Tilray to Acquire 4 Craft Beer Breweries From Molson Coors

Global cannabis giant Tilray Brands Inc. keeps hopping further into the beer market. The company announced Aug. 13 that it entered into a definitive agreement to acquire four craft breweries from Molson Coors Beverage Co. The acquisition includes Oregon-based Hop Valley Brewing Co., Georgia-based Terrapin Beer Co., Texas-based Revolver Brewing, and Michigan-based Atwater Brewery, and will bring the company’s beverage footprint to a total of 18 brands.

The move follows Tilray’s ongoing strategy of acquiring leading craft beverage brands, including its:

• 2023 purchase of eight beverage brands (including breweries and brewpubs) from Anheuser-Busch, including 10 Barrel Brewing, Widmer Brothers, Redhook Brewery, Square Mile Cider, Breckenridge Brewery, Blue Point Brewing, HiBall Energy and Anheuser-Busch’s in-house created Shock Top Wheat.
• 2022 acquisition of Montauk Brewing Co., a leading New York-based craft brewer with distribution across more than 6,400 outlets, including top national retailers such as Target, Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, Stop & Shop, King Kullen, Walmart, 7-Eleven, Costco, BJ’s and Speedway.
• 2021 acquisition of SweetWater Brewing Co.—which at the time was the 10th largest craft brewer in the nation with distribution across more than 40 states—as part of Tilray’s merger with cannabis giant Aprhia Inc.
• 2021 acquisition of Breckenridge Distillery, a Colorado-based distilled spirits company largely known for its award-winning bourbon whiskeys, and (ironically) known as the world’s “highest distillery” at 9,600 feet above sea level.

RELATED: Tilray’s Takeover: Following its blockbuster merger with Aphria, Tilray continues its M&A streak and grows its revenue and geographic reach considerably.

“Tilray Brands is proud to be driving the most compelling and unique growth story in the craft beer industry,” Tilray Brands Chairman and CEO Irwin D. Simon said in a press release. “With the acquisition of these four craft breweries from Molson Coors, we are marking another strategic milestone in Tilray Brands’ growth plan.”

Simon said the company—which supports over 40 brands in over 20 countries, including 13 adult-use cannabis brands, four medical-cannabis brands, hemp-based foods, and craft beverages—plans to continue to invest in the future of these craft breweries, “accelerating their growth and capturing a wide range of new market opportunities.”

“Tilray Brands is a beacon for craft brands, and we are committed to driving their growth and success within our portfolio,” he said. “Our proven track record of integrating acquisitions and driving profitable growth gives us the confidence to deliver incredible value for our shareholders."

“Last fall we set a clear portfolio premiumization ambition, and achieving it is going to require tighter focus on the segments we believe have the highest growth potential for our business,” Molson Coors Chief Commercial Officer Michelle St. Jacques said in the press release. “While we love these craft breweries and the people behind them, this move allows us to do exactly that – focus our time, energy and resources behind the initiatives we believe will best help us meaningfully grow our U.S. above premium portfolio in beer and beyond beer.”

“Through this acquisition, our beer business is expected to grow to 15 million cases annually, cementing Tilray Beverages as the #1 craft brewer in the Pacific Northwest, #1 in Georgia and anchors Tilray’s craft brands in two key beer states, Texas and Michigan,” Ty Gilmore, president of Tilray Beverages, North America, said in the release. 

Tilray Not Alone in Cannabis-Beer Unions
For starters, this is not Molson Coors’ first cannabis transaction. The company’s Canadian unit teamed up with Canadian marijuana producer HEXO in 2018 to form joint-venture Truss Beverage Co. to produce cannabis-infused, nonalcoholic beverages, the Denver Business Journal reported. In August 2023, however, “following the acquisition of Hexo by Tilray Brands in June, the two partners confirmed the sale of Molson Coors’ 57.5% stake in Truss to Tilray,” Global Drinks Intel (GDI) reported. “The cannabis beverage market hasn’t grown to the industry’s initial expectations,” Molson Coors’ Chief Communications Officer Adam Collins said (as reported in GDI’s article). “We decided to sell our portion of the Truss Canada JV and exit this space as we turn our focus to other segments with stronger growth potential.”

Green Thumb Industries (GTI) CEO Ben Kovler also expressed interest in a merger between GTI and Boston Beer Co. (creator of Samuel Adams Boston Lager) in June. Kovler released the June 2 letter he wrote to Boston Beer Co. founder and Chairman Jim Koch in which he was proposing a merger of the companies. Kovler wrote that he thinks the combination of the two companies “can be the future of consumer brands for recreational activities and well-being in America.”

RELATED: UPDATE: Green Thumb CEO Releases Letter to Boston Beer Founder, Expressing Interest in Merger

Going back some six years, international beer, wine and spirits producer and marketer Constellation Brands, with household beer names such as Corona and Modelo under its umbrella, was a first-mover into the cannabis industry in 2018, when it invested $4 billion in Canopy Growth Corp. and increased its stake in the company to 38% shortly after, investing an additional $3.8 billion. The company, however, announced earlier this year that it was divesting from Canopy. “We are pleased to complete the conversion of our Common Share ownership interest in Canopy into Exchangeable Shares,” Bill Newlands, Constellation’s president and CEO, said in an April 18 press release. “While we remain supportive of Canopy’s strategy, this transaction is expected to eliminate the impact to our equity in earnings and is aligned to our intent to not deploy additional investment in Canopy as we’ve previously stated in our capital allocation priorities.”

But even before Constellation, Heineken-owned Lagunitas Brewing teamed up with vape cartridge manufacturer CannaCraft and its AbsoluteXtracts line to create a limited-edition, cannabis-infused IPA called SuperCritical, containing cannabis terpenes, Cannabis Business Times reported in 2017. Then in June 2018, the company launched HiFi Hops as “the first cannabis beverage from a beer producer in history within the nascent category,” according to Lagunitas’ website.