Lager is top search choice for Ohioans
College football fans in Ohio and that state up north have something to hoist a pint over, their love of lager.
People in Ohio and Michigan, when they turn to Google to search for beer styles, are most often looking for lager, according to BusinessBroker. net. Lager is Ohio’s go-to, but in Virginia, saison is the thing. Californians, surrounded by brewers wedded to hops, look for pale ale more often than not.
BusinessBroker.net sifted through reams of data via Google Trends to provide the most-searched beer styles and breweries from each of the 50 states and Washington, D.C. Craft breweries are the most-popular search term everywhere but Missouri, the home of Anheuser-Busch, which took home the title.
The most-searched brewery in Ohio? It’s right here in central Ohio, Columbus Brewing Co. While that is the biggest local craft brewery, it is much smaller than Cleveland’s Great Lakes Brewing Co. Great Lakes has wide distribution throughout the Midwest and Atlantic states, which might cut into its share of searches in Ohio. Columbus Brewing Co. only distributes in the state, and mostly in central and northeast Ohio.
One brewery topped the list in two places. Victory Brewing Co. came out on top in its home state of Pennsylvania, but also as the most-searched brewery in Washington, D.C. Otherwise, states stuck to their own.
Kentucky googled Braxton Brewing the most. Braxton is known for collaborations with Graeter’s Ice Cream that mimic some of Graeter’s flavors, like a black raspberry chocolate chip stout. Michigan residents looked for Founders Brewing Co. Indiana was on the hunt for Upland Brewing Co., a Bloomington-based brewer with several brewpubs in central Indiana. New York stuck with Brooklyn Brewing Co. California, which has an embarrassment to choose from, hoisted one for Stone Brewing Co.
As for Ohio’s mostsearched style, lager, well, the state isn’t alone. Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, South Dakota, Missouri and Mississippi are interested in lagers, as well. Pale ale, which includes the most popular craft style, India pale ale, held sway in 19 states, from Maine to California and Texas to Minnesota. Odd standouts were kolsch, a German ale, that was most searched in Arizona and Colorado, while stout was tops in Wisconsin. Montana and Kansas, with their amber waves of grain, looked most for wheat beer.
It’s no wonder that craft beer garners so much attention online. The U.S. now has more than 6,000 breweries thanks to a revolution in beer making and drinking preferences. Though growth is slowing in the craft space, it has latched onto another key food movement — local.
“Today, 83 percent of the population lives within 10 miles of a local brewery,” said Bart Watson, chief economist at the Brewers Association, a trade group for craft beer.
Watson added that data points to craft beer drinkers visiting nearby breweries several times a year, which could account for at least some of the action on Google.