DENVER — The Great American Beer Festival kicked off today with more than 450 breweries, cideries, and distilleries pouring more than 2,000 beverages inside the Colorado Convention Center — marking the first year that distilleries are part of the lineup.
Hosted by the Brewers Association, the trade group representing small and independent breweries, the annual festival draws tens of thousands of attendees over three days of tasting, judging, and celebration.
The inclusion of distilleries signals a new chapter for an event long defined by hops and malt.
The Distilling Experience at GABF features a curated selection of distilled spirits, with 0.25-ounce samples of whiskey, vodka, gin, and more. With a few exceptions, nearly all of the distilleries at the event are based in Colorado.
Lee Wood, co-founder of Wood’s High Mountain Distillery in Salida, Colorado, and president of the Colorado Distillers Guild, said distillers have long seen a place for spirits at the country’s largest craft beer festival.
He said Colorado’s brewing community helped lay the groundwork for its distillers — both by creating an audience that values flavor and by establishing the resources that small producers depend on.
“The brewing industry paved the way for us to — particularly for consumers to sort of understand what we’re doing,” Wood told Memphis Beer Blog. “And so we owe a huge debt of gratitude to the brewers.”
Wood described the GABF collaboration as a natural fit.
“Certainly as distillers, we’re not asking people to not drink beer,” Wood said. “I love beer as much as the next guy. But, you know, when it’s time for whiskey, well, we want to be there to supply it. There’s great synergy there, and so we’re excited about it.”
Navigating a changing craft beer landscape
While GABF remains a celebration of creativity and community, it also unfolds against a backdrop of challenges for the craft beer industry.
After a decade of explosive growth, brewery openings have slowed, competition has intensified, and many taprooms are fighting to keep customers amid shifting drinking habits and uncertain economic conditions.
In 2024, craft brewers produced 23.1 million barrels of beer, a 4% decrease from 2023. And, for the first time since 2005, the overall number of operating craft breweries declined nationwide.
Just this week, the industry’s woes made The New York Times, which declared, “Once the darling of the alcohol industry, small-batch beer makers are shutting down because of increased competition and flagging interest.”
The inclusion of distilleries, cideries, and non-alcoholic options at GABF reflects how brewers are adapting to that changing landscape.
“The festival’s always mirrored what trends and what our breweries are doing — and what our consumers are consuming,” said Ann Obenchain, vice president of marketing and communications for the Brewers Association.
“We know that consumers are drinking a lot of different things, and breweries are meeting them where they are. They’re offering or they’re making distilled spirits and cider and RTD (Ready to Drink) cocktails, as well.”
Of the more than 450 participating producers on the festival floor, 438 are breweries. The rest include 21 distilleries and 18 cideries — some of which are breweries that also make cider.
Festival organizers have kept several new elements introduced last year, including themed experience areas such as the “Prost!” German biergarten, the Halloween-themed “Fright” area, and “Blast Off,” with beyond-beer options such as ciders, RTD cocktails, hard teas, lemonades, and more.
Another returning feature is the gluten-free garden, along with non-alcoholic beers peppered throughout the festival floor.
Even music is taking on a larger role at GABF in 2025.
The “Mile High Stage” will host costume and lip-syncing contests, the stein-hoisting finals, and nightly concerts, including Memphis band Southern Avenue, which is headlining the event on Friday.
With its mix of beer, spirits, spectacle, and music, this year’s festival feels less like a traditional beer event and more like a celebration of the wider craft beverage culture that breweries now inhabit.
Memphis perspectives on the addition of spirits
When it comes to the craft beer downturn, Memphis has not been immune.
Both Hook Point Brewing and Urban Consequence Brewing have closed their doors this year.
In August, Memphis Made Brewing Co. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and announced that it was exploring a potential sale, a move that sent shockwaves throughout the beer community.
Memphis craft brewery operators say the inclusion of distillers at this year’s GABF is a way to keep the festival — and the craft beer community — relevant in a period of transition.
“As all alcohol sales are down across the industry, we are making moves to be more cooperative across liquid deviations,” said Blair Perry, co-founder and CEO of Soul & Spirits Brewery, which is the only Bluff City brewery pouring at the 2025 event.
Perry said she understands the thought process of adding as much diversity to the festival to bring in more people, especially as attendance has sharply declined in recent years.
However, Perry’s conflicted about having spirits at such a massive beer festival, a change that, she worries, could lead to greater intoxication than in years past.
“I think most people say, ‘the more the merrier,’ but in a time when the beer industry especially is declining — and you come to the biggest beer festival in the world — you would expect to celebrate really only beer,” Perry said.
Davin Bartosch, co-founder of Wiseacre Brewing Co. and a GABF competition judge this week in Denver, said the inclusion of distillers really underscores the Brewers Association’s mindset amid the changing market.
“The BA is very interested in breweries surviving right now,” Bartosch said. “The addition of spirits opens up the festival to the legions of humans that are not interested in beer, but are still interested in drinking.
“It is a sign of the times, for sure.”
Wiseacre launched its own line of canned cocktails, The Set Up, in 2021 — a foray that mirrors the festival’s broadened focus this year.
“We have made our own canned cocktails and we currently sell cocktails and wine in our taprooms, so we certainly understand the need to be inclusive of all drinkers,” Bartosch said. “It definitely doesn’t hurt.”
Balancing tradition and change
Obenchain said the Brewers Association sees GABF as a reflection of both the brewing industry and the drinkers it serves — a place where innovation and heritage intersect.
When festival-goers attend events like GABF, Obenchain said, they expect the same variety they find in taprooms.
“We’re reflecting what the brewers are doing, as well as what the attendees are looking for,” she said.
Still, beer remains at the center of it all.
“I want to be super clear that beer is still the star,” Obenchain said. “It is not the beverage festival. It is the beer festival.”
For all the new flavors and experiences on the festival floor, GABF’s identity continues to evolve — still centered on beer, even as the craft world around it changes.
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