Decreased Membership in Homebrew Club....

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scottstribling

scottstribling

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We have noticed a slump in our homebrew membership. Our remaining members are average age of mid 50's. We have non-brewing members but our ranks are shrinking. Are any other clubs have experiencing this? Has craft beer become so accessible that homebrewing is "no longer needed"? Have interests moved from craft to whiskey (bourbon), spirits etc.?
 
I think the salad days of homebrewing were about 10-15 years ago, but has been in a big decline since. There's a thread that, interestingly, started over 15 years ago, but there are many recent posts discussing the possible whys and wherefores of the slump in recent years.

My take is that many people jumped into the hobby when it was getting a lot of attention, then lost interest due to (take your pick): cost, family/career commitments, not getting good at it, preferring to just buy beer, cutting back on alcohol, etc.

Anything that is once a fad, eventually reverts back to its core constituency. We're it.
 
People are drinking less alcohol. The ones that still do are moving on to lower carb options like hard seltzer and canned mixed drinks. The homestead and "maker" revolution is waning. It's kind of the perfect storm. Fostering the hobby first requires marketing so that everyone knows that making beer at home is a thing. Once everyone knows you can make beer at home, now you get the .001% of those people to take the next step.

I remember our club (around 2011) used to set up a station at local beer festivals to do a demo brew and we'd pick up maybe one member on average from that. It's a lot of outreach work.
 
Is your club hosting any brew-day event or other events at the brewery to help promote the hobby? Is the secretary or manager replying to inquiries online? I only ask because a couple years ago I was hunting for a club in Metro Detroit. I emailed a handful and only one replied, I inquired multiple times with others but no reply.

The club I visited was small but nearby, the members were complaining about the club not being more active. I have yet to see any announcement about a brew-day event or anything to promote the hobby.

I have a half-barrel gas fired rig set up on a rolling rack. My mouth started to open to volunteer for a parking-lot brew day (I live 3 minutes away), but I am not a member and did not want to bully my way into a leadership role.
 
scottstribling said:
We have noticed a slump in our homebrew membership. Our remaining members are average age of mid 50's. We have non-brewing members but our ranks are shrinking. Are any other clubs have experiencing this? Has craft beer become so accessible that homebrewing is "no longer needed"? Have interests moved from craft to whiskey (bourbon), spirits etc.?
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You may want to contact American Homebrewers Association. @julia_1 was active here a while back (and apparently logs in from time to time), so maybe PM her as well.

IIRC, there is clubs section over at their web site as well as in the forum (which is open to all).
 
I was told that my club regularly had 20-40 people showing up at events a few years back, as @Bobby_M can attest to. Now we are lucky to get 6-7.

Tomorrow is our monthly meeting, and the first at a popular brewery near my house, Alternate Ending Brewing Company. I hope this causes some of the “irregulars” to show up. A partnership with this brewery would be fantastic.
 
Bobby_M said:
People are drinking less alcohol. The ones that still do are moving on to lower carb options like hard seltzer and canned mixed drinks.
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I generally agree with your statement, but I'd be surprised if "canned mixed drinks" are lower carb. Then again, it's not something I've sought out.
 
I need to mention that I first thought this said "deceased club membership" which puts a very different spin on the discussion! 🤣

I've joined a relatively small club, where most members are older than I (late 50s to 70s) and I believe there's only been two "new recruits" in the last few years... and that includes me.

The other clubs I found in the area were either too far of a drive or seemed to be inactive.
 
Mr. Vern said:
I have a half-barrel gas fired rig set up on a rolling rack. My mouth started to open to volunteer for a parking-lot brew day (I live 3 minutes away), but I am not a member and did not want to bully my way into a leadership role.
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Reach out to them and suggest the idea. I don't think that's too forward. Tell them you're interested in the club and want to help. Maybe they've been waiting for just the right promotion and someone willing to do it. OTOH, if they blow you off or give you some bad vibes, then walk away.
 
I think another thing affecting this is "deurbanization"... ie people moving out to the country, which has increased. I was a member of a club from 2009 till I moved away in 2018. The stats of people moving to the country have definitely changed.
 
lumpher said:
I think another thing affecting this is "deurbanization"... ie people moving out to the country, which has increased. I was a member of a club from 2009 till I moved away in 2018. The stats of people moving to the country have definitely changed.
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Or just people moving, period. I often see people selling their gear because "I'm moving and can't take it with me."
 
