UPDATE: Link to the craft beer 2011 stats infographic

(Boulder, CO) – The Brewers Association reported official craft beer statistics for 2011 today. Here are the numbers along with some comments (and last year’s numbers):

– Volume share for craft beer grew from 4.97% to 5.68%. The 11.5 million barrels produced is an increase of 13.2% from 2010. Though it is not an exact correlation, Anheuser-Busch U.S. market share dropped the same amount as craft beer market share grew last year. Total U.S. beer market share declined 1.32%.

– Side note: Volume was estimated to be up 14% at the halfway mark in 2011, compared to 9% at the halfway mark in 2010. Full-year volume for 2010 was up 11% whereas volume was up 13.2% for all of 2011. This means that volume growth accelerated in the second half of 2010 but it decelerated in the second half of 2011. With Boston Beer’s weaker-than-expected volume performance in the fourth quarter, that could partially explain it, considering Boston Beer production accounts for 21% of craft beer volume. The question that may be on some minds is whether volume growth (as a %) has seen its peak.

– Dollar share grew from 7.6% to 9.1%. The $8.7 billion of craft beer sold is a 15% increase from 2010. It seems to be a given that dollar share will pass the 10% mark this year. The total U.S. beer market is estimated to have sold $95.5 billion of beer last year.

– The official number of breweries for 2011 is 1,989, an 11% increase over 2010. The official number of craft breweries is 1,938. It is a reasonable assumption that there are now more than 2,000 breweries in the U.S.. More interesting though…have we hit 2,000 craft breweries yet? If not, we certainly will in the second quarter.

– The largest growth in the number of breweries came from the production side (versus the brewpub side). There are now 88 regional craft breweries (producing at least 15,000 barrels of beer annually) and 787 microbreweries, a number up 28% from 2010 despite some of those 2010 microbreweries graduating to regional craft brewery status. Will we hit 1,000 production breweries in 2011? How about 100 regional craft breweries? Probably yes and yes.

– 250 breweries opened and 37 breweries closed in 2011. Compare to 152 and 63, respectively in 2010.

– The craft beer industry employed “approximately” 103,585 people in 2011.