Trump Tariffs Could Impact Your Local Brewery's Bottom Line

UNDATED (WJON News) -- A tariff announced by President Donald Trump last week has the craft beer industry on edge.

The Craft Brewers Association says a 25 percent tariff on steel and aluminum imported into the United States is set to go into effect on March 12th.

They say this mirrors the one made under the first Trump administration in 2018. However, during that tariff trading partners Canada, the European Union, and South Korea received exemptions from the tariffs. Trump has stated that those countries will not be exempt from these newly announced tariffs.

The U.S. imports more aluminum from Canada than from any other country. The Craft Brewers says, that even with Canada excluded from the 2018 tariff, there were still price increases on raw aluminum, impacting the price of cans.

In 2023 the use of aluminum cans for packaging craft beer grew almost four percent. Sales data shows aluminum cans account for about 75 percent of packaged craft beer's volume and revenue.

Pantown Brewing Company co-owner Marty Czech tells WJON News

The last tariff had a big impact. Aluminum is everywhere in brewing. Almost all kegs are aluminum and packaging for beer has almost completely moved away from glass to aluminum cans.
We've been exploring getting into 16oz cans and doing a little wider distribution and knowing there's a significant increase in aluminum costs imminent gives me great pause.
Currently, for small brewers like us, the cost of cans is about 25% of the wholesale cost for cases of 16oz cans. Increasing that expense by 25% is going to change our plans.

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Bad Habit Brewing Company co-owner Aaron Rieland says their cost for aluminum has stayed pretty steady over the last few years.

We order our cans from a company in Minneapolis called Lagersmith. They are a reseller of our cans. I will be ordering here again in the next few weeks so we shall see if there has been a price increase. We didn’t sell a whole lot of cans back in 2018 which isn’t true of today. We sell quite a bit more these days.

Canada is also the largest supplier of steel to the U.S., followed closely by Mexico. The two countries account for close to 40 percent of steel imported into the U.S. Companies that make steel products for breweries including kegs, steel tanks, brewhouses, and building materials could be impacted.

The Craft Brewers Association says in 2023 Minnesota had 237 craft breweries which made a more than $2 million economic impact on the state.