Bobby_M said:
People are drinking less alcohol. The ones that still do are moving on to lower carb options like hard seltzer and canned mixed drinks.
Click to expand...
I must be the outlier. I'm drinking more and these high octane IPA's are all over the place, every store and a load of YouTube videos. Too bad there aren't any clubs near me :(. Nearest LHBS is ~70 miles.
 
The other day there was the perennial article about how younger people are turning away from beer and drinking less, drinking more spirits, etc. The article made the case that younger people weren't necessarily drinking less, but drinking less beer due to the sky-high price of beers (even in brewery taprooms). In Denver the median price for a pint in a taproom is approaching $8.00 - pit that against a $10.00 bottle of decent wine and you can see where a shift may be occurring and that would include homebrewing as well.
 
You always have short term hobbists, Life is cycles. Brewing in your twenties is fine, until the kids come along. Great in your forties, unless your knees give out, etc. You need to constantly bring in new bood. Question is, what are you offering? Used to be tht was the way to learn how to brew. I learned from the internet and experimentation, there are tons of info for free.

The brewing event is a good way to attract interest. Group brews are nice, but rather hard to do. having club hardware is nice, but expensive. I have heard of group buys. I was interested, but the person talking about them was too fast to wave me off with "no, no, that is just for members" rather than a "would you be interested in joining?"

And recruiting is everyones job. It takes a positive attitude at all times. If you are talking about brewing in jpubllic, be ready to include strangers in the conversation. If you only want your personal friends in the club, it will be a small club.

And sometimes even stupid stuff works. Get club shirts that say "Ask me about brewing, name of brew club" and wear them to large events when you are going.
 
Airborneguy said:
I was told that my club regularly had 20-40 people showing up at events a few years back, as @Bobby_M can attest to. Now we are lucky to get 6-7.
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I’m in western PA and all the local clubs have disappeared. I travel to the central NJ area about once a month, any chance I could stop in at your meeting?
 
fwiw, I have noticed a general falling off of clubs across a wide spectrum of endeavors, which I attribute primarily to the Boomer generation aging out. Most of the activities I enjoyed associating with others that were once quite popular have pretty much faded away. In my specific case, model railroading, R/C flight, and fly tying clubs, for examples, and now over the last decade homebrewing as well.

And that doesn't include all the sports related activities, which my decrepit generation has lost too much cartilage to continue ;)

Cheers!
 
lumpher said:
I think another thing affecting this is "deurbanization"... ie people moving out to the country, which has increased. I was a member of a club from 2009 till I moved away in 2018. The stats of people moving to the country have definitely changed.
Click to expand...
Clubs still have a chance even outside urban areas, though getting the word out when starting is usually much more difficult.

Our club in a city of 6,000 keeps 7-15 members at our monthly meetings, though the snowbirds are starting to take a chunk from our winter attendance.

But I'd say a good chunk is what @day_trippr mentioned - in person clubs are sort of a old person thing. Our Lions and Rotary are both hurting for active members as well.
 
Many VFW and Legion posts have been closing up in recent years (my brother is commander at his Legion and he has echoed that). Vietnam vets are dropping out, and not as many younger vets from Desert Storm and GWOT eras joining up. Maybe younger people aren't joiners as much as older generations.

That retiring boomer thing @day_trippr cited could be a big factor in lower memberships all around.
 
So I'm the president of the homebrew club in my area. I'd say we average 16 people, give or take. This is a slight uptick based on what we used to pull pre-COVID (I wasn't president then), so I consider us lucky. We have a partnership of sorts with our host brewery, which is great. Anyway, something that I think has helped us is the format of the meetings. They used to be structured around an educational talk of some sort, with the sampling being an afterthought. Now, they're centered around the sampling & discussion thereof, and I try to get through the "business" stuff quickly to maximize that time. We actually have a decent range of ages as well.
 
When I was the president of the Whales club back in the 2010 era, we were gaining about 4 members a month and about 45-50 people would try attending a standing room only meeting space. We had to put controls in place to keep casual beer tourists away and make sure everyone was at least brewing occasionally. I think just prior to COVID, they had less than 10 active members. I moved out of the area and joined a club that just got off the ground a few months earlier and it's been slow growth over 7 years. It's probably up to 30 regularly showing up to meetings and events. The hobby isn't dead by any means but it has a bed in the hospital.
 
Agent said:
in person clubs are sort of a old person thing. Our Lions and Rotary are both hurting for active members as well.
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I may be getting old, but nothing improves a brewer's skill and understanding like in person brewing clubs. You get access to BJCP judges that can confirm that "this" beer has a high level of DMS, Acetaldehyde, Diacetyl, etc....and hand you a cup of it to calibrate to. It's the difference between reading a book or hearing a lecture and performing a lab.
 
