Legal marijuana hurting beer business

In states with legalized recreational marijuana, beer sales have dropped.

Time reports that research firm Cowen & Company analyzed the state of the beer industry in Colorado, Oregon and Washington, states where marijuana is legal and a booming craft beer industry. The research showed that beer markets in those states have underperformed the last two years.

“With all three of these states now having fully implemented a [marijuana] retail infrastructure, the underperformance of beer in these markets has worsened over the course of 2016,” the researchers wrote.

Domestic brewers like Anheuser Busch-InBev and MilllerCoors have seen the largest drops, but craft beers also took a hit, Time reports. 

Research shows the affect is strongest in Denver, where total beer volumes plummeted by 6.4 percent.

Cox Media Group