Last week’s Alberta Beer Awards Gala, marking the end of the annual Alberta Craft Brewing Convention, came with some emotionally-charged moments.
The Establishment Brewing Company of Calgary, AB brought home the Alberta Small Brewers Association’s top award, Brewery of the Year, leading to a standing ovation from the cheering crowd as tearful hugs were shared amongst the brewery team. They have won the award 3 times in the last 4 years, showing their focus on variety, innovation, and experimentation – all while keeping production quality sky high.
For some, it was bittersweet. Ol’ Beautiful Brewing Co of Calgary, AB gathered 4 awards from the show, including a gold medal for their Eternal Twilight Dark Lager in the category Amber and Dark Lager. After a devastating fire burned down their taproom in late June, the well-deserved wins represent the payoff of continued effort and resilience through hardship.
One moment in particular was met with universal shock and confusion: The announcement that there would be no winner of the New Brewery of the Year award. This award is usually given to the new brewery that collects the most other award points, same as Brewery of the Year. But a few questions present themselves in the wake of this: Why was there no winner, and what does it mean for the Alberta beer industry?
The Significance of New Brewery of the Year
Stonyslope Brewing Company of Calgary, AB was awarded New Brewery of the Year in 2023 after opening in March of that same year. That title went to Irrational Brewing Company of Edmonton, AB in 2022. Both breweries entered the competition within their first year of business, so it’s difficult to discern what real-world benefits (increased patronage, revenue, etc) came from the notoriety.
From a marketing perspective what might be more tangible is public perception about the product; for example, one might assume that an award-winning beer tastes better, is more flavourful, uses higher quality ingredients, and is well-crafted in the brewing process. For an award that signals the best new brewery in the province, the public perception is that those qualities encompass the entire product lineup. I reached out to Stonyslope for comment, but did not hear back at the time of publication.
Who Qualifies for New Brewery of the Year?
One of the first things that was said after the surprising announcement Wednesday night was a restatement of the eligibility criteria. According to the Alberta Small Brewers Association (ASBA), who hosts the competition and awards, in order to qualify for the New Brewery of the Year award a few criteria must be met:
- The brewery opened on or after January 1 of the previous year (To qualify for the award in 2024, a brewery would have to have opened in 2023 or later)
- The brewery has not submitted to previous years’ Alberta Beer Awards (Many breweries start as liquor agencies who can contract other breweries to produce and package their beer)
- The brewery wins an award in the current Alberta Beer Awards (A bronze medal is worth 1 point, silver is 2 points, gold is 4 points)
But within the subtext of the competition, there is another criterion:
- The brewery must be a member in good standing of the Alberta Small Brewers Association
We’ll get to that in a little bit. But first, how many breweries does that include? According to Alberta Gaming, Liquor & Cannabis (AGLC), the official licensing body for Alberta liquor manufacturers, 22 breweries opened doors in Alberta on or after January 1, 2023. Out of those:
- 14 are not ASBA Members
- 6 previously entered
- 1 opened their doors after the entry deadline: Nodding Donkey Brewing of Drayton Valley, AB
There are also two breweries registered with AGLC that have not yet opened their doors: Brewsmith of Calgary, AB, and Hermit’s Brewery of Calgary, AB (No official website or social media accounts are known at this time)
So, that leaves 1 brewery that was open, is presumed eligible to enter, and did not win any awards: The Bell in Scona Brewery of Edmonton, AB. Because the data from Alberta Beer Awards only shows the winners, I reached out to The Bell in Scona for comment to determine that they were in the running, but did not hear back at the time of publication.
ASBA Membership Rates
Let’s unpack this a bit. From the above list, 63% of the breweries that opened since January 1 2023 are not ASBA members – and therefore are unable to enter the Alberta Beer Awards. As of writing, there are 142 Class E beer breweries registered with AGLC, 72 of which are ASBA members – giving a total engagement rate of just over 50%. This doesn’t include Associate Members, Contract Breweries or Breweries in Planning, which have lesser membership tiers with no voting rights. It also does not delineate between “small” and “big” breweries – Labatt, Wild Rose, and Banded Peak are not eligible for membership as they are partially or wholly owned by multinational corporations.
While this 50% figure does not necessarily indicate anything about the wider Alberta beer industry, it does say quite a lot about ASBA and their struggle to engage prospective members. In fact, this falls quite short of the figure published on ASBA’s homepage, which hasn’t been updated in a few years: According to their statistics, ASBA members represent 70% of the industry. I can only speculate whether their figures are outdated or factored differently.