Bobby_M said:
I may be getting old, but nothing improves a brewer's skill and understanding like in person brewing clubs. You get access to BJCP judges that can confirm that "this" beer has a high level of DMS, Acetaldehyde, Diacetyl, etc....and hand you a cup of it to calibrate to. It's the difference between reading a book or hearing a lecture and performing a lab.
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I was going to mention that "the youth of today" (OMG does that make me feel old) are probably accustomed to researching things online, and may not have much interest in driving to an in-person club meeting. So, club attendance may not directly correlate to the state of the hobby.

But I agree that in-person is the best way to improve skills, particularly sensory and judging skills.
 
MaxStout said:
Or just people moving, period. I often see people selling their gear because "I'm moving and can't take it with me."
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From time to time I scour the Marketplace searching for a good homebrew deal and I think this is offered as a reason more times than is really the case. Beginner's kits and even BIAB aren't that space intensive and if it is a hobby you enjoy would really part with your stuff? If I fell on hard times, I would definitely keep a working homebrew setup. They don't want to say anything that could be interpreted as a negative as they are trying to get rid of their gear.

I checked the AHA site before and besides the club that is about 40 minutes away, there is one that might be about 20 miles but they have no online presence. The farther club is supposed to hold monthly events but it seems that they only try 1-2 times a year. And since it is technically illegal to transport HB here in my state without a license, they don't do it yet they schedule most meetings at a local craft brewery so then nobody will be bringing it as far as I know. I have an annual campout with friends where I am potentially committing a felony!
 
Bobby_M said:
I may be getting old, but nothing improves a brewer's skill and understanding like in person brewing clubs. You get access to BJCP judges that can confirm that "this" beer has a high level of DMS, Acetaldehyde, Diacetyl, etc....and hand you a cup of it to calibrate to. It's the difference between reading a book or hearing a lecture and performing a lab.
Click to expand...
But how many clubs are doing that? And once the club members have done that a few times, it becomes boring to them. I am not disagreeing with you, I just doubt many clubs offer that. And how many of the existing members just go to kick back and "sample"? What does the average club currently offer that potential members want? If they have evolved into a buddy's drinking club, most people would rather drink with their own buddies...
 
TheBluePhantom said:
But how many clubs are doing that? And once the club members have done that a few times, it becomes boring to them. I am not disagreeing with you, I just doubt many clubs offer that. And how many of the existing members just go to kick back and "sample"? What does the average club currently offer that potential members want? If they have evolved into a buddy's drinking club, most people would rather drink with their own buddies...
Click to expand...
The club that I joined is more or less a small group of friends who like drinking together. I mean, they've got a great deal of knowledge and are happy to provide advice or answer my questions, but there's not much critical judging of our homebrews. I've read about some clubs that operate at a very high level, but this one is definitely more casual. Still, it's better than nothing, and the members are cool... just not really structured or into a lot of formal, prepared presentations.
 
I’m a member of the club Bobby used to run, WHALES. Membership is WAY down, but we still treat meetings as learning experiences.

Recently we’ve done wort and hop tea tastings, yeast biology lectures, various process informational sessions, and we always do the Big Brew and teach a friend to brew days on the club equipment.

Wednesday we met at an amazing local brewery and got one of the best lectures on brewing that I have ever heard. I went back alone yesterday and spent another hour and a half talking Ph and various other specifics with the head brewer. All because of the club.

In two weeks, and once a month ongoing after that, rotating members are going to give a brewing class every Saturday morning at one of the local LHBS. I can’t unfortunately, my other big hobby is every Saturday morning.

So there’s still merit to clubs. If anything, be the catalyst. Steer it in the direction you think you’ll best benefit from.
 
Homebrewing is down as is craft beer generally. There are lots of reasons for it. The rise of craft beer made it accessible so people like myself who got serious about brewing due to limited access have less incentive to keep brewing. The craft beer swell in the mid-2010s got a lot of people to try it out and got out when it wasn't for them or life happened and couldn't dedicate a weekend day to brewing. Alcohol is on somewhat of a downturn at the moment and where's popular right now is the spirits and cocktail sector. People are also still on the swing away from spending as much time at home after covid. Craft beer may never be as big as it was at the peak but these trends will go the other way and beer will become popular again.

