Here's To National Drink Beer Day

TAMPA BAY, FL -- Raise a glass. Sept. 28 is National Drink Beer Day and, lucky for you, you live in one of America's top 10 beer-loving states.

You'd expect Missouri to be on the list. Anheuser-Busch has been an institution in St. Louis for 165 years thanks to German immigrant Adolphus Busch, and it's now the largest beer producer in the world.

It's also no surprise that beer is a favorite beverage in Colorado, the state where Adolph Coors created his now-famous brew on the banks of Clear Creek in Golden, Colorado, in 1873.

While Florida has no major beer heritage to brag about, there's little doubt that its residents love beer.

Whether it's a IPA or a can of Bud, 24/7 Wall St says Floridians drink 423 million gallons of beer every year. That puts Florida at No. 3 in the country for beer consumption, behind California and Texas.

That may explain why the Sunshine State is bursting with craft breweries. In the last two decades, 335 craft breweries have popped up throughout the state, according to the Brewers Association, which lists craft breweries in each state.

Statista, the statistical studies website, gives a more conservative number -- 243 but still ranks Florida as 10th in the nation for the number of craft breweries.

"I think a good picture of Florida's craft brewery growth is painted by the number of the state's breweries that had booths at the recent Great American Beer Festival -23," said beer aficionado Gerard Walen. "That's about how many breweries were in the entire state just 10 years ago. Now there are about 300."

And Walen has sampled beer many of them in pursuit of research for writing the Florida Breweries guidebook (Stackpole Books, 2014). Walen also runs Florida's definitive website for beer lovers, BeerinFlorida.com.BeerinFlorida.com.

"Not only are we making a lot of beer, we're making some damn good beer," said Walen. "Breweries from Florida won seven medals at the GABF competition that has thousands of entries from breweries across the country -- three golds, three silvers and on bronze."

That's good news for Florida's economy.

The craft brewing industry contributed $67.8 billion to the U.S. economy in 2016 and created 456,373 full-time jobs. Florida's share of that contribution was more than $3 billion, according to the Brewers Association.

So, drink up. You can always use the excuse that you're contributing to the health of the economy.

Photo by Gerard Walen

Here's a sample of the contents of author and beer aficionado Gerard Walen's refrigerator.