Firestone Walker and Duvel Moortgat USA have agreed to acquire the Stone Brewing brand from Sapporo USA for an undisclosed amount, Brewbound reports. The transaction is slated to finalize within the second quarter of the fiscal year.
California-based craft brewery Firestone Walker — in which Duvel USA acquired a majority stake in 2015 and continues to operate independently — will assume ownership of the Stone Brewing brand in California, Texas, and other western U.S. markets, along with overseeing national accounts. Duvel USA will handle Stone’s distribution east of the Rocky Mountains, according to Brewbound. The two brands will also assume ownership of four taprooms in California.
The deal’s announcement comes weeks after Firestone Walker agreed to absorb California-founded craft brewery Trumer Pils from Gambrinus, a transaction set to close this summer. Both moves will expand Duvel USA’s craft footprint, particularly in California.
“We become the dominant craft player in L.A., San Diego, Orange County, which is part of the rationale for this in the first place,” Nick Firestone says in an announcement.
The acquisitions will also tack on roughly 280,000 barrels to Duvel USA’s overall production, raising its annual yield to nearly 900,000 barrels. The expanded ownerships mean Duvel USA will likely leapfrog Tilray Brands to the No. 4 seat in the Brewers Association’s ranking of craft brewing companies, per Brewbound.
Following the transaction’s completion, Stone’s production will shift to Firestone Walker’s Paso Robles, Calif. facility and Duvel USA’s Kansas City, Mo. facility. Sapporo will continue to brew Stone at its Richmond, Va., and Escondido, Calif., plants until the deal closes. The Japan-headquartered company is shopping around the Escondido brewery, but the Richmond facility will become its primary U.S. production site after the transaction.
While Firestone Walker and Duvel expect to offer jobs to a “significant number” of Stone’s hospitality, sales, and marketing employees, production roles will be assessed as operations transition to the new locations, Brewbound reports.
In a filing this morning, Sapporo Holdings claims to expect an $80 million impairment loss related to its Escondido, Calif., plant where Stone is currently brewed. It also anticipates $23 million in gains from the transfer of ownership in both tangible and intangible assets. That figure does not reflect the terms of the transaction.
VP Pro Take
“Sapporo is blessed to have Constellation Brands to keep it from going down in American history as Big Beer’s biggest craft-brewing loser. It was less than a decade ago that the Japanese conglomerate bought San Francisco’s Anchor Brewing Company for $85 million as a foothold for stateside expansion; it was less than half a decade ago that it scooped up Stone for $165 million. Blowing a quarter of a billion dollars on two craft breweries is, in practical terms, better than blowing a full yard on just one, as Constellation infamously did in its abortive Ballast Point purchase of yore. But man, it ain’t good.
I have reported at length how and why Sapporo’s plans for Anchor did not pan out, to the extent that they existed at all. The thesis underpinning its Stone acquisition was a bit more clear, and more clarifying: In buying the Escondido craft heavyweight’s flexible bicoastal capacity and deep national distribution network and sales force, the Japanese firm signaled it was prioritizing scale over specialty. Woe to Anchor’s Our Special Ale, perhaps the most undeserving victim of this bumbling pivot. Results are more mixed for Stone’s portfolio; despite some bright spots, its once-pioneering beers have not regained much luster under the Sapporo USA Sapporo-Stone aegis.
But the move has borne fruit for Sapporo as such. Its flagship beer has grown by 14.4 percent in dollars and 10.4 percent in volume for the 52 weeks through March 22nd in multi-outlet grocery, mass retail, and convenience stores tracked by the market-research firm Circana. When the company announced $60 million in upgrades for its California and Virginia plants in 2024, all its messaging highlighted how the investment would improve domestic production of Sapporo beers. Stone may have been the “brand new toy” compared to Anchor, as one of the latter’s workers bitterly put it to Hop Take in 2023, but three years later, the novelty has clearly worn off.
On the subject of macrobrewers’ mismanagement of craft-brewing acquisition, one has to marvel at Duvel USA’s notable deviation from the norm. The American subsidiary of the Belgian mid-major Duvel Moortgat has proven a savvier and steadier “strategic partner” (corporate owner, in the jargon) to its holdings — Firestone Walker, Boulevard Brewing, and Brewery Ommegang — than virtually any other in the segment. (Certainly more so than its Low Country rival Heineken — the Dutch mega has flailed mightily with Lagunitas, its own billion-dollar stumble into American craft beer.) Brewbound’s Justin Kendall ran the back-of-the-napkin numbers: with the addition of Stone’s 250,000 barrels and the 30,000 barrels of Trumer Pils Duvel USA just bought off Gambrinus last month, the group is now pushing 900,000 barrels annually, which would make it the fourth-largest BA-defined craft brewer, bumping bargain-binner Tilray Brands out of that spot.
That’s assuming Tilray’s hot-handed chief executive Irwin Simon doesn’t get the acquisition itch again before the end of 2026, of course. Given the firm just announced a stock scheme to raise up to $180 million “to invest behind its global beverage platform,” that’s anything but a safe assumption.” —Dave Infante, VinePair columnist and contributing editor
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