How Local Was Harrisburg Beer Week?

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With the cancellation of the 2019 Pittsburgh Craft Beer Week and Philly Beer Week coming under criticism for taking sponsorship money from the marijuana industry, we thought now is the time to discuss the events that make up a craft beer week. And what better timing than with Harrisburg Craft Beer week just wrapping up.

One of the many criticisms we hear (from consumers and brewers) is that beer weeks in Pennsylvania are getting away from supporting local and moving towards bigger brands that can afford to keep a beer week moving. One of the loudest criticisms of Pittsburgh Craft Beer week was that sponsorship from big named distributors took over and as a result the week stopped focusing on the cities breweries.

Below we take a look at the break down of events from Harrisburg Beer Week. We split the events by local and non local. Local being considered as Pennsylvania beer. Definition of each below:

Local Events:

• Events hosted onsite at a brewery
• Events hosted at a distributor, bar or restaurant that featured local beers

Non Local:

• Events hosted at a distributor, bar or restaurant that featured non local beers
• Events that featured Fat Heads were filed under non local. While Fat Heads has a location in Pittsburgh, a majority of their brewing and locations are found outside PA

Untitled — *Stats based on the listings from the Harrisburg Beer Week Events Page*

As you can see, an overwhelmingly large number of events from Harrisburg Beer Week supported local beer and breweries. Of the 135 events that were hosted, 109 of those featured local beer. Not pictured above; over half of those local events were held at the breweries themselves with 59 brewery events. Even most of their sponsors were local business.

One interesting point of note; three of the non-local events featured what some would consider “big beer”. Two Wicked Weed and one Goose Island event was held during the week.

Overall, our opinion (take it or leave it) is that Harrisburg Beer Week continues to do a phenomenal job on shining a light on Pennsylvania Craft Beer. As craft drinkers ourselves we do enjoy the local flair of beer weeks. However we also enjoy bringing outside beer into the state as well. And we believe that Harrisburg Beer Week continues to do an excellent job offering a mix of each.

Cheers to another successful Harrisburg Beer Week.