Heineken buys 50 percent stake in Lagunitas
One of America’s favorite craft beers just became half Dutch.
According to 
Fortune, Heineken purchased a 50 percent stake in California-based Lagunitas on Tuesday in the beer industry’s latest example of the big players trying to tap into the world’s growing desire for craft beer.
Beer enthusiasts knew something was brewing earlier Tuesday when Chicago Tribune beer critic Josh Noel tweeted out a juicy tidbit:
With breweries in Petaluma, California and Chicago, Lagunitas is the 
sixth-largest craft brewer in the U.S., according to trade group the Brewers Association, and shipped nearly 600,000 barrels in 2014. They company has also expanded shipping to include the U.K. and Canada.
Per 
Fortune:
Lagunitas shipped almost 600,000 barrels in 2014, soaring from just over 100,000 in 2010, according to industry tracker Beer Marketer’s Insights. The market share within craft has grown from 1% to over 3% over that period within the U.S. Heineken’s beer volume growth, like other big brewers, is far slower,
http://www.theheinekencompany.com/media/media-releases/press-releases/2015/08/1943014rising 3.6%
http://www.theheinekencompany.com/media/media-releases/press-releases/2015/08/1943014in the Americas in the first half of 2015.
Though details of the deal have not been released, some are placing it at around half a billion dollars.
As Fortune notes, one in every 10 beers sold in America is now a craft beer, with that volume rising dramatically since Anheuser-Busch InBev, the world’s largest beer company, 
bought notable craft breweries such as Seattle-based Elysian Brewing and Oregon-based 10 Barrel.
“This venture will create a way for Lagunitas to let Heineken participate in the growing craft beer category across its global distribution network in places from Tierra Del Fuego and Mongolia to the far-flung Isle of Langerhans,” Lagunitas founder and owner Tony Magee said in a
statement. “Lagunitas will share in the best quality processes in the world and enjoy access to opportunities that took lifetimes to build. This alliance with the world’s most international brewer represents a profound victory for U.S. craft. It will open doors that had previously been shut and bring the U.S. craft beer vibe to communities all over the world.”
The move is somewhat surprising considering owner and founder Magee’s 
documented disdain for big-beer.
That was addressed in 
a thread Magee started on beer review website Beer Advocate to discuss the deal in which he said he never discussed the deal with Miller-Coors or Anheuser-Busch InBev because “they don’t get it,” and referred to them as “bankers by any measure.”
But perhaps Magee, a Chicago native, had left clues in 
an interview he did with the Chicago RedEye in 2013, in which he said: “The global beer industry is being handed over to the next generation of brewers. You have to just keep your eye on the ball so that you’re standing there to catch it rather than worrying about who else is trying to catch it, too.”
He emphasized that the deal is a joint venture, and not a sale to a private equity fund, an ESOP or a way of selling the business.
Magee signed off of the Beer Advocate thread sporting a new outlook: “My mantra has become: The future will not be like the past. And so it shan’t. Furthur [sic].”