Well, the race has been run and won, and we have a new top three. We’re sure there will be plenty of discussion in the days to come about Australia’s hottest craft beers for 2024, with Mountain Culture Status Quo, Coopers Original Pale Ale and Balter XPA filling the podium, not least that green beer making it into second place. 

Outside the podium, it’s the most fascinating Hottest 100 in years – for the most part, at least. Sure, some things remain the same, or continue to trend as they have been for years. But dig a little deeper and there’s some great takeouts and stories in there.

So, let’s take a look at them, shall we?

In With The Old

Before we get into the deeper dive stuff, we need to talk about Coopers Original Pale Ale coming in at number two. It’s the first time Australia’s oldest family-owned brewery has made it onto the podium, after the Adelaide brewers have enjoyed a steady rise over recent years. 

In last year’s poll, the beer placed seven; up one place from eight in 2022’s vote. This year, the beer was one of four to make the list for Coopers. Over the last few years, they’ve engaged more heavily in the countdown and called for more votes, asking their many fans to back the brewery.

Clearly, the country's oldest indie operation still has clout in a world far removed from how it would have been in 1862 when they launched their first batch of Sparkling Ale.

Grassroots Rising

There’s no doubt the beer landscape has shifted in recent years (or, perhaps more accurately, been battered into a new shape). Most notably, the Valley of Death between those breweries large enough to exist profitably on a national scale and smaller operations existing under the $350,000 excise tax cap has widened, with many of those who were somewhere between the two finding themselves in serious strife – and often in and out of administration too.

Overall beer sales are down, with craft beer’s years of double-digit growth disappearing in the rear view mirror, yet there are causes for optimism to be found within the current reality. Arguably, the greatest of those stems from the industry’s new bottom-heavy structure.

As brewery owners pull back to focus on their local markets, or open more venues through which they can engage with and sell to customers directly, the opportunities to win over consumers in a meaningful manner are growing.

Are you more likely to bring drinkers into the world of local, Australian-owned beer by selling your flagship hazy pale or award-winning IPA in every city and state – something that’s ever harder now the Endeavour Group and Coles’ past wooing of the indie world has started unravelling in the face of unfriendly market forces – or by welcoming people into your venue, engaging them with warm hospitality and freshly-brewed beer, and sharing your story with them?

The latter is certainly a slower way to go about building the audience for craft beer, but it’s one that’s likely to set down deeper roots. The next customer through a brewpub’s door might not like anything other than their most approachable lager (at least at first), but if they enjoy themselves there, come to understand it’s a local family or a few mates behind the business, and see their own family enjoying themselves in a way they can’t in one of AVC’s growing army of identikit venues, or the TAB and pokies barn a couple of streets away, they’ll be back. And they’ll tell their mates.

As such, it’s great to see so many smaller operations appear in the top 100. Sure, the reduction in breweries and beers entered in this year’s poll, and a drop off in get-out-the-vote campaigns (see later) most likely played a role, but there won’t be many crafty drinkers out there who haven’t enjoyed seeing the likes of BoJaK Brewing (Dandenong), Curly Lewis (Bondi), Reckless Brewing (Bathurst), Future Magic (East Brisbane), Dangerous Ales (Milton), and Brewmanity (South Melbourne) join the likes of Hiker, Shout, Seeker (up to the giddy heights of 19 with a NEIPA), and Sunday Road in this year’s lineup.

Their arrival brings some welcome diversity to a poll that’s been criticised over recent years for its retreat to the mean. That said…

Reversion To The Mean

Pale, hoppy ales in their various forms have devoured the Hottest 100 over the years. It makes sense for a number of reasons: the greater the number of voters, the harder it is for funkier or limited release beers to break in; such beers have been the most popular craft beer styles for years now; brewers have been asking fans to vote for their flagship beers, which are mostly pale, hoppy ales; and so on.

At the same time, the lager renaissance we’d been predicting years ago and have commented on many times since is now a full-blown revival. A decade ago, just one lager made the top 100 (Stone & Wood’s at 91, in the same year La Sirène’s Praline came in fifth), while in the two years following, 2015 and 2016, just two appeared. This year, however, has seen an all-time lager high, up four from 2023’s poll to 16.

Put those together with the 80 ales that fit into the “pale and hoppy” space – pales of different strengths, XPAs, hazies, and various IPAs – and you have a Hottest 100 in which 96 percent of the beers are pale, hoppy ales and lagers.

That leaves room for just four others: One Drop’s We Jammin’ smoothie sour; Matso’s Mango Beer; Bad Shepherd’s everpresent Peanut Butter Porter; and White Rabbit Dark Ale (which first appeared in eighth spot back in 2009).

As above, there are reasons aplenty for this – to which you might add the belt-tightening that’s been forced upon consumers and producers alike over the past couple of years – but it can make one wistful for the year in which there were seven barrel-aged or fermented beers. That was 2014 for those asking at the back: Feral’s Watermelon Warhead, BFH, and dubiously-titled Barrique O’Karma; La Sirène’s Cherie Kriek; Moon Dog’s Black Lung IV and Jumping The Shark; and Boatrocker’s Ramjet.

Tassie’s Back, Baby*

The longest drought in GABS history has ended: Tasmania is once again part of the countdown.

By appearing not once, but twice, Fox Friday have achieved something that no other Tasmanian brewery has managed in 12 long years. The last time a Tassie brewer made the list was in 2012, when Moo Brew’s Pale Ale came in at 89 with their Hefeweizen just sneaking in at 98.  

Of course, this drought-breaking appearance does come with something of an asterisk since Fox Friday have opened breweries in Perth and Melbourne following the acquisition of the original business by the Hoopers. Having said that, they present themselves as a Tasmanian-founded brewery, and their campaign – which was authorised by D Licious and can be viewed here – was focused on their original brewery’s hometown of Hobart. 

