Beer Marketer's Insights - Beer $$ Down 2.6%, Vol -4.4% YTD Thru Mar 23 in MULC; Not Much Better for St Paddy's 2-Wks; Top RTDs Compared to Big Beer Fams

After a solid start to the year in Jan, beer sales remained soft thruout most of the rest of Q1 in off-premise scan data. Beer $$ declined 2.6% to $8.967 bil with volume down 4.4% to 291.5 mil cases for 12 wks thru Mar 23 in Circana multi-outlet + convenience channels. In first 4 wks of the year, beer $$ dipped just 0.3% with volume down 2.4%, partially boosted by timing of New Year's Eve. Following 4 wks thru Feb 23 saw a drastic deceleration as beer $$ suddenly slipped 4.8% with volume down 6.4%. Trend improved a bit in the latest 4 wks thru Mar 23, but nothin' to write home about; $$ down 2.5%, volume down 4.2%. Superpremium & NA Beer the Only Growth Segments in Q1 Scans; Imports & FMBs Still Gaining Share Superpremium and NA beer are now the only growth segments in beer YTD thru Mar 23; superpremium $$ up 3.6% and NAs up 26%. Lead brand fams for each segment continue to drive growth. AB's Michelob family grew 5%, posting the largest growth (up nearly $37 mil) of any alc bev brand family in scans while accounting for the vast majority of the superpremium segment. Athletic grew 28% to $24.5 mil YTD in MULC; it's the #39 beer brand family overall in these channels, larger than Topo Chico hard seltzer (-12%), Victoria (+42%) and Shiner (-8%) among others.FMB $$ were flattish (+0.2%) but volume now down 1.4% for the year in MULC. And imports swung all the way to $$ down nearly 2%, volume -3.6% YTD thru Mar 23. Even with imports and FMBs no longer growing, they still managed to gain share of beer in Q1 scans, +0.2 and +0.3 respectively. Just far lower share gains than they've been accustomed to in recent yrs. Both superpremium (+0.6) and NA beer (+0.31) posted larger $$ share gains than imports or FMBs YTD. But superpremium and NA beer collectively account for just over 11 share of total beer sales in scans. With all other segments down, no wonder beer is struggling lately.Premium $$ Down 6%, -0.9 Share; Craft, Seltzer & Subpremium Shed Share; Cider Share Flattish Premium segment continues to lose the most ground of all. Its sales declined 6%, volume down 7% YTD thru Mar 23 in MULC. Shed 0.9 share of beer $$. Subpremium (-3%), craft beer (-4.5%), hard seltzer (-5%) each saw sales decline at steeper rates than total beer, collectively shedding 0.4 share of beer $$. Tho hard cider sales dipped just 2.3% YTD, holding share, fueled by better trends from lead brand Angry Orchard (-1%).Not Much Better for St Paddy's 2-Wk Period; Smirnoff Up, Guinness Down; STZ Improved; AB Gained Share Beer didn't perform much better for latest 2 wks thru Mar 23. Sales dipped 2.4% with volume down 4.1% for period that accounts for a more complete picture of sales leading up to and coming out of St Patrick's Day. Mark Anthony (+0.7%), Diageo (+0.3%) and Constellation (+0.2%) were the only top 10 beer suppliers that grew $$ for the latest 2 wks, tho all grew $$ less than 1% with volume down.Diageo's $$ growth is coming from a different brand than you might expect: Smirnoff family $$ grew 2.5% for period while Guinness family actually slipped 2% for 2 wks. Constellation improved as Modelo family $$ dipped just 0.2% and Corona down 2% (ex NAs). But YTD thru Mar 23, Modelo family $$ declined 1% with volume down 3%; Corona family $$ down 3%, volume down 5%. This continues to be the longest stretch we've seen Modelo family decline. Mark Anthony is posting consistent $$ growth all year as White Claw, Mike's Harder and Cayman Jack gains offset Mike's Hard family decline. And while AB didn't grow, it did manage to gain share of both $$ and volume for latest 2 wks thru Mar 23 with $$ down 2.1%, volume down 3.4%.Top RTDs Among Top Beer Fams: BuzzBallz, High Noon, BeatBox, Cutwater, NUTRL Climbing Many of the top wine & spirit RTD brand fams continue to post strong double digit growth in Circana MULC data, and would rank among top 50 beer brand families. BuzzBallz grew most of all with $$ up 64% to nearly $85 mil in these channels. Only Michelob family gained more $$ across alc bevs in scans. BuzzBallz $$ sales surpassed the #20 beer family in Circana, Yuengling; ain't far behind Keystone (-5%), Pacifico (+19%) or Bud Specialty (-7%) too. High Noon's nearby as well with sales up 12% to $78 mil, making it larger than Dos Equis and Stella, and not far behind Yuengling. BeatBox wine-based RTDs grew 52% to $56 mil YTD; larger than Guinness and right on Blue Moon's tail (excluding NAs). AB's Cutwater grew 24% to $33 mil, surpassing Steel Reserve, Angry Orchard and Sam Adams in scans, among others. Not too far behind Four Loko, which dipped 5% to $37 mil. And AB's NUTRL vodka soda family ranks just below the top 50 beer brand families. NUTRL sales grew 35% to $19.3 mil YTD; nearly as big as Redd's (-10%), Founders (-1%) and Simply Spiked (-31%) in these channels.

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Beer $$ Down 2.6%, Vol -4.4% YTD Thru Mar 23 in MULC; Not Much Better for St Paddy's 2-Wks; Top RTDs Compared to Big Beer Fams

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