Craft beer makers take on bigger players

Washington DC based New America Foundation has come out with a new proposal that could force the beer industry into rethinking its strategy.

The foundation has called on lawmakers to pressure the US Department of Justice to investigate whether industry leaders were in  violation of antitrust law. The foundation's push comes with small craft brewers saying they had lost market share as the largest breweries continued to dominate the marketplace.

According to Barry C Lynn, director of New America's Markets, Enterprise and Resiliency Initiative, the diversity that is seen, only in the little 5 per cent of the marketplace was greater than anywhere else in the world.

He said at a panel hosted at the think tank's Washington offices Wednesday that it was a result of that marketplace that was put into place in the 1930s.

The New American Foundation is not battling the major beer industry players, a similar statement came from The Brewers Association, which billed itself as ''dedicated to small and independent American craft brewers.''

Arguing that small brewers now faced a unique set of challenges, the association warned against allowing conglomerates to continue attempts to consolidate.