Continuing what was seen during the recession, consumers are either buying more premium-priced beers or buying less beer overall, Jennifer Zegler, beverage analyst at Mintel, Chicago, told Beverage Industry in March. However, with price adjustments, brewers have seen dollar sales rise but not necessarily volume sales, she added. For example, the U.S. beer industry sold 2.9 billion 2.25-gallon cases of beer for $71.5 billion in 2008 compared with unit sales just shy of 2.8 billion 2.25-gallon cases for $78.1 billion in 2012, she said.

Domestic beer case sales were relatively flat for the 52 weeks ending May 19 in U.S. supermarkets, drug stores, gas and convenience stores, mass market retailers, military commissaries, and select club and dollar retail chains, according to Information Resources Inc. (IRI), a Chicago-based market research firm. However, dollar sales were up approximately 2 percent for more than $23 billion in sales. Across the domestic segments, super-premium fared the best with a 19.6 percent increase in dollar sales.