In Oregon, almost twice as many breweries close as open in 2023
The damage to Oregon’s reputation and economy hits even their most famous products: breweries.
Axios reported that in 2023 there were 22 brewery and brewpub closings in Oregon included well-known names like Ex Novo, Ecliptic, and Cascade Brewing. Only 12 breweries opened. Even worse, for those that stayed open, their sales overwhelmingly decreased.
The gotcha for Oregon is that it defied national trends showing more openings than closings. More evidence the luster has worn of Oregon breweries.
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One thought on “In Oregon, almost twice as many breweries close as open in 2023”
With over 300 breweries in Oregon, a net -10 in one year is not that big of a deal, especially in an industry with so much overcapacity a number five times that wouldn’t be unexpected.
The example breweries are all special cases: Ex Novo, sold to Lazy Days, net zero impact. Ecliptic, sold to Ninkasi (#2 largest in Oregon). Cascade Brewing, really weird case, was “sold” several year ago to a group, but then upon Art’s death was discovered that it actually wasn’t sold and the current “owners” couldn’t afford to buy it from his heirs. I think you can only argue Ecliptic closed due to business reasons.
But yeah, the kids aren’t drinking as much these days, and after years and years of booming expansion there’s so much overcapacity that you must be able to brew good beer and know how to run a business in order to stay in business, and even then it takes luck.