There are lots of events that Anchor Brewing Company has made it through. The 1906 earthquake in San Francisco. The Spanish flu. Prohibition, even. But this week, the 127-year-old beer maker announced it’s shutting down.

Anchor, which was bought by the Japanese brewery Sapporo in 2017, said inflation, the pandemic, and increased competition are all to blame. But also? We’re just drinking less beer.

When Anchor spokesperson Sam Singer was just getting to be of age in Berkeley in the ’70s, getting a hold of an Anchor beer was a big deal. 

“That’s what the cool guys drank,” he said. “That was old style. That was OG.”

Anchor is OG, in that it calls itself America’s first craft brewery. 

But it’s relied on people buying its beer in bars and restaurants, which we didn’t go to as much during lockdowns.

Singer said the company’s annual revenue has declined by 75% since 2016. And there are now over 9,000 craft breweries in the U.S. compared to one when Anchor started. 

“And they’re wonderful competitors, wonderful brews,” he said. “But many of those also are eating up shelf space.”

Also, beer sales were down 3% last year by volume, according to the Brewers Association, a trade group. 

Bart Watson, its chief economist, said wine and liquor have gotten less expensive relative to beer. 

“And if you have two somewhat substitutable goods, one gets cheaper relative to the other, you’re going to see some consumer shifts there,” he said.

Also, Americans are aging, and Watson pointed out the older we get, the less beer we drink.

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