This is an English adaptation of a FoodBud historical article originally published on August 19, 2022.
This adaptation is based on reporting by Xiaguangshe, which described China’s craft beer category in summer 2022 as both heating up and moving into a faster phase of consolidation.
In summer 2022, craft beer was gaining visibility across China: from neighborhood taprooms to online stores selling imported and local craft labels. Grocery and delivery platforms including Hema, Meituan, and Dingdong Maicai were also pushing the category closer to everyday consumer goods.
Hema said craft beer sales in May 2022 were up 369% year on year. Dingdong Maicai launched its private-label craft beer brand, 1972 Farm, in June 2022; within two weeks, one SKU reached daily sales of 16,000 cans. Helped by the private label, Dingdong’s craft beer sales in June 2022 rose more than 200% year on year.
For younger urban consumers, craft beer offered a different social occasion from baijiu, cocktails, or late-night beer-and-barbecue meals. It was seen as casual, varied in flavor, and suited to cleaner, more comfortable bar settings.
Before local craft beer became widely available, China’s beer market was dominated by large industrial lager brands such as Tsingtao, Budweiser, Harbin, Yanjing, and Carlsberg. These beers were produced at scale with standardized processes. By contrast, craft beer emphasized higher wort concentration, hop aroma, and more distinctive brewer-led flavors.
Craft beer had a longer history in the United States, where homebrewing took off in the 1970s and helped create the world’s largest craft beer market. In China, craft breweries began appearing in larger numbers around 2008.
After more than a decade of consumer education, craft beer was moving beyond niche circles. Fruit beers and lower-alcohol styles helped recruit new drinkers. One example cited was Fruli strawberry beer, a well-known fruit beer blending wheat beer and strawberry juice, with a drinking experience close to juice for consumers who did not previously have strong alcohol habits.
While China’s overall beer industry was declining, craft beer was still growing quickly. From 2013 to 2020, craft beer consumption posted a compound annual growth rate of 35.38%. Qichacha data showed more than 4,300 existing craft-beer-related companies, including more than 1,300 registered in 2021, up 25.5% year on year. By the article’s publication in August 2022, nearly 1,000 more had been newly registered that year.
The article argued that craft beer would not simply replace industrial beer.
A restaurant entrepreneur who had returned from Shanghai to his hometown told Xiaguangshe that at barbecue stalls and night markets, customers drink beer quickly and in volume. In those settings, the biggest sellers are usually the cheapest local beers; even Budweiser can be considered expensive, making craft beer a poor fit on price.
Craft beer’s complex flavors suit slower tasting occasions. Industrial lager remains better aligned with high-volume food occasions such as barbecue or spicy crayfish, where a light, refreshing beer clears the palate rather than competing with the food.
The more relevant commercial role for craft beer was premiumization. China’s beer industry was already mature and concentrated: the top five companies accounted for more than 90% of sales volume. National Bureau of Statistics data cited in the article showed China’s beer output declining from 2013 to 2020, while demand for premium beer, represented by craft beer, rose against the broader trend.
According to the Tmall Beer Trend White Paper cited in the article, China’s craft beer market growth in 2021 was far higher than the overall beer industry. Sour beer, fruit beer, and IPA grew by 45%, 35%, and 19%, respectively.
Despite strong growth, craft beer penetration in China remained low. A Zheshang Securities research report cited in the article put China’s craft beer penetration at just 2.2% in 2020, compared with 12.3% in the United States. The category was still fragmented: many products, few nationally recognized brands.
That combination of fast growth, low penetration, and no dominant leader kept the sector attractive to capital. Since 2013, craft beer had drawn investor attention. Leading independent breweries used funding to build chains, produce canned and bottled beer, and expand online sales. Large beer companies also launched premium products and brought craft-style beer into traditional beer channels.
Funding accelerated after 2021. According to incomplete statistics cited in the article, craft beer brand financing exceeded RMB 1 billion in 2021 alone. In July 2021, Xuanbo Beer announced a RMB 50 million Pre-A round; four months later, it raised another A round worth tens of millions of yuan. Panda Brew completed four rounds of financing, with investors including Challenger Capital, associated with Genki Forest founder Tang Binsen.
Large beer groups also entered through acquisitions, stakes, or internal development. Budweiser acquired Boxing Cat in 2017. Carlsberg invested in Jing-A in 2019. Yanjing Beer and Tsingtao Beer also launched their own craft beer brands.
Foodservice and beverage chains were drawn to craft beer’s offline fit and social-media appeal. Banu, Mixue Bingcheng, Starbucks, Haidilao, and others launched private craft beer brands or related concepts. Mixue Bingcheng extended into alcohol through its Fulujia convenience-store format, opening Fulujia Beer Factory stores. The article said the brand had around 15 stores at the time and briefly gained attention on Xiaohongshu.
E-commerce and grocery platforms were also moving in, using channel and supply-chain advantages. Dingdong Maicai’s 1972 Farm focused on fresh unpasteurized craft beer sold within 24 hours. Meituan Maicai and Hema also launched private-label craft beers. At Hema, fruit beers were especially popular; one regular customer said she treated them more like beverages and trusted Hema’s self-operated products to be easy to drink.
Craft beer was shifting from a neighborhood taproom business into a commercialized, branded consumer category. New entrants were using brand, channel, and occasion expansion to address craft beer’s low market share.
But rising interest also intensified competition. Qichacha data showed closures and cancellations among craft-beer-related companies increasing year by year: only 3 related companies were cancelled or revoked in 2016, compared with 323 in 2021.
The article expected more craft brands to appear and suggested China’s craft beer market might eventually follow the United States, where craft could reach around one-third of total beer market share, with local leaders emerging.
Still, craft beer lacked a unified global definition. The Brewers Association in the United States defines a craft brewer partly by annual production of less than 6 million barrels and by independence, with no more than 25% ownership by a non-craft brewer or company. Under definitions like this, the article noted, many efforts to take craft beer mainstream contain a built-in contradiction.
China’s craft beer market was still early, with standards, scale, capital, and brewer identity all being contested.
Note: Financing amounts, ownership references, market projections, and forward-looking category expectations are historical as of the article’s August 19, 2022 publication date.