Total alcoholic beverage sales in the U.S. 2006-2020

Before the outbreak of the pandemic, alcohol sales in the United States had begun to rise. 2020 was a sharp reversal of this trend with sales declining by 12 percent compared to 2019.

Where is the growth coming from?

If we look at the different segments within the alcoholic beverage industry, we see that beer has been losing market share to spirits and to a lesser extent wine. Since 2010, spirits have gathered an additional 10 percent of the alcohol market while beer has lost the same amount over that time. The rise in total alcohol sales might then be explained by this shift towards spirits, where in 2020 “all categories expect the cheapest "value" category saw positive growth.