Park Street Insider Podcast

Essential Talks - Ryan Lake on the Current Trends Driving Mergers & Acquisitions in Beverage Alcohol

Season 4 Episode 11

Mergers and acquisition deals often make for good headlines, but to take a step back and look at the sum of these deals often reveals larger insights in the state of beverage alcohol.  This perspective can prove useful in helping brands shape their own strategies.

In this Essential Talk, Ryan Lake, Managing Director at Arlington Capital Advisors, provides an overview of the current trends driving M&A activity in beverage-alcohol.

Lake closely examines the perspectives of strategic acquirers, offering insights into spirits categories, packaging types, and technologies driving the market. He highlights the types of deals that dominate investments, showcasing how some of the biggest deals in the past year fit into these different investment structures.

Additionally, Lake examines one of the most dominant forces in the M&A landscape: industry and category convergence. He explains why it's suddenly become so attractive for major soda companies like Coca-Cola and Pepsi to enter the beverage-alcohol arena. You'll also hear about how major suppliers have broken category norms in recent months to align with consumer trends.

Listeners will learn about the best ways to incorporate M&A trends into their own thinking. Lake offers brand owners his best practices for staying agile in an ever-changing market. 
 
Episode Breakdown:

1:50 - Trending spirits categories driving M&A
4:05 - Trending packaging types and occasions driving M&A
5:55 - New technologies and innovations driving M&A
7:17 - Most common types of investments
9:15 - Industry convergence
10:40 - How brands can take advantage of M&A trends

Key Quote:

"If you're not building your brand for where the consumer is going,  you're already getting left behind. Make sure you're watching the trends: trends that go beyond spirits, beyond spirits-based RTDs, beyond beverage-alcohol even."

In this episode you'll hear from:

Ryan Lake, Managing Director, Arlington Capital Advisors

Mentioned in this episode:

Park Street’s 2022 Beverage Alcohol M&A Overview
Arlington Capital Advisors

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