{"id":848584,"date":"2025-05-15T22:12:47","date_gmt":"2025-05-16T03:12:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/05\/15\/impossible-us-breweries-buffeted-by-trump-tariffs\/"},"modified":"2025-05-15T22:12:47","modified_gmt":"2025-05-16T03:12:47","slug":"impossible-us-breweries-buffeted-by-trump-tariffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/05\/15\/impossible-us-breweries-buffeted-by-trump-tariffs\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Impossible\u2019: US breweries buffeted by Trump tariffs"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

US President Donald Trump’s 25 percent tariffs on steel and aluminum imports fuel material costs for beer cans – Copyright AFP\/File SAUL LOEB<\/small><\/em><\/p>\n

Beiyi SEOW<\/em><\/p>\n

For US craft brewer Bill Butcher, President Donald Trump\u2019s expanding range of tariffs have sparked an unexpected impact \u2014 a shortage of bottles to package his beer \u2014 while uncertainty looms over his business costs.<\/p>\n

From Canadian malted barley to aluminum beer cans, Trump\u2019s tariffs have hit multiple products that American craft breweries need, buffeting businesses in the world\u2019s biggest economy.<\/p>\n

Turbulence in supplies could ultimately translate to higher beer prices for consumers, brewers warn, even as importers and breweries try to absorb additional costs triggered by the levies and their consequent supply shocks.<\/p>\n

Similar conditions are playing out in various industries across the country, including construction and appliance production.<\/p>\n

In Trump\u2019s latest salvo, 25 percent levies on US steel and aluminum imports took effect this week.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs the aluminum tariffs have kicked in, the major beer suppliers in the country are switching a lot of their production back to bottles,\u201d said Butcher, founder of Port City Brewing Company in the state of Virginia.<\/p>\n

As a result, his provider can no longer supply bottles to him after shipments through March. Aluminum levies also raise the cost of producing cans, threatening higher prices down the line.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of uncertainty. There\u2019s a lot of chaos that\u2019s been injected into our supply chain,\u201d Butcher told AFP.<\/p>\n

He typically goes through 90,000 bottles per month or so \u2014 forming 70 percent of his packaged products \u2014 and the rest goes into cans.<\/p>\n

But in the absence of bottle supplies he expects to use more aluminum cans anyway, or sell more beer in kegs.<\/p>\n

Atlas Brew Works founder Justin Cox, who packages his beers in aluminum cans, estimates their price form about a third of the total cost for a case of 24 beers.<\/p>\n

Aluminum tariffs add to packaging costs \u201cin what\u2019s already a small-margin product going into the wholesale market,\u201d Cox said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll of this ends up with a higher price of our beer on the shelf,\u201d added Cox, who has facilities in Washington and Virginia.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn average, about 10 percent of every can in the US is Canadian aluminum,\u201d said Bart Watson, president of the Brewers Association, a trade group.<\/p>\n

This piles further cost pressures on American craft brewers, he said.<\/p>\n

\u2013 \u2018Impossible\u2019 \u2013<\/p>\n

For Butcher, uncertainty also lingers over costs of the Canadian pilsner malt that forms the base of his beers \u2014 and the bottle caps he imports from Mexico.<\/p>\n

While both products were hit by Trump\u2019s blanket tariffs on Canadian and Mexican goods this month, the president\u2019s partial rollback of them within days has allowed him temporary relief.<\/p>\n

But it remains unclear if duties will return from April 2, when Trump has promised a new wave of \u201creciprocal tariffs\u201d to tackle trade deemed as unfair. These will be tailored to each country, taking into consideration their tariff levels on US goods and other factors.<\/p>\n

Watson estimates the United States imported about $230 million of malt last year, much of it ending up with craft brewers.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost of the barley in the US is contracted for by large brewers or for export to Mexico,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Craft brewers therefore end up using malt containing some portion of imports, he added.<\/p>\n

Tariffs are paid by US importers of foreign goods, and breweries expect duties would filter to them over time.<\/p>\n

Butcher told AFP it has become \u201cimpossible for us to plan out our business, our production, if we don\u2019t know what the price of our supplies are going to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2013 \u2018Sit and watch\u2019 \u2013<\/p>\n

Brendan Chaney, Port City\u2019s logistics manager, noted that tariffs can be an economic tool when used in a targeted manner.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But he cautioned that blanket levies create an atmosphere of fear \u201cakin to five years ago, when Covid happened\u201d and threw supply chains into disarray.<\/p>\n

Butcher and Cox warned that smaller businesses like theirs have limited capacity for storage \u2014 and less cashflow \u2014 making it harder to stockpile inventory to cushion the blow from tariffs.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can only hold so much in our small space, and a minimum order on aluminum cans is a full truckload,\u201d Cox of Atlas Brew Works said.<\/p>\n

The pricing of cans is also subject to flux, Cox noted. Breweries are billed for the final product after production, which can be weeks after orders are placed.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re having to just sit and watch, and hope that things get better before it\u2019s time for us to order (more),\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

AFP
Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

US President Donald Trump’s 25 percent tariffs on steel and aluminum imports fuel material costs for beer cans – Copyright AFP\/File SAUL LOEB Beiyi SEOW For US craft brewer Bill Butcher, President Donald Trump\u2019s expanding range of tariffs have sparked an unexpected impact \u2014 a shortage of bottles to package his beer \u2014 while uncertainty<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":848585,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32352,1076],"tags":[19102,10620],"class_list":{"0":"post-848584","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breweries","8":"category-impossible","9":"tag-breweries","10":"tag-impossible"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=848584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/848585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=848584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=848584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=848584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}