Thanks to the “good food” movement, a push to recognize local, organic, and high quality-flavored food and beverages, there has been a steady increase in craft beer at the expense of large-scale facilities. Because of its emphasis on creative flavors, food pairings, and the DIY hobby culture it steams from, craft beer gives women slightly more opportunity for inclusion—even if bros still struggle to take them seriously.

A Question of Taste

In Colorado, one of the most brewery-rich states in the country with 154 individual facilities, there are only 10 women total who are known to be a part of the main brewing process. The main obstacles that women continue to face in this industry include perceptions of taste, media influence, and preconceived notions about their skill and ability.

For more women to be involved in the beer industry it helps to increase the amount of women drinking beer. According to a recent Gallup poll, only 20 percent of women prefer beer over other alcoholic beverages. “You have to have a beer drinker before you have a woman beer professional,” says Teri Fahrendorf, President of the Pink Boots Society, an all-female organization to help women in the beer industry.

Beer is for guys, as just about any Budweiser or Coors television ad will remind you. The role most often played by women in these spots is either the sexy waitress or the would-be girlfriend. “The Swedish Bikini Team doesn’t make me thirsty, certainly not for beer,” Fahrendorf says. “To me, every guy in America who wants to drink beer is already doing it, but every woman who wants to drink beer may not be doing it. It has to start on the consumer level to really grow the industry.”

“Beer is universal, it’s probably the second-oldest fermented beverage behind mead and more and more people realize that there is flavor potential there,” says Ginger Johnson, founder and owner of Women Enjoying Beer. Because of the flavor potential and that yearning for local, home brewing has become a popular hobby with over a million people brewing beer at home. Many home brewers take that hobby to the next step and end up opening their own microbrewery. But even though plenty of home-brewers are women there is still skepticism about their roles when it comes to business.

“I have two male partners and it's challenging to have my voice heard,” says Inna Volynskaya, voice of reason (her official title) at Headlands Brewing Co. “We all do sales, we split up accounts. I’ll get a phone call, like, ‘Hey I went to do this sale and the guy doesn’t like me; I think he prefers someone with a skirt show up,’ and I deal with that a lot.” What she’s dealing with is the perception that female sexuality can sell a product more than the product can sell itself, which devalues both the women in the company as well as the product trying to be sold.