S.F.’s Anchor yanked up by Sapporo
SAN FRANCISCO » Anchor’s aweigh, indeed.
An era came to an end Thursday when Anchor Brewing, the maker of the famous Anchor Steam beer that has slaked the thirsts of everyone from longshoremen and servicemen to tech industry wunderkinds since Grover Cleveland was president, sold itself to Japanese beer giant Sapporo.
Reports put the sale price at $85 million, but neither Anchor nor Sapporo confirmed that amount. The deal is expected to close Aug. 31.
But while Anchor will remain at its Mariposa Street location in San Francisco, the days of independence for what many call the original craft brewery are coming to an end.
“They were an inspiration for me, no doubt,” said Dan Gordon, co-founder and chief operating officer of San Jose-based craft
brewery Gordon Biersch. “When I was 16 years old and drinking their beer — under parental watch — I knew their beer was good, and it made me think about how I could do something like this.”
Founded in 1896, Anchor made its name as a San Francisco original, and the company’s beers are still best-known around the Bay Area. As such, even as Anchor’s name recognition spread, the company still remained in the category of small, or craft breweries, known for creating beers with richer, stronger flavors than those of macro breweries such as Anheuser-Busch InBev and MillerCoors.
According to a statement from Sapporo, Anchor sold 1.75 million cases of beer and generated $33 million in revenue during 2016.
Anchor will be joining a Japanese beer giant with a history even older than its own. Sapporo is the oldest brand of beer in Japan, and began brewing in 1876.
“I’m not surprised it was Sapporo,” said Terrence Fox, a longtime Bay Area beer distributor with M.E. Fox and DBI Beverage. “The Asian breweries need to diversify because they have an aging customer base. They should match up well because both brands don’t really overlap among their targeted customers.”
And beer industry officials say it comes as no sur- prise that Sapporo would want the status of having a well-known name from the craft brewing sector in its stable of brands.
“Anchor has a lot of cachet nationwide, and certainly among beer enthusiasts,” said Tom McCor- mick, executive director of the Sacramento-based California Craft Brewers Association, which counts more than 500 state brewers among its members. “To those who know craft beer well, the brand is one of the most respected craft beer brands in the country.”
The Brewers Association, a national trade group for craft and small breweries based in Boulder, Colo., said overall beer sales in the U.S. reached $107.6 billion last year, with craft beer sales making up $23.5 billion of that amount. Bart Watson, chief economist at the Brewers Association, said Sapporo’s purchase of Anchor is just part of a larger trend going on in the beer industry.
“The overall beer market has become more competitive as the number of breweries has increased,” Watson said.
“The world’s largest brewers are increasingly entering the fuller- f lavored beer space. (And) many brewing companies are looking for partners that can help them grow by bringing additional resources to the company.”
Signs of that were seen locally when, in May, Petaluma-based Lagunitas sold the remaining 50 percent of itself that Heineken didn’t already own to the Dutch brewing giant.
Other notable craft beer acquisitions in recent years include Chicago- based Goose Island selling itself to AB InBev in 2001, and Corona beer maker Constellation Brands buying Ballast Point, of San Diego, for $1 billion in 2015.
“It’s a highly volatile business,” said Gordon, of Gordon-Biersch. “Sapporo is taking over a gem of a brand.”