Want to buy Rolling Rock?

...because Anheuser-Busch InBev is thinking of selling. Which is funny because three years ago AB bought Rolling Rock from InBev for $82 million dollars. One possible suitor is North American Breweries Inc. (a brewery holding corp crated by KPS Capital Partners), which recently purchased Labatt USA from AB following the DOJ's stipulations for the AB/InBev merger. Oddly enough, Labatt also used to own Rolling Rock.

Is there no love for the Pennsylvania Heineken?

No More Free Beer At Busch Gardens

Article in the St. Pete Times. For those who were wondering whether InBev's stated goal of reigning in the corporate excess of Anheuser-Busch would impact consumers, it begins. Busch Gardens will stop offering free beer samples at their hospitality areas starting the 25th. (You've got 10 more days Florida! And, Virginia too I guess.) Apparently they are also revamping the parks' various restaurants, and there is some question whether (and which) InBev brands will be in, though they will probably put Stella Artois in at the very least. InBev has also mentioned that it is considering selling the parks, so perhaps this is step on in making them more family-friendly for a future non-brewery owner?

Alcohol News

So it's Finals and Christmas time and I will likely be short on posts for the next few weeks. I'll be up in Seattle over Christmas for a sorely needed break from all this sunshine!

In the mean time, here are some interesting news articles:

1) Direct Shipping in Michigan: think again.

Article in the Detroit Free Press. Two months ago a federal judge ruled that the state had to allow direct shipping to consumers in what sounds like a Granholm decision (I haven't had a chance to read the opinion yet). In response, state lawmakers have introduced a bill to ban all direct shipping, instate and out. Michigan is a monopoly state, with the Michigan Liquor Control Commission acting as the wholesaler in their three-tier system. It's interesting to see what monopoly states do in situations like this, because the state itself has an economic interest in preserving the status quo. For example. comparing it to Washington could be interesting, as Washington's beer and wine industries are thriving while Michigan's are near non-existent. Is Michigan protecting fledgling domestic wineries? Or just making sure they get the markup and taxes paid on all alcohol entering the state? I'll try to look more into this when I get some time after finals.

2) Superjuice

Apparently things are getting bad in Manitoba, where members of the local reservation are abusing a new type of alcohol called "Superjuice". It sounds like they're just drinking some kind of mash swill made with distiller's or "Turbo" yeast. The best part is the idea that the yeast keeps acting in people's stomachs, which sounds ridiculous to me. A consult with my resident science adviser (my wife) has let to the same conclusion. Tough as that yeast is, and I've tried some horrific rocket-fuel barleywines made with it, it's not going to keep going in your gut.

3) Radio Bordeaux Dating

No it's not a new Studio Canal show. Article on the BBC about using gamma rays and ion beams to authenticate very old bottles of wine. Should result in some interesting fraud suits in the future. Now if they can only find a way to tell if the bottle's become corked...

4) Prices are falling. So is the sky.

In the current economic climate it appears that people are less interested in paying $1,000 for a bottle of Chateau Lafite Rothschild. Champagne is down as well. Apparently now's the time to buy... (cough cough). The same is happening with Vodka in Russia. Sales are down 70% and people are turning to poisonous moonshine. Yikes. Times are bad when you can't afford $1 a liter vodka...

5) AB Merger News

Two weeks ago the Justice Department approved the Anheuser-Busch / InBev merger on the condition that they divest themselves of the Labatt brand and facilities. No word on a buyer. (Heineken?) Tuesday the companies completed their stock sale. The new share price of Anheuser-Busch InBev immediately went up 16%, the highest increase in company history.

6) Sam Caglione, of Dogfish Head, in the New Yorker

Great article on Sam Caglione, owner/brewer at Delaware's Dogfish Head Brewery in the New Yorker. I've now got a half-crazed plan to try and brew a steinbier/sahti based on his in the article. There will be extensive posting about it, if I can get ahold of some river rocks...

The Deal Goes Through: Hello Anheuser-Busch InBev

InBev shareholders approved the $52 billion takeover of Anheuser-Busch this morning. Looks like the new company name will be Anheuser-Busch InBev, and it will be the largest brewer in the world.

By far. Fifty percent of the US market, ten percent of Russia and China.

What has been most interesting to me about all this is not that one large brewery would combine with another (Miller-Coors, or Heineken's growing empire of brands) but the reaction by some that AB is somehow a "national" brand. You hear talk of 'monopoly!" and "they're going to Belgianize Budweiser!" (If only!) It's interesting that only now are people screaming monopoly.

You cannot understand the meaning of the 21st Amendment and the resulting caselaw without an understanding of the history behind it. The big brewers, AB, Coors, Miller, Pabst, etc., were all in operation before prohibition and their growing power and influence was one of the justifications for prohibition. People feared the concentrated influence and capital of the big brewers (just as they feared the power of other industrial Trusts at the time). In 1933 the three-tier distribution system was theorized by Fosdick and Scott to disrupt the power of these monopolies, as was anti-tied-house legislation. (Btw: Fosdick and Scott is an amazing read, too bad the only print copies for sale on Amazon start at $250...some day!)

The post-prohibition story of American beer has been one of consolidation and homogenization. From thousands of local breweries prior to Prohibition, the national brewing landscape by the end of the 1970s consisted of 44 breweries. So now we come full circle and are facing a scale of monopoly in the large breweries that the prohibition-era lawmakers could never have dreamed of. What will be interesting to see in the coming years is whether the laws that resulted from the 21st Amendment can still achieve their original goals (whatever the courts may currently state those to be...) in the face of what is now the third largest consumer product company in the world.

And do we still want them to?

The First Post

So there have been several people who have bugged me to start a blog, and to them I say: "Well ok then."

My goal with this is first and foremost to be a place for me to write about my research project this semester, both to help me organize my ideas and to keep a record of the process. I am researching conflict between the 21st Amendment and the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution. In short, what happens when the 21st amendment appears to grant control of alcohol to the states, but a federal law is in conflict with those state laws? The focal point of the article is a case currently before the Federal District Court in Santa Fe, NM, US Airways, Inc., v. Lopez (6:2007cv01235). Essentially, US Airways is seeking an injunction against the State of New Mexico regarding the state's insistence that the carrier hold a liquor license to serve alcohol over New Mexican airspace. The implications for an airline victory here could be huge. A full writeup of the facts of the case and my initial impressions will be posted soon.

Hopefully, some of it will be of interest to others as well. There is a lot of caselaw to re-read, and I hope to publish short casenotes on some of the more important Alcohol Law cases as I look into their applicability. I will also post interesting updates about the alcohol industry, such as the InBev stockholder vote on the AB merger that should take place on the 29th.

Secondly, I want this to be more than just a legal blog and of interest to friends and family as well. So I'll be adding posts about other things that are going on in my life. It could be records of brewing sessions, reviews of commercial beers and homebrews, stories from law school life, photo records of weekend trips around South Florida, records of my ongoing charcuterie experiments, and who knows what else.

I have been thinking of starting this blog since last year, but between school and work I haven't had the time. This year is much more open, so I hope to post fairly regularly. Whenever I get some time at home. For example, today I am home with Ase because he snagged and ate an entire RitterSport (one of the corn flake ones! Wrapper and all!) and I am dealing with a sad-looking-and-occasionally-violently-ill mutt. Ah the joys of dog ownership...