r/beer • u/Top-Shape9402 • 3d ago
Beer cans, empty cans added to U.S. 25% aluminum tariff product list
https://globalnews.ca/news/11111731/beer-aluminum-cans-us-25-percent-import-tariff/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter117
u/joe_the_bartender 3d ago
Reusable growlers are coming back. Calling it now.
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u/dtm1017 3d ago
It really bothered me when it was more expensive to fill mine than buying a 6 pack of the same beer.
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u/tama_chan 2d ago
For me 4 pk of 16oz was priced the same as growler. You’d think growler would be cheaper due to no packaging. Guess they want to push the packaged product due to it being a number already on the books?
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u/KennyShowers 1d ago
Draft pours are usually higher-margin than packaged beers, so if they’re selling product they expect to make a bigger profit on for a smaller profit it could cut into the math on their overhead/margins.
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u/MegaZakks 1d ago edited 1d ago
It's more than that. Growlers inherently have more loss when filling. You'll always lose a decent amount down the drain unless you have perfect bartenders who can get them filled without excess foam. Also it is flat out the worst format of packaging to maintain quality. No matter what you do you will pick up tons of oxygen filling from a tap. Growlers are good for only a couple hours after filling before quality will begin to drop and quickly. As a brewer it's probably one of the last formats I would ever want you to drink the beer I produce out of.
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u/nobullshitebrewing 2d ago
We would go to the bar that is next door. (Literally one wall dividing the breweries tap room and the next door bar) And fill the growlers for half the price.
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u/subsurface2 3d ago
Time to revisit my brewing days. Been wanting to get back into it. Might as well give it a shot.
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u/Top-Shape9402 3d ago
“The Trump administration on Wednesday said it was slapping a 25 per cent tariff on all beer imports, adding the beverage and empty aluminum cans to a list of derivative products subject to its tariffs on aluminum.
The move would be a substantial hit to beer imports that exceeded US$7.5 billion in 2024, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. Mexico dominates U.S. beer imports, at US$6.3 billion last year, followed by the Netherlands at US$683 million and Ireland at US$192 million and Canada at US$73 million.“
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u/beerguy74 3d ago
Tell me why all the aluminum cans I have drank over the last 5 years and I recycled cannot be melted down and used again for beer, mitigating the need to import from Canada? This is a serious question.
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u/A_Queer_Owl 3d ago
well we'd need factories to make them in the US.
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u/beerguy74 3d ago
Isn't Crown Cork and Seal in the US?
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u/stizz19 3d ago
The dude that sings Kiss from a Rose? I think he is British
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u/beerguy74 3d ago
Crown holdings, formally known as Crown Cork and Seal! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crown_Holdings
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u/ChemistryNo3075 2d ago
Crown & Ball are both US companies. But I'm guessing they buy imported aluminum and it is cheaper to get it that way then recycle themselves.
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u/Iforgotmypassword__ 2d ago
Hi, I work in the aluminum industry and have tons of experience with recycling and procurement of recycled materials and primary aluminum.
Aluminum is 100% recyclable and your cans are absolutely being melted down and turned back into cans, usually in about 60-90 days, fun fact! This is the cheapest of several inputs used in the generation of aluminum can sheet. However, the can is actually made up of two different alloys of aluminum, with different chemical makes ups changing the physical properties of the aluminum.
There is the can body, a more mailable alloy, and the can end and tab, a more ridged alloy. When producing aluminum sheet to turn into a can, these two alloys are created independently.
When melting a can, the chemical make up of the molten bath generated is outside of the specifications for creating either can body alloy or can end/tab alloy. So, this is where the primary (almost entirely pure) aluminum comes in. You need to rebalance the chemistry of the molten bath with prime aluminum and additional elements to achieve the needed chemistry to have the physical properties for can body. For can end/tab the chemical makeup is far out enough of that from a melted can, that you need to have a different mix of inputs to create it, mostly that pure aluminum and additional elements, with some recycled materials that match the can end and tabs specific chemistry, or close enough to it.
This is where the Canadian aluminum is so important, there is not nearly enough supply of primary aluminum generated in the US to meet the demand of ALL of the aluminum industry, not just cans, so, our friends up north have abundant processing capabilities and utilizing hydro electric power, can provide relatively cheap, green and clean aluminum. The supply chain has been set up for decades railing that stuff in, making it quick and dependable.
If the goal of the tariffs are to bring that generation of primary aluminum back to the US… well, those are multi-billion dollar, multi-year projects that you’re asking for the US companies to invest in. So you likely won’t see any new plants generating primary aluminum in the US for nearly a decade. Then there’s the issue of power generation, smelting primary aluminum is the most energy intensive process on the planet, literally. Who’s going to pay to set up those power plants to get to the aluminum smelters reliably? Also with this administration, the energy will not be clean.
TLDR- Melting cans doesn’t make the right type of aluminum to make another can.
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u/bjlwasabi 2d ago
Is melting cans problematic because you're mixing the two alloys? If there were a way to reliably separate the body from the end/tab, would you be able to melt them separately and have a useable aluminum for each element of the can? Or would you still need the primary aluminum?
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u/Iforgotmypassword__ 1d ago
Yes, since it throws the chemistry out of spec when melted together, you’re not getting the physical properties needed from each alloy to make either part of the can.
That’s actually an idea that has been thrown around! However, the logistic challenges are steep to overcome with that. Most aluminum cans are gathered in curbside bins, brought by people to recycling facilities for scrap drop off, or turned in at deposit facilities in states with deposit programs. These are then cleaned, crushed, briquetted and baled together at recycling plants and municipal facilities, making lid separation effectively impossible.
