Illinois In Bottom Half Of Capita Per Brewery, But There's Room For Growth

By Chuck Sudo in Food on Mar 8, 2013 7:25PM

The New Half Acre Tap Room

The Brewers Association ran population statistics for each of the 50 states against its number of breweries and found, despite a growing list of breweries opening in Illinois, the Land of Lincoln still lags behind other states in the number of residents per brewery.

Illinois ranks 34th on the list with 54 working breweries and a population of over 12.83 million people — that's one brewery for every 237,604 people. The silver lining here is legislation like the Craft Beer Act allowing smaller breweries and brewpubs to self-distribute has resulted in a modest increase in the number of breweries applying for licenses in Illinois — a number that's sure to grow, if the explosion of breweries in Chicago is any indication.

The state with the most capita per brewery? Vermont: With 24 breweries and a population of nearly 626,000 people, that's one brewery for every 26,073 people. We've included the list here . [PDF]