The Cost of Entry: ASBA Membership and the Awards
ASBA is Alberta’s only recognized provincial organization for breweries. Membership is paid, and your annual dues are determined by both a “fixed” fee that starts at $500/yr at the lowest rate, plus a “variable” fee depending on your brewery’s Annual Worldwide Production (AWP) from the previous year. While the membership form gives a few examples, the whole fee has an air of mystery around it – I reached out to ASBA to ask for the full calculation table, but did not hear back at the time of publication. There is also a one-time $500 administration fee for signing up, separate from the annual dues.
So what does that all mean? A small, community-based microbrewery might only pay $500 for membership, while a larger, established brewery might pay in the tens of thousands of dollars. On the surface it seems simple: if you produce more beer, you pay more to be a member. However, when considering the fees against the production volumes, it gets a little more complicated. That small, community-based microbrewery might pay upwards of $1.50 per hectolitre of beer produced, while the large, established brewery might only pay as little as $0.10 per hectolitre. As with everything else in the beer industry, economies of scale make all the difference.
On top of the membership, entry into the Alberta Beer Awards is also paid. For the 2024 competition, members were able to enter 2 beers for free, and $75 per entry after that. There is an entry cap of 8 beers per brewery, meaning that if a brewery were to enter as much as they could – stacking the odds in their favour – they would be paying $450. This is not even to mention the soft costs of entering competitions (a topic for a future blog post).
The dues also include an automatic membership into the Canadian Craft Brewers Association (CCBA), which is free to join regardless, but partners with provincial organizations to reduce the hassle on breweries. That organization prides itself on being representative of the whole Canadian craft beer industry, which fits with their free membership model as well as the open competition structure for their Canada Beer Cup. For that competition, breweries are eligible to enter if they meet the criteria for becoming CCBA members – regardless of their current membership status. In comparison, the Alberta Beer Awards seem much more restrictive.
Besides the cost of membership, there are a myriad of other reasons why breweries may not want to participate in ASBA. Many breweries pride themselves on their apolitical or independent nature, and others may not have the time or resources to take full advantage of membership. Some may have issue with the way ASBA operates or the people who govern it, and take a stance of boycott rather than trying to change things from the inside.
ASBA vs. Alberta Beer Industry
Since its inception in 2013, ASBA has kept the Alberta Beer Awards in their back pocket. While it’s not the only professional competition of its kind in Alberta (Culinaire Magazine’s Alberta Beverage Awards, and Alberta Food Processors Association’s Alberta Food & Beverage Awards come to mind), it is generally regarded as the most prestigious and most focused on beer, and you have to be an ASBA member to enter. This is by design, using the awards as a lure to entice more brewery membership. The question of opening up the awards to non-members – even for an additional fee – has been a topic of several closed-door conversations in ASBA, but no plans of change have been officially announced.
The problem is that the awards are becoming less and less inclusive of the industry; with 50% of the breweries in the province even holding a membership, let alone putting in the effort and expense of entering the competition. This bias toward ASBA members in showcasing the “Best of Alberta” shows pay-to-play representation, which increases marketing costs for breweries that are generally small, family-owned businesses. What’s arguably more dangerous is the policy and advocacy work ASBA performs based on the results of member surveys and feedback, lobbying the Albertan and Canadian government for policy to suit the needs of their members while imposing this policy on the whole industry. This, as well, is a call for membership; have your voice heard, let the government know you’re struggling – these are not bad things. But the message they send is clear: you have to pay up if you want in the club.
Conclusion
In the end, a lack of New Brewery of the Year is not an omen for the demise of the Alberta beer industry, but it may be a signal that change needs to occur. I do not believe ASBA is acting maliciously or in bad faith, and I do not wish harm on the organization or its individuals. As an industry, I believe more can be done to include those that feel their voices are not heard, that they are being used as political leverage, or that the system is designed from front to back to skim their hard-earned profits. Whether that is with ASBA, with another such organization (my mind drifts to “The Alberta Even Smaller Brewer Association”), or without such organizations, the signs and symptoms are there. It’s up to us to do something about it.
So, what’s to be done? Should breweries shift focus to doing 100% Cabin collabs? Should there be a massive call for reform, both inside and outside ASBA? Both are pipe dreams at this point; Cabin has too many tanks dedicated to Super Sat and its many variations. What’s much more likely is that things continue to operate in the way they are currently, alienating more new breweries and making things worse before they can get better.