Larry Bell told MLive yesterday that he’d consider a sale as early as fall if he can’t consolidate ownership of his Comstock, Michigan-based brewery. Ten individuals control the 11 share holdings not owned by the Bells, Larry told CBD.

Mark Hegedus has been with Goose Island over a month now. The recent Deschutes sales and marketing chief alum will help GI with priority No. 1: the brand strategy and messaging to reach customers across 20+ states…

It may have been long-coming from a market size standpoint. But craft has finally arrived in New York, especially in NYC. But it hasn’t all been smooth sailing of late…

Technomic’s recently released “Dinner & Late Night Consumer Trends” says that beer is the most-frequently ordered beverage among late-night patrons, followed by mixed drinks and wine. But which segment of the category has the stronghold?

Sales chief Dave Guender, an InBev alum, thus says they see 420 Fest as an extremely valid Key Performance Indicator. “The festival conveys perfectly our trueness to the brand and SweetWater’s culture,” he says. It’s one that seems to resonate even with the unexpected; communications chief Steve Farace says touch-screen surveys done after the event’s 5K a few years ago painted a somewhat surprising composite of the 420 fest-goer. That turned out to be a 28-year-old active female with an appreciation for the arts. Indeed, artist tents line the grounds.

We know the convenience channel is underdeveloped for craft. Big local brands do well in certain chains, and the channel’s buyers will tell you that it is becoming more appealing from its heartier margins and more monied consumer. One memorable quote from an am/pm category manager: “Bubba is our customer,” according to Nancy Knott, who says 40% of her sales are singles, and also skews high in multipacks. “But we have seen our customer change with the recession.

Bob “Sully” Sullivan confirmed that they’re in the planning stages of a launch in the DC area around early June. “It would include the adjacent portion of Maryland and Baltimore, and the Northern Virginia area,” he told CBD of a DC launch.

Starbucks did a whopping $12 billion in revenue for their 2011 fiscal year, including some 10,787 U.S. locations. That’s a lot of stores on corners near craft beer drinkers, who by contrast funneled $9 billion into that segment last year. Meanwhile, the coffee retail giant has been slowly and quietly rolling out locations with beer and wine programs since October 2010…

Terry Usry tells CBD the recent expansion to 75,000 barrels capacity will help open new markets. They expanded heavily into the Northeast last year, and are

It’s finally here – the BA’s latest lists of top 50 brewing companies, according to 2011 beer sales volumes. We’re always interested in who has switched places since the previously released lists…

In a segment dominated and sometimes driven by hop-forward profiles, this is worth a note: New Zealand’s Nelson Sauvin hop has played prominently in some of the largest craft brewers’ latest offerings. New Belgium used it in Shift, their biggest release of the year. Boston Beer Co. featured it in their Single-Batch series debut late last fall…

In Wednesday’s issue you were promised more on House of Shandy “tomorrow,” but ultimately forced to wait ’til today. That’s fitting: Alan Newman has been waiting for more than 15 years to roll out the shandy project he’ll do under Alchemy & Science, finally brought to fruition by the Boston Beer product development team.

Boston Beer’s Angry Orchard national rollout is now in full effect. Jim Koch tells us that though a rollout is never quite finished, he guesses the new cider product will be with the vast majority of distributors over the course of the year. “They seem to be pretty excited. Of course, you always have a few who are waiting to see. And that’s ok.”

Brian says there is some craft consumer crossover with other bev-alc – and it seems to us that it’s the craft drinker that’s the most experimental across categories. A typical craft customer will also have a bottle of premium spirits, a $10 bottle of wine and snacks in his or her basket. The mix of goods makes the craft consumer…

As one Twitter-goer pointed out, the 250-barrel brewhouse is bigger than most Chicago-area breweries combined, including Goose Island. Construction is expected to be completed by July 2013 and cost $15 million – $18 million, with an eventual 600,000-barrel capacity to exactly mirror the Petaluma facility. By the time Lagunitas Chicago is ready to mash in in late 2013, they plan to move about 140,000 barrels of production there.