The Massachusetts Brewers Guild and the Beer Distributors of Massachusetts have reached an agreement aimed at ending a 10-year dispute over how easily craft breweries can switch distributors, the groups announced on Saturday.
Both groups agreed to support a bill to allow breweries producing less than 250,000 barrels in a calendar year to end a relationship with a distributor with 30 days’ notice, at any time, according to a joint press release.
“This legislation is a victory for the more than 200 craft breweries across Massachusetts,” said Sam Hendler, president of the Massachusetts Brewers Guild and co-founder of Framingham-based Jack’s Abby Craft Lagers, in a statement.
The bill is the move away from the law where breweries essentially were locked into a long-term deal with a single distributor, once the brewery picked a distributor. The law was established when the market was dominated by a handful of national breweries, and their changing distributors could disrupt a single distributor’s entire revenue stream. As the beer market has increasingly become diverse with smaller craft breweries, being locked into a long-term deal with a single distributor could hinder a brewery’s growth prospects.
Both groups have long disagreed over proposed bills to legislate how breweries may end their relationships with their distributors, according to a press release.
