Craft breweries typically have strong connections with their local communities. These connections are manifest in a number of ways. The owners usually live in town. The brewery provides space for activities such as a local yoga club, and several times a year they brew a special beer, part of the profits of which are donated to local charitable causes. In discussing craft breweries, George Homewood, Norfolk, Virginia’s director of planning and community development, notes:

“there is a different food truck outside nightly. Depending upon the brewery, there may be yoga on Sundays, trivia on Wednesdays, retro video games on Thursdays, and music on Saturdays as well as neighborhood block parties, a monthly pet adoption day or a free community meal.”

Regardless of where we live, all of us know local breweries who support their communities in these types of way. Some breweries are so proud of their local community that they name beers after local landmarks, historical figures, or important events in the community’s past. A growing number of breweries are even trying to source more of their ingredients, particularly hops, from the local region. For some breweries, one of their major contributions to the community is simply to provide a gathering place for locals; a refuge of sorts where neighborhood residents can come, meet up with a few friends, and enjoy a couple of beers.

And craft beer drinkers seem to appreciate this commitment to local communities and are very happy to support the locally-owned brewery, rather than the faceless multinational corporation (e.g., AB InBev or Heineken). There’s even a name or this preference for the local – it’s called “neolocalism”. The geographer, Steven M. Schnell defines neolocalism as a “conscious attempt of individuals and groups to establish, rebuild, and cultivate local ties, local identities, and increasingly, local economies.” Writing specifically about craft breweries, Schnell and his co-author Joseph Reese, stated that craft breweries represent a desire on the part of increasing numbers of people to “reestablish connections with local communities, settings, and economies”.

There is no doubt that buying a locally brewed beer supports a local business. Advocates of purchasing locally produced food are quick to point out the economic, social, and environmental benefits of doing so – keeping more money in the local community, encouraging cultural diversity, preserving genetic diversity etc. On the other hand, economists Jason Winfred and Philip Watson point out buying local conflicts with Ricardo’s two hundred year old principle of comparative advantage. Of course, there is the whole issue of what constitutes “local”, a topic I discussed in a previous blog entry.

Many breweries are rightly proud of the contributions they make to their local communities. And on their websites, they are not hesitant to articulate their community commitment. Crazy Mountain Brewing Company of Denver, CO, for example, state that, “although beer is our passion, one of Crazy Mountain’s core values is our commitment to community involvement”. According to Fairport Brewing Company in Fairport, NY, “our commitment to the local community run deep”, while Roadhouse Brewery of Jackson Hole, WY is “committed to supporting the local community of Jackson Hole”.

I got to thinking about craft breweries and their connections to the local economies the other day, when I was putting away a t-shirt that my oldest daughter had gave me as a Christmas gift. It was a t-shirt from Boulevard Brewing Company in Kansas City, MO. My daughter had been to Boulevard recently, while visiting a friend in Kansas City. I visited Boulevard myself while attending a conference in Kansas City in June of last year. Anyway, as I picked up the t-shirt I looked at the label just inside the collar. I was curious as to where the t-shirt was made. The label said, “Made in Honduras”. That got me wondering – where were all my other brewery t-shirts made? How many were made in the United States? I took each of them from the closet and examined them. Here is what I found:

• Bare Arms Brewing, Waco, TX – Nicaragua
• Black Cloister Brewing Company, Toledo, OH – Nicaragua
• Boulevard Brewing Company, Kansas City, MO – Honduras
• Church Brew Works, Pittsburgh, PA – Nicaragua
• Dogfish Head, Milton, DE – USA
• Earnest Brew Works, Toledo, OH – USA
• Elevator Brewing, Columbus, OH – Mexico
• Grapevine Brewery, Grapevine, TX – Nicaragua
• Kona Brewing Company, Kona, HI – Mexico
• Lansing Brewing Company, Lansing, MI – Mexico
• Market Garden Brewery, Cleveland, OH – Nicaragua
• Maumee Bay Brewing Company, Toledo, OH – Nicaragua
• Pike Brewing Company, Seattle, WA – Honduras
• Rhinegeist Brewery, Cincinnati, OH – USA
• Round Barn Brewery, Baroda, MI – Honduras

First off, I own fifteen t-shirts from breweries. I never knew that. Of the fifteen t-shirts, seven were made in Nicaragua, three in Mexico, three in the United States, and two in Honduras. Now I fully realize that my fifteen t-shirts do not constitute a scientifically valid sample, so I am not going to make any generalizations regarding the larger population of American breweries. Thinking scientifically, I thought that it might be interesting to have a control group. So, I randomly selected fifteen of my non-brewery t-shirts that I had purchased in the United States, and examined their labels. All of them were manufactured in Latin America – five in Mexico, four in Nicaragua, and three each in Honduras and El Salvador. These, albeit non-scientific, findings do hint at the possibility that American craft breweries may be more prone to purchase American made t-shirts than the average retailer.

That most of the brewery t-shirts I own are made in Latin American countries did not surprise me. I teach this stuff in my Industrial Geography course at The University of Toledo. By and large, it comes down to labor costs. Manufacturing labor costs are significantly cheaper in Latin America than in the United States. For example, according to IVEMSA, a company that assists U.S. companies interested in establishing manufacturing facilities in Mexico, American manufacturers who locate in Mexico will pay 20-30% less in labor costs. Add to that a forty-eight hour work week (before requiring overtime pay) and the advantages of manufacturing in Mexico soon become apparent.

Three breweries in my non-scientific sample do sell t-shirts manufactured in the United States. They are Dogfish Head in Milton, DE, Earnest Brew Works in Toledo, OH, and Rhinegeist Brewery in Cincinnati, OH. The t-shirts sold by Earnest Brew Works and Rhinegeist Brewery are made by American Apparel, who are based in Los Angeles, CA. The company makes apparel in countries all over the world, including Bangladesh, Honduras, and the United States. Interestingly, one of American Apparel’s commitments is supporting the economies in which they are located. They do this by “using local suppliers for transportation, food services and raw materials and accessories for our production facilities such as dyes, buttons, zippers, boxes and office supplies.” The two American Apparel t-shirts I have were as I mentioned above, made in the USA. The components used to manufacture these two t-shirts came both from the United States and other countries

The t-shirt sold by Dogfish Head Brewery is manufactured by a company called TS Designs, who are based in Burlington, NC. Not only are TS Designs’ t-shirts made in North Carolina, the cotton that they are made from is grown in North Carolina.

It would be nice if more breweries who sold t-shirts, baseball caps, wool hats and other souvenir items sourced those from inside the United States. If these items came from inside or close to the community in which they reside it would be another indication that the breweries are committed to supporting their local and/or regional economy.

Further Reading

Schnell, Steven M. and Joseph E. Reese. 2003. Microbreweries as tools of local identity.” Journal of Cultural Geography, Volume 21, number 1, pages 45–69.

Schnell, Steven M. 2013. Deliberate identities: becoming local in America in a global age. Journal of Cultural Geography, Volume 30, Issue 1, pages 55-89.