Oregon's Breweries Defy Economic Odds

From Astoria to Baker City to Klamath Falls, cities all over Oregon are hearing good news from local brewers. In the last 18 months, there have been more than 50 opening or expansion announcements from Oregon brewers. According to the Oregon Brewers' Guild, Oregon is the second largest producer of craft beer in the U.S. Oregon brewers produced more than 1.17 million barrels of beer in 2011.

Twenty four of Oregon's 36 counties have a brew pub or a brewery. The majority were in the Portland tri-county area (Clackamas, Multnomah, and Washington counties) - which accounted for 100 establishments. The other 84 business units were dispersed across the state. Eastern Oregon is represented well when the total population is considered. With seven brew pubs in Eastern Oregon, there are 15,000 people for every business establishment. Compare that with the Portland metro area where there are 16,600 people for each brewery or brew pub unit. Oregonians with the shortest walk to the local brew pub are the north coast where there are 9,890 people for each establishment. In Central Oregon, the region with the highest number of brewing or brew pub jobs per capita, there are 11,857 people for each brewery or brew pub.

When it comes to jobs per region, it is Central Oregon that takes the gold medal. Central Oregon breweries and brew pubs employed 513 people in 2011. The three-county region (Crook, Deschutes, and Jefferson) has one brewing industry job for every 390 people. In Portland the ratio is 620 people per brewing job. And although the north coast counties have a lot of brew pubs, there was one brewing job for every 460 residents.

The job growth from region to region since 2007 not only defies overall employment trends, in some cases the number of jobs has more than doubled. Between 2007 and 2011, the number of brewing industry jobs in Eastern Oregon increased by 140 percent. Portland metro area breweries and brew pubs added the greatest number of jobs in the last four years (+561).

Interested in learning more about employment trends in Oregon's breweries? You can find more information in the full article!