From festivals filled with Arizona beers, local drafts at most restaurants and bars, and brewery-run taprooms around the state, it’s easy to take Arizona’s reputation as a craft beer state for granted. But behind the scenes, a nonprofit organization has been helping our craft beer trade succeed for nearly 25 years.
Established in 1998 when there were only 18 breweries in the state, the Arizona Craft Brewers Guild took on the mission to “work in partnership with independent breweries to promote the virtues and raise the profile of Arizona’s locally crafted beers.”
Today, Arizona’s breweries top more than 100 and the once volunteer-run Guild now has a small staff that does everything from event planning to legislative advocacy and industry outreach.
Andrew Bauman, deputy director of the Guild, explains that while the scope of Arizona’s craft beer trade has grown, the Guild’s mission remains the same.
“It was the same as it is now—to make sure that the legislative needs are being paid attention to and that we are promoting craft beer in Arizona,” he says.
As a 501(c)(6) organization, the Guild represents its members on legislative issues that include updating laws for modern consumer demands—like expanding packaging definitions that used to limit take-away growlers to glass containers—and advocating for new products and business models that can help brewers diversify.
But to the general public, the Guild is probably best known for the festivals it runs, like the Strong Beer Fest in Phoenix; the Baja Beer Festival in Tucson; and Arizona Beer Week with 10 days of beer-focused events throughout Arizona. Bauman says these events showcase what Arizona brewers are creating.
“With so many of [our breweries] being a taproom model and not into distribution so much, it’s hard to get a complete view of what they are doing,” he explains. “When you go to festivals, you learn a lot more. Breweries will bring their favorite beers and share that with people. So that’s where you can get the best idea of what’s going on.”
