Enjoy Beer Acquires Abita Brewing Company

Abita Brewing Company has become a founding partner for Enjoy Beer, a new financial consortium designed to enable larger scale craft breweries to pool resources.

Organized by former Harpoon Brewery CEO Rich Doyle and backed with capital from private equity firm Friedman, Fleisher & Lowe, Enjoy Beer will offer business services and capital to partner breweries in addition to an acquisition platform. 

Because the partner breweries also have the option to invest in Enjoy Beer, it remains to be seen how the overall ownership structure works. But according to industry sources Abita was acquired and the owners will take a minority stake in Enjoy Beer. According to Doyle, the Abita announcement is a first step in taking larger-scale regional breweries and combining them into one entity to facilitate further growth – expected to come through positioning smaller brewers to compete against macro brewers for market share.

“As the craft brewing industry continues to evolve, there is enormous pressure on brewers to compete against the big breweries," said Doyle, the president and founder of Enjoy Beer. "Local brewers like David Blossman at Abita, have been committed to innovation and finding new opportunities to compete while ensuring the company’s independence and local roots.”

Enjoy Beer's goal, said Doyle, is to create partnerships with additional top craft brewers who wish to preserve their local independence, while gaining shared resources in areas such as marketing, sales, purchasing, logistics, and finance in order to compete with large-scale corporate competitors.

“As a local brewer, I’ve always dreamed of an opportunity to help develop something like Enjoy Beer,” says Blossman, President of Abita Beer and Board Member of Enjoy Beer. “Enjoy Beer is an innovative concept that’s going to give Abita the resources and expertise we need for a successful long-term, national growth strategy, while keeping our local roots in Louisiana.”

Adds Doyle, “Enjoy Beer will pioneer a new model in the industry, and together, we will help these independent companies compete at the next level by expanding their resources and their reach.”