim 12-ounce seltzer cans during each 8-hour shift. That capacity, combined with expansion to other A-B plants, was expected to give Bud Light Seltzer an advantage over White Claw, which is produced by the smaller Mark Anthony Brands of Chicago.
As of last year, the Baldwinsville brewery made about 75 different beverages, totaling around 6 million barrels per year (the equivalent of 82 million cases).
Of its total volume, about 60 percent was Budweiser, Bud Light, Busch, Michelob Ultra and other classic “A-B lagers.” Another 10 percent are “craft” beers under brands purchased by A-B, and the remaining 30 percent includes flavored alcohol beverages, seltzers and other non-beer drinks.
The Baldwinsville brewery is also huge — it has four 1,000-barrel brew kettles (a barrel is 31 gallons) and many enormous fermentation and storage tanks.
MORE ON HARD SELTZER IN CNY
Inside Anheuser-Busch’s CNY-based challenge to White Claw
Central New York craft brewers are joining the hard seltzer bandwagon
Utica’s Saranac Brewery launches hard seltzer with a twist
Labatt joins hard seltzer craze, test markets it in Upstate NY
Bud Light Seltzer vs. White Claw: How do they compare?
Don Cazentre writes for NYup.com, syracuse.com and The Post-Standard. Reach him at dcazentre@nyup.com, or follow him at NYup.com, on Twitter or Facebook.
The Link LonkFebruary 04, 2021 at 10:47PM
https://www.syracuse.com/drinks/2021/02/hard-seltzer-spike-drives-anheuser-busch-to-invest-millions-in-its-cny-brewery.html
Hard seltzer spike drives Anheuser-Busch to invest millions in its CNY brewery - syracuse.com
https://news.google.com/search?q=hard&hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US:en
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