Furthermore, you have to wonder if their marketing or their fans did all the heavy lifting. The beer they campaigned for – their cold, wet, fizzy Pale Ale – came in at 91 while their Hazy IPA kept them waiting all the way to number 30. Does it mean the brewery’s focus should have been elsewhere? Or is their hazy IPA a modern classic that doesn’t need a special push?

As the team celebrates in Hobart (and Melbourne and Perth), it’s worth discussing just why Tasmanian breweries have struggled to appear in the countdown for more than a decade. The state is home to a very high number of breweries per capita; this is a great thing for locals and tourists alike but we’d argue a broad spread of smaller breweries means it’s difficult for any single operation to rise above the pack in such a popularity contest.

Furthermore, few of those breweries distribute beer on the mainland and instead focus on their local markets. Thus, when the poll opens, few breweries south of Bass Strait even ask their fans to vote; fair enough, really… what benefit can you gain from a national poll if you’re selling most of your beer at your own bar?

Go Hard…

It’s long been a reality that if you want people to vote for your beer, you have to encourage them to do so. As the years passed and marketing budgets swelled, many businesses reaped the rewards of asking their fans for support. Then asking again. And again and again. 

Once more, the overall winners at Mountain Culture ran a smart, fun and engaging campaign in which their team appeared as the stars. This time, they rallied around Status Quo with a campaign borrowing from classic flick The Castle and their dream of winning a third time. 

Likewise, if you spent any time scrolling Instagram over Christmas, you would have been hit by posts from breweries asking for votes via targeted ads reminding you just how important your five votes can be. 

QR codes pushing votes have become a common sight on cans too; Rocky Ridge even sold 500ml cans of Jindong Juice for the same price as their standard 375ml cans throughout December: Christmas treats they’ve released before that provide more space for marketing as well as 33 percent more liquid. That beer’s positioning at 16  suggests such largesse worked.

…Or Go Home

While some went hard to capture votes, others went quiet. 

Last year, Modus went all in with their Cerveza Chronicles, a video series that saw Modus Cerveza land in 67th, a drop of 37 spots from 2022. This time around, the NSW brewers skipped the hustings altogether and disappeared from the list. Instead, they opted to post this video about how they weren’t going to “hound fans for votes” and were instead focusing on their 12 Days of Christmas deals. 

Likewise, Brick Lane dropped out of the list following a year in which they were far quieter on the campaign front. Their One Love Pale Ale came in at 39 in 2023 and 28 in 2022, with previous efforts seeing them utilise social media, radio ads, and in-venue initiatives like an election-style voting booth in their Queen Victoria Market venue.

It’s easy to see why some breweries chose to skip the poll – or at least put less effort into it this time around. In the face of ongoing economic and market challenges, many teams are smaller, scrappier and are focusing their attention elsewhere. Some have pulled back from national distribution – deliberately and / or due to changed priorities from major retailers – and are instead selling beer more locally. Appearing towards the pointier end of the poll might improve your chances with national retailers, but if those conversations aren’t happening, then why bother?

It’s also easy to surmise why two other brands that have disappeared from the top 100 aren’t there. With Fixation’s main man Tom Delmont leaving the business in the second half of 2024, and the brewing company’s Collingwood Incubator closing soon afterwards, few would have expected Fixie IPA to poll high, while Deeds Brewing’s fall from multiple AIBA champs to shutting up shop and selling their gear in the space of a few months has been well documented.

The only other brand to disappear from 2023 to 2024 is Kosciuszko Pale. Interestingly, another Lion-owned brand did make the top 100. You could debate whether a beer such as the clear-bottled macro-lager Byron Bay Premium Lager should be eligible in the first place, but its appearance at 74 did have the Crafty team wondering whether there was an edict within the Kirin-owned operation to switch last year’s Kosciuszko vote from the mountains to the beach…

As an aside, there was one other disappearance of sorts in the poll. Capital Brewing’s H100 mainstay Hang Loose Juice made the cut again at 69 However, while you might still find some in retail, the NEIPA was axed by the Canberra brewers last year, replaced in their lineup by hazy pale ale, Haze Oasis.

The Mighty Have Fallen

This year’s Hottest 100 features the most significant fall in the number of beers from Japanese-owned craft brands in a number of years. There are just 17 – 12 from CUB / Asahi and five from Lion / Kirin – compared to 22 last time out.

Presumably, the brand managers will be happy enough, however, given all of the acquired breweries’ flagship beers – most of them launched post-sale – made the lineup.

Feral’s return to independence accounts for one of the five, and it was interesting – although perhaps not surprising – to see just one entry for Stone & Wood. The parent company’s focus on Pacific Ale has only seemed to intensify, even in a year in which their Big Pale was named Champion Australian Beer at the Australian International Beer Awards.

Looking ahead 12 months, it will be interesting to see how their near neighbours to the north, Balter, fare now that the founders’ five-year commitment to the business post-sale to CUB is over, with a number of key figures having left, or set to leave.

Boss Hog!

One of the Hottest 100 all-time greats (let’s face it: one of Australian beer’s all-time greats) has made a return to the Hottest 100. Feral Hop Hog was the only threepeat winner prior to Mountain Culture but dropped away, most notably after the brewery was sold to Coke, with its last previous appearance a lowly 95 in 2020.

Did Feral’s return to independence in 2024 play a role in its return in 85th spot, or is it in some way tied to the nostalgia sweeping parts of the booze world? Who cares? It’s just great to see a bona fide classic back in the mix.

Check out the full Hottest 100 here, or rewatch The Crafty Pint's video livestream here.