Page 12 - Next Draft News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

For 50 years in Massachusetts, craft breweries have lacked the power to easily jump from one wholesaler to the next because of a law, written when their industry did not exist, binding them to lifetime contracts. Distributors have held sway, empowered to a level where they can buy and sell craft beer brands without say from the brewers. No longer. At 3:26 a.m. Jan. 6, hours before the end of the 2020 legislative session, the House passed a bill that allows brewers producing fewer than 250,000 barrels a year — 99% of the breweries in the state — to end their relationship with a distributor...

The Next Draft: Bull Spit Brewing Co. in Lancaster weighs clean break, fresh start with new brewery in Winchendon By Matthew Tota Correspondent Once, naively, I believed that a brewery could thrive in any town or city in this state. I had been convinced that every community could benefit from hosting one or even three breweries. Any trepidation from local leaders would fade once they see the kind of social and economic benefits breweries offer, or get to know the hard-working small business owners running them. There are always exceptions, of course — see Sunday River Brewing Co. in Maine ...