Homebrewing clubs are victims of all these trends plus other social trends. A lot of the interaction and information sharing clubs provide is replaced by forums, social media and video sharing sites. It's not necessarily a bad thing that information has become so democratized that you don't need to seek out the two or three guys in a club who know the answer to your questions. Club meetings in my experience serve as an excuse to drink and talk about beer but it's easier to do that at your leisure at a taproom which are easier to find than a monthly club meeting. Also, during the rise of homebrewing and craft beer, homebrew shops became a substitute for a place to go for your in-person questions. A lot of shops were running learn to brew courses to get people in the door. They've replaced that function of clubs to some extent.
 
Deadalus said:
From time to time I scour the Marketplace searching for a good homebrew deal and I think this is offered as a reason more times than is really the case. Beginner's kits and even BIAB aren't that space intensive and if it is a hobby you enjoy would really part with your stuff? If I fell on hard times, I would definitely keep a working homebrew setup. They don't want to say anything that could be interpreted as a negative as they are trying to get rid of their gear.
Click to expand...

Maybe, but frankly I don't really care what reason is given. I don't wish ill will or health issues or whatever but end of the day, they're selling and it's something I want at a price I'm willing to pay, or not.
 
TheBluePhantom said:
But how many clubs are doing that? And once the club members have done that a few times, it becomes boring to them. I am not disagreeing with you, I just doubt many clubs offer that. And how many of the existing members just go to kick back and "sample"? What does the average club currently offer that potential members want? If they have evolved into a buddy's drinking club, most people would rather drink with their own buddies...
Click to expand...
I wouldn't know how many clubs do it. I just know that competition/judge culture is pretty prevalent at most of the clubs I've been in and/or visited. None of the clubs I've ever been physically exposed to could be described as a drinking club. All the clubs I've been a part of have guest speakers (hop farm owners, head brewers, malt house supervisors, etc), technical presentations, beer tasting classes, off flavor calibration events, group brews, competitions, etc.. AND there's beer sampling. Not a single member would argue this statement to be false; "joining a club was the fastest improvement to my beer since I started brewing".
 
BrewnWKopperKat said:
You may want to contact American Homebrewers Association. @julia_1 was active here a while back (and apparently logs in from time to time), so maybe PM her as well.

IIRC, there is clubs section over at their web site as well as in the forum (which is open to all).
Click to expand...
Hi Scott and everyone and thank you Brewn for tagging me.
scottstribling.96096/

  • At Homebrew Con 2023 we discussed this very topic in a first ever 2 hour workshop where 50+ club officers discussed their roadblocks and opportunities. The .pdf of what the panel presented is here: Homebrew Club Officer Bootcamp
  • I am looking to do this bootcamp again at GABF in October for AHA's annual event and a volunteer leader to coordinate. Here is where AHA members can apply to volunteer: AHA Committee
  • We at the AHA still house the most robust directory of clubs and shops. Find a Homebrew Club
  • Also, we offer Homebrew Club Insurance, and more than 300 clubs take advantage of that (and if 75% of the club are AHA members, it's free/if not very low cost per). Liability protection is important. Enrollment opens Feb 1. Homebrew Club Insurance
  • My two cents: Some clubs are up and some are down in numbers. COVID created challenges beyond cultural/marketplace challenges being experienced. Some clubs also have evolved into social drinking clubs/education vs. brewing too. Clubs that actively recruit beyond the circle of already brewers are showing success.
  • The #1 question I get from clubs is how do we grow our ranks. To consider is this post with some ideas (not comprehensive and focus is diversity so please keep that in mind.) Are We Doing Enough? Inviting All Walks of Life to Homebrew
Cheers, and I hope it was/is ok with HomebrewTalk moderators to have shared the above links. The goal is to be helpful and show the resources available. Happy homebrewing,
Julia
 
I'm just spitballing, but I suspect many clubs incorporate some kind of learning element into their mission. Plenty of homebrewers want to hone their craft and I would think that if they are taking the time to go to meetings and events, they would like to get more out of it than a bunch of drinking buddies hanging out.

I don't doubt that a few clubs are more like drinking clubs. NTTAWWT. :yes:

I was in one that had lots of educational activities. Guest speakers, taproom visits, blind-tastings, BJCP-cert members giving feedback for beers brought in, a few field trips. We even took a tour of Rahr once. The pandemic put the kibosh on it and since then I just never drifted back.
 
our club has seen a notable membership decline over the past couple/year years.

No clue what is driving that.

More local breweries?
More craft beer on the shelves?
Closing of LHBS?
 

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