Brewery Brain · Action Brief

Reformulate — substitute 50% of Citra

Cost-side

Recovers ~$830/month of margin pressure from the Citra hop spike (+30% vs. T12).

Hazy IPA · Production & Wholesale · Coastline Craft Co.

Logged 2026-05-15

Brief printed 2026-06-09

How we got here

Company NOI dipped below trailing-12. Drilling into revenue centers narrowed the pressure to Production & Wholesale, where COGS / BBL ran above its baseline while volume and price held.
Brand-level COGS. Six brands sorted by total COGS / BBL. Hazy IPA sat at the top with both the highest cost level and the steepest lift vs. T12 (+41%).
Ingredient × Yield. Decomposing material into ingredient (cost in the BBL out the door) and beer loss (yield- driven shrink). Hazy IPA's beer loss held flat — the lift was almost entirely on the ingredient side, not yield slippage. The story is sourcing or recipe.
Recipe drill. Hazy IPA is a hop-forward specialty IPA. Citra hops alone explained essentially the full move (+30% vs. T12, ~$1.5K/month margin pressure). Root cause is procurement-side, not market narrative: the Citra forward contract expired in Dec 2025, and spot pricing has ridden the Yakima Valley shortage up every month since.

Cost-side action — lower the input cost. Strata + Mosaic blend keeps the tropical / citrus profile at lower cost.

Baseline COGS / BBL

$344

Baseline GM %

35.7%

Expected recovery / BBL

Expected recovery / month

$830

Expected margin lift

+0.9 pp

Speed

Slow

Tradeoff

Recipe rework; flavor profile shifts; brew + sales alignment needed.

Owner

Mike Torres, brewmaster

Expected impact date

2026-07-14 (35 days out)

Status

Open · awaiting impact window

Action ID

reformulate

What we'll check on the impact date

Target: Hazy IPA COGS / BBL ≤ $339 ($344 baseline − $5 expected recovery).
Monthly target: ~$830 of margin recovered (+0.9 pp on Hazy IPA). If COGS / BBL hasn't moved, escalate to procurement.
Mark the action as realized, partial, or missed in the tracker. Capture context for next time.