You could introduce a step, if the cans are not crushed already, where you cut the lid off of the top prior to recycling or during the gathering step. The way most cans are received at facilities, the people dropping them off would have to not crush the cans, which means less being able to fit in a bag, less weight and less payment for the scrap, or when being picked up and sorted by municipalities and recycling companies in trucks, extra care would need to be taken to not smash the cans in the gathering and sorting step. This could work in states with a deposit system and a machine which you feed cans into to cut the tops off of, but then you’re relying on the depositor of the can to do extra work, it would probably take longer, and they would have to put the cans into the machine correctly. All small things, but you have to think about your base user. Recycling rates are already incredibly low throughout the country, and any barrier to the recycling process would just lead to a lower recycling rate.
Also, there is always some form of contamination within the recycling process, other metals, steel, copper, etc. that would throw off chemistry needed. Heck, even some of the residual paint throws off chemistry! Cans with a lot of white paint on them for example, have higher levels of titanium from that paint.
There is also the holy grail of the uni-alloy can, where an alloy that meets both properties of mailability in the can forming process, and rigidity needed for the lid. You could thicken the gauge of the lid possibly, but it would still need to be easy to open for the consumer, and not explode under the pressure of a carbonated beverage. A lot of people have tried, and they’re still working on this.
With recycling rates being so low, you are not going to get the supply of used beverage cans to meet the demands of the industry, so prime will likely always be a necessity in that regard.
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u/80-20RoastBeef 3d ago
It just depends whether it's cheaper to recycle than importing will be. With a whole lot of recyclable materials, the cost to recycle and reproduce a product is more expensive than producing a new product from new material. Don't know if that's a reality with aluminum.
For arguments sake let's say it's cheaper, or the same cost, as importing or domestic new aluminum. Recycling is never 100% conversion rate due to impurities and just general loss in the process. So to keep the supply the same we still need new fresh. New fresh that will now cost more than it did before, imported or otherwise.
Further, a lot of people just straight up don't recycle or live in areas that don't offer recycling (again due to cost). They will end up just discarding their cans in regular receptacles removing even more aluminum from the system requiring more new aluminum usage.
Either way because the cycle doesn't achieve near perfect efficiency we still need more inserted from new material.
I think I googled and something implied recycled aluminum to be cheaper. Idk if that's true, but what I do know is that if it IS cheaper it means it IS VERY LIKELY being used a lot already. This would imply that we are already seeing the benefits of recycling with imperfect efficiency and that we are still importing regardless .... Meaning import prices increases will continue to hurt
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3d ago
[deleted]
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u/A_Queer_Owl 3d ago
aluminum can be recycled infinitely without losing strength. it's not a long chain polymer like plastics, so it doesn't degrade with heat and UV exposure.
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u/HARSHING_MY_MELLOW 3d ago
Well that's just blatantly wrong.
Aluminum is infinitely recyclable. ~95 percent less energy is required to recycle it than to produce virgin aluminum.
Today, about 75 percent of all aluminum produced in history, nearly a billion tons, is still in use.
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u/Reinheitsgetoot 3d ago
Most beer distributors are owned by right wing political donating holding companies so they’re getting what they voted for. Retailers, get together and boycott Constellation brands and other imports, don’t let them pass on the tariff to you. While at it, you can print those cutesy little “I did that!” stickers but with Trumps face this time. - edit tense.
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u/Ok_Section_3230 3d ago
While you’re at it you can support your state’s craft breweries, many of which who did NOT vote for this, who are all having a tough enough time before worrying about this 🤩
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u/StopCollaborate230 3d ago
The owners will just raise prices to cover their bonuses. They won’t feel a thing.
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u/Goddamn_Tinnitus 2d ago
Constellation isn’t a distributor, they’re a very liberal company (Kept DEI, are heavily focused on empowering women and working from home), and are forced to brew their beer in Mexico per an agreement with the US government.
You’re looking for someone to blame, but it’s not them. They stand the most to lose from this whole thing — a good chunk of their core consumer is being deported or scared of it, and their moneymaker is being hit with a 25% tariff.
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u/Reinheitsgetoot 1d ago
Oh, I think it sucks that the import category is going to get dragged for this including Constellation. My issue is that Constellation is a huge feather in the cap for right leaning beer distributors. What I should have said was if the distributors (who most likely voted for this) pass on the 25% straight to the consumer, people need to say no to these brands until the distributors starts eating the food they made if you will. Reyes Beverage alone gave over 20 million to Republicans in 2024. If they can waste 20 mil, they can pull themselves up by the bootstraps.
Retailers need to say no to the price hike. This isn’t the yearly price increase.
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u/Top-Shape9402 3d ago
Will this affect Heniken?
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u/MisterZacherley 3d ago
Good thing my doctor told me today to drink less beer because of my cholesterol. 😬
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u/SPAGHETTI6661 1d ago
It’s times like these I’m thankful for YouTube. I was able to make my own white lighting and I didn’t go blind. I can’t hardly bake a pizza and I figured it out. I heard beer is even easier. Also since these tariffs are happening, why does the irs still exist, and why’s my income still being taxed?
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u/Lower-Price5334 1d ago
Perhaps everyone will go (partly) back to glass bottles - e.g. pick up of fresh brews directly from brewery
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u/MDGmer996 3d ago
Should be a fun time to be a brewery, beer store and a beer drinker. /s