The move comes amid President Donald Trump\u2019s trade war with Canada, which has contributed to a significant decline in U.S. liquor sales after the country ushered in a boycott of American booze, and as more young adults are cutting back on drinking.<\/p>\n
Jim Beam, owned by Suntory Global Spirits, is one of Kentucky\u2019s biggest bourbon producers.<\/p>\n
The Bluegrass state\u2019s $9 billion whiskey bourbon industry has been struggling to manage its abundant supply of liquor against the drop in demand.<\/p>\n
In a statement, the company said it was shutting down production at its Clermont distillery on January 1, 2026, though the visitors\u2019 centre on the site is to remain open, according to the Lexington Herald Leader.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are always assessing production levels to best meet consumer demand and recently met with our team to discuss our volumes for 2026,\u201d the statement said. \u201cWe\u2019ve shared with our teams that while we will continue to distill at our [Freddie Booker Noe] craft distillery in Clermont and at our larger Booker Noe distillery in Boston, we plan to pause distillation at our main distillery on the James B. Beam campus for 2026 while we take the opportunity to invest in site enhancements.\u201d<\/p>\n
There were nearly 1,500 employees at the James B. Beam Distilling Co. in Kentucky last year, according to the newspaper. The company said it was assessing \u201chow best to utilize our workforce during this transition\u201d in a statement to the outlet, and added it was in discussions with the union.<\/p>\n
In March, following sweeping tariffs imposed by Trump, many Canadians decided to boycott American liquor in protest.<\/p>\n
Industry group Distilled Spirits Council of the United States said that U.S. spirits exports plummeted 85 percent, falling below $10 million in the second quarter of 2025, which CEO Chris Swonger blamed on \u201cpersistent trade tensions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Swonger warned the figures signalled \u201ca shift away from our great American spirits brands\u201d and urged Trump \u201cto help facilitate a lasting return to tariff-free trade with our longstanding trading partners.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump suspended trade talks with Canada in October after an ad shared by Ontario premier Doug Ford featured spliced clips from Ronald Reagan\u2019s 1987 address, where the late president said tariffs caused trade wars and economic disaster.<\/p>\n
Canada and the U.S. have since agreed to launch formal discussions to review their trade agreement in mid-January, according to Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.<\/p>\n
The president\u2019s tariffs are not the only headache for the U.S. liquor industry \u2014 a drastic change in drinking habits is also having an impact on sales.<\/p>\n
A record high percentage of U.S. adults (53 percent) said moderate drinking is bad for their health, up from 28 percent in 2015, according to a Gallup poll published in August.<\/p>\n
The uptick in doubt about alcohol\u2019s benefits is largely driven by young adults \u2014 the age group that is most likely to believe drinking \u201cone or two drinks a day\u201d can cause health hazards.<\/p>\n
The survey found that 54 percent of U.S. adults said they drink alcoholic beverages such as liquor, wine or beer, which is lower than at any other point in the past three decades.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The move comes amid President Donald Trump\u2019s trade war with Canada, which has contributed to a significant decline…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":205209,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,61,60,898],"class_list":{"0":"post-205208","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-latest-news-ticker"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=205208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205208\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/205209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=205208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=205208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=205208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}