2025 Crop Report
HPA recently published the 2025 crop report, proudly sharing the results of our latest hop harvest with staff, distribution partners, brewing customers, and the broader industry through a series of emails, social posts, and media coverage from the likes of The Crafty Pint, Beer & Brewer, Drinks Trade, Craft Brewing Business, Asia Brewers Network, Alpine Observer/Myrtleford Times, The Border Mail, ABC Rural Radio Victoria and ABC Country Hour Tasmania. Crafty Pint also published an Aussie Hop Series on their podcast. This included Caolan Vaughan from Stone & Wood talking about Galaxy®, Zach Nichols from Cellar West talking about Vic Secret™, Max Haemmerle from Philter talking about Eclipse®, Jeremy Moynier from Stone talking about Ella™, George MacGregor from Aether talking about Enigma®, and Jesse Searls from Young Henrys talking about Topaz™. Plus, Hop Culture also published a series of articles celebrating the commissioning of Hop Central, our breeding program, and Aussie hops in liquid products.
To celebrate the end of this year’s harvest, we sponsored the Hobart Community Hop in Tasmania, the High Country Hop in Victoria, and the Inner West Hop Harvest Fest in New South Wales. These festivals support the communities in which we operate, strengthen our relationship with the local brewers, and help educate consumers about the role hops play in beer.
Hop Central video
We recently filmed a video to celebrate the commissioning of Hop Central and communicate how the new facility will benefit our brewing customers. A big thank you to Hans, Katie and Michael for their cooperation, as well as the rest of the Hop Central team for accommodating the film crew. We also filmed a second video for the Asahi For Hops Program, an investment in innovation and collaboration to boost precision agriculture. Another big thanks to Simon and George who provided the necessary information to pull this together.
ANZ sales update
The third quarter of FY25 has been full of change and momentum for the sales team.
We farewelled our much-loved TAS & NZ Sales Rep, Adrian Ianculovici, who left HPA to pursue his dream of becoming a police officer. To fill the role, we ran a comprehensive recruitment process that attracted nearly 70 applicants. We’re thrilled to announce the appointment of industry veteran Lindsy Greig – a respected brewer, beer judge, and all-round legend. You can check out her profile here. Lindsy officially joins HPA on 23 June 2025.
Since our last update, several independent breweries have undergone major changes. Deeds Brewing, Sydney Beer Co, Rocks Brewing Co and Fox Friday all entered voluntary administration. Unfortunately, both Deeds and Sydney Beer Co have ceased operations. Rocks Brewing has been acquired by Sydney Brewery (not to be confused with Sydney Beer Co), and Fox Friday has been acquired by Mountain Culture Brewing Co who will take over Fox Friday’s Melbourne and Hobart brewery and venue operations, along with the Moonah Hotel & Cellars. Fox Friday’s Perth brewery and venue was acquired by Rocky Ridge Brewing Co, who also recently acquired Thunder Road’s Melbourne brewery.
The sales team has been working harder than ever as both consumers and brewers feel the pinch of cost-of-living pressures. HPA is well positioned to navigate these market shifts. In this quarter alone, HPA sales reps have judged the Australian International Beer Awards and the Royal Queensland Beer Awards, and will judge the NZ Beer Awards and Royal Adelaide Beer & Cider Awards in the coming weeks. And next month