Dive Brief:
- Reyes Beverage Group has acquired Gold Coast Beverage Distributors Inc. of Doral, FL. Both companies are privately held and terms of the deal were not disclosed.
- The transaction catapults Reyes, which already moves more than 100 million cases of MillerCoors, Pabst, Heineken, and more annually, into the top slot among U.S. beer distributors.
- Gold Coast, which was the 12th largest distributor in the nation prior to the acquisition, had sales of more than $640 million last year.
Dive Insight:
The beer distribution space is getting intense. Within hours of the announcement that Reyes would buy Gold Coast Beverage came news that another Florida distributor, Gold Coast Eagle, which distributes AB InBev brands, was buying a family-owned distributor in Ohio. All this comes just weeks after two giants of beer sales in New York merged.
The whole thing is starting to look like a series of troop maneuvers prior to all-out war for the rights to distribute beer in America, as the first skirmishes begin in the courts.
