Dogfish Head 1st Quarter 2012 Recap – Sales Up 28%

Dogfish Head Craft Brewery 2012 First Quarter Recap

Thanks to all our great wholesalers, retailers and consumers across the 27 states that we currently sell beer to, we had another record quarter. By the end of March 2012 we shipped 28% more beer to a smaller footprint than we did during the same period last year. Our depletions grew around the same pace shipping well over 500K case equivalents. Having had a moratorium on new distribution in 2011 we’ve finally been able to grow our account base in specific markets on all core, seasonal and occasional brands and package sizes. Increased distribution hasn’t diluted our turns per brand and package size, with all core beers reaching their fastest rate of sale over the last ninety days. Our portfolio mix is exactly where we planned seven core brands account for eighty percent of our sales, five seasonals account for ten percent and sixteen occasional beers account for the other ten percent of overall shipments.

In following our revised business strategy from 2011, we now sell over 52% of our beer in six states within 150 miles of the state of Delaware. Our current sales pace will allow us to finish 2012 at our anticipated goal of over 171,000 bbls shipped. We’ve added two new Regional Managers based in Florida and Southern California with another two positions to be filled in the next sixty days. We made another monumental beer /music announcement with the upcoming June release of Positive Contact, a hybrid cider-beer created in collaboration with Deltron 3030. Renowned chef’s Mario Batali, David Chang, Joe Beef, Sean Paxton and James Syhabout designed recipes for us that were inspired by this beer. Our entrance into the Gluten Free craft beer market has been well received by consumers across the country. We shipped well over 13K case equivalents of Tweason’ale with larger volumes being shipped three more times this year.

Our eighteen month $52 million expansion project broke ground which will allow us to grow to 600,000bbls. Overall we continue to be committed to a profitable, methodical and steady business growth model that allows us to continue to make Off Centered Ales for Off Centered People. We’re looking forward to the rest of the year!