Kicking back and conversing with a friend or friends over a cold beer or cocktail is a simple, yet great joy. Doing so in the environs of the Golden Isles is an even greater joy.
Piling on even more joy, a distillery and a brewery are on their way to downtown Brunswick.
The Richland Distilling Company’s new rum distillery is in the final phases of construction on Newcastle Street. The distillery has already had a couple First Friday open houses.
On the other side of Newcastle will be Silver Bluff Brewing Co. Silver Bluff is in the early stages of construction. When it opens, perhaps this year, it will be a fully operational brewery with a beer garden and tap room.
The distillery industry is booming. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the number of operating distilleries in the U.S. has increased from 145 in 2010 to 675 in 2016. Employment in the industry has increased from 7,252 workers in 2010 to 12,207 in 2016. And distilleries pay well: the average weekly wages of distillery workers in 2016 was $1,362.
The boom in the brewery industry has been even more impressive. In 2002, there were 365 breweries operating in the U.S. By 2010, there were 527. In 2016, there were 2,843. Employment in the brewery industry has increased from 24,864 in 2010 to 58,580 in 2016.
But there’s much more to the beer story than that. If you are an old and inveterate beer snob, as I am, the evolution of the beer industry in the U.S. since the 1970s is a small yet glorious episode in the history of American capitalism.
In the 1970s, the beer situation in the U.S. was grim. The country had only 40 breweries, and the industry was highly concentrated: the five largest beer manufacturers accounted for 75 percent of beer sales. Weak and wimpy lagers ruled the day. Beers with actual flavor were pricey and hard to find.
Big beer’s only innovation in the 1970s was to introduce light beer. Is there any beer worse than a weak and wimpy lager? There is: light beer. It is light beer, along with disco, bell bottoms and a disturbing enthusiasm for polyester that mark the 1970s as among western civilization’s lowest ebbs.
In capitalism, such situations are the mothers of entrepreneurship. And it was in just that situation in the 1970s that craft brewers were born. The increase in U.S. breweries from 40 in 1970 to 2,843 in 2016 is almost entirely attributable to craft brewers entering the market.
Compared to the 1970s, the variety and quality of beer available in the U.S. today is spectacular. The big brewers of the 1970s had to become entrepreneurial to survive, and most of them have, by offering much more variety and much better quality.
Now the booming distillery and brewery industries are making their way to downtown Brunswick in the form of Richland Distilling and Silver Bluff Brewing. This is great news for downtown Brunswick and an encouraging sign. Entrepreneurs don’t locate just anywhere. They locate where they see profitable opportunities.
And Richland and Silver Bluff are the sorts of businesses that can spark a boom in a small and pretty downtown. Downtown Brunswick has seen a rising wave of entrepreneurship over the past couple years. Richland and Silver Bluff could make the wave much bigger.
Reg Murphy Center