‘Everything costs more’: How the aluminum tariffs are affecting a Nashville craft brewery

For craft brewers, an industry largely consisting of small businesses and where the product is made in steel plus packaged in aluminum, the newly applied tariffs are having a direct strike on their bottom lines.

Perhaps there’s no better example of where the newly applied 25% tariffs on aluminum and steel will be felt than craft brewers, an industry that uses both materials in all facets of production and sales. And for Wesley Keegan, owner and founder of Nashville-based TailGate Brewery, the implementation of the tariffs will have swift effects on his business. “Everything costs more,” he told CNN. “We get a price increase letter just immediately from every supplier.” On Wednesday, President Donald Trump enacted a new round of tariffs on the raw metals. Since much of it comes from abroad, US companies — small and large — that rely on steel and aluminum may have to pass on the cost of those tariffs to consumers. But specifically how much more Keegan’s customers will pay for a 6-pack of his brewery’s ciders, stouts and lagers isn’t clear just yet. He admits that businesses like TailGate have to be “willing to take the haircut” in terms of profits. “The hard piece is juggling the reality that you can’t be in business if you’re not making money,” he said. “But then you also have to continue to take those price changes on the chin because the consumer is only willing to give you so much.” Keegan said that TailGate tries to “absorb” as much as it can, but beyond tariffs “there is not a single input in our industry that hasn’t increased prices every single year for the last five years.”