Convenience. Quickness. Small or big pours. Less staff. Less wasted product. These are some of the pitches for self-pour dispensing systems. iPourIt Inc. is one of North America’s leaders in self-serve beverage dispensing technology. The company has more than 8,800 taps installed, 320 million ounces poured and 300 locations in operation. And, it’s not just beer pouring out of these cool self-serve taps all over the country but interesting data as well.
iPourIt’s GEN 4 self-pour beverage platform is powered by proprietary software that collects and records data for every ounce poured. In fact, the company notes it’s the only solution on the market that offers its operators access to this valuable data — product preferences, customer demographics and revenue generation info from their particular location. IPourIt gave us all a taste of this data last week when it released its annual pour reports that include things like the top most-poured beverage styles, what women pour vs. men, what age groups gravitate towards, what brands are trending and beyond.
This information was crunched from all the iPourIt systems operating in 2022. Here’s an example: This is the pour demographic for my age group (open the image in another window to see it bigger). I do love IPAs!
There are actually two Pour Reports. I downloaded both, and they are super interesting. Here are the links to both (hover over them):
- 2023 Annual Pour Report — the most-poured beverage styles, the top products for each style and the top wine products
- 2023 Pour Report PRO — the most-poured styles and products by gender, age, generation, and US region, plus exclusive iPourIt operator data including tap wall traffic and revenue
The 2023 Annual Pour Report shares the most-poured beverages in a variety of different categories, and craft beer makes a good showing on most lists — both indie craft products from Firestone Walker and Creature Comforts Brewing to rollup craft brands like Golden Road Brewing and Elysian Brewing (both owned by Anheuser-Busch). Big standouts include newcomers like Minnesota’s Bear Cave Brewing Co. The Top 50 Craft Beers and Microbrews section includes seven different Bear Cave brands — Bear Slayer IPA (No. 6), Larry’s Lager (No. 8), Couple’s Skate cream ale (No. 12), Nate’s Passion hazy IPA (No. 19), Bear Bear stout (No. 30), Mister California IPA (No. 35) and its Mainstreet Wheat (No. 43). Holy moly. According to the report:
iPourIt operator Bear Cave Brewing opened its flagship brewpub last year, pouring a record-breaking number of ounces. While many self-pour operators are constantly rotating their beers, Bear Cave’s core beers are regularly featured on the tap wall and seven of their top brews made it on the list.
Open for lunch and dinner, Hopkins, Minneapolis-based Bear Cave offers 52 taps serving beer, cider, wine and cocktails. I would totally bring my pair of pugs to BC’s dog-friendly patio and rooftop deck, eating zucchini pesto pizza and sampling all seven of these chart toppers. Here’s a recap of Bear Cave’s self-pour operations:
Now, check out the entire Top 50 Craft Beers and Microbrews list below (open the image in another tab to see it bigger):
These reports are full of interesting info. Both parts contain rare, on-premise insights drawn from more than 55 million ounces of verified pour data. For instance, IPAs remain the most poured style, and there was a 5 percent increase in total ounces poured over the previous year. Lager earned the second spot with an impressive 37 percent increase in total ounces poured. While good portions of the Top 10 Most Poured Products went to lager brands like Michelob Ultra (No. 1), Bud Light (No. 2) and Coors Light (No. 4), craft brands flexed their pour prowess (even though most of these are owned by AB) with Golden Road’s Mango Cart (No. 3), Elysian Brewing’s Space Dust (No. 7) and Firestone Walker Brewing’s 805 blonde ale (No. 10). From the press release:
“iPourit’s Pour Report offers a one-of-a-kind view for self-pour operators, brewers, distributors, and anyone else looking for comprehensive real-life data. It was created to answer the question of ‘What do consumers really want?’ The report is based on proprietary on-premise analytics and is truly ‘the pulse of the industry,’” said Chris Braun, CEO at iPourIt. “We’re excited to share the most popular beverages, useful insights, and industry trends to help food and beverage operators, beverage producers, and suppliers understand which mix of products will drive growth in their businesses.”
The two-part report also includes comparative details to the previous report, revealing position changes, new brands and products and some consistencies from the prior year. Among the top 15 most-poured beverage styles, 14 carried over from the prior list, and Cocktail was added for the first time. Get free copies of the full 2023 Annual Pour Report via the links above.
Mike Eme says
I love these things