Matt Allyn lists quite a number of craft breweries in the United States that are no longer independent or were never independent of the big brewing corporations:
It matters who owns your beer, says Carol Stoudt, founder of Stoudt’s Brewing, “The passion is lost when the people running a brewery don’t have ownership, and then quality suffers.” A bigger concern, one echoed by brewers like Stoudt and Dogfish Head’s Sam Calagione is that the larger companies also have the power to manipulate markets. The chief example, one cited by Calagione, is that corporate brewers will sell their craft-like ale well below the cost of true craft beer to push them off a bar tap line.
The Brewers Association trade group defines a craft brewer as small (less than six million barrels), traditional, and independent — with less than 25 percent ownership by a non-craft brewer.
Here are the current “craft” brewers who don’t meet that ownership criterion:
10 Barrel Brewing — Anheuser-Busch InBev
Ballast Point Brewing — Constellation Brands
Blue Moon Brewing — MillerCoors
Blue Point Brewing — Anheuser-Busch InBev
Breckenridge Brewery — Anheuser-Busch InBev
Camden Town Brewery (U.K.) — Anheuser-Busch InBev
Cervejaria Colorado (Brazil) — Anheuser-Busch InBev
Dundee Brewing — North American Breweries
Elysian Brewing — Anheuser-Busch InBev
Fordham and Dominion Brewing — 40 percent owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev
Founders Brewing — 30 percent owned by Mahou-San Miguel
Four Peaks Brewing — Anheuser-Busch InBev
Golden Road Brewing — Anheuser-Busch InBev
Goose Island Beer Company — Anheuser-Busch InBev
Kona Brewing — 32-percent owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev
Lagunitas Brewing — 50-percent owned by Heineken International
Leinenkugel’s Brewery — MillerCoors
Magic Hat Brewing — North American Breweries
Meantime Brewing (U.K.) — SABMiller
Mendocino Brewing — United Breweries Group
Olde Saratoga Brewing — United Breweries Group
Portland Brewing Company (formerly MacTarnahan’s) — North American Breweries
Pyramid Breweries — North American Breweries
Redhook Brewery — 32-percent owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev
Saint Archer Brewing — MillerCoors
Shock Top Brewing — Anheuser-Busch InBev
Widmer Brewing — 32-percent owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev
