Christopher Hunter's Blog

Since Vancouver’s city council unanimously approved zoning changes that allow small craft breweries to add a lounge area where patrons can drink on site this past July, there has been an increasing trend in micro-breweries opening in concentrated areas around the city. In a way, these distilleries (maybe unintentionally) use the marketing mix to find ways to differentiate their product. I’m going to use this tool to analyze why micro-breweries are increasing in popularity, specifically looking at how they use a good quality product and  strategically place their breweries/bars to create successful businesses in a fairly new industry.

Product:

Owners of micro-breweries tend to be adamant in creating the best quality beer they can. David Bowkett, owner of, Powell Street Brewery, describes the job to the Globe and Mail as “a labour of love”. He adds, “people are just more willing to support the small guys now”. In other words, people are inclined to visit these breweries because their very nature facilitates top quality products. The small size of micro-breweries allows the people who are brewing it to pay more attention to the actual product, which differentiates them from their larger counterparts (i.e. Molson, Coors, etc.)

Place:

Several lounges have been opening up within walking distance from each other in two parts of the city. Just this year, 9 new breweries have opened in Vancouver, with four of them situated between First and Broadway on Main Street. The others are mostly around Commercial Drive and East Hastings, which is home to establishments such as Parallel 49 and the aforementioned Powell Street Brewery. Because they’re located in such close proximity from one another, people are inclined to participate in bar crawls, where they visit more than one of these distilleries in one trip. In this way, these micro-breweries have created a mutually beneficial relationship with each other because of their strategic placing.