President Donald Trump’s tax cuts are helping American owned brewing companies compete with the larger companies owned by foreign countries.
Founder and CEO of Boston Brewing company Jim Koch (pictured) boasted that thanks to the president lowering the corporate tax, local breweries had a better chance of competing with brands like Budweiser, now owned by InBev, a Belgian-Brazilian beer conglomerate. Boston Brewing company brews Samuel Adams beer.
“The tax reform was a very big deal for all of us, because 85 percent of the beer made in the United States is owned by foreign companies,” he told Donald Trump while attending a dinner hosted by the president at his club in Bedminster.
He said the business climate that led many of the big beer brands to sell off to overseas companies improved significantly with the passage of the tax cuts.
“We were paying 38 percent taxes and competing against people who were paying 20,” Koch said. “And now we have a level playing field, and we’re going to kick their ass.”
Koch said he was speaking on behalf of the around 7,000 small brewers in the country and although his company was the largest American owned brewing companies he only had two percent market share.
“When I started Sam Adams, American beer was a joke, and it pissed me off,” he said. “And now, American brewers make the best beer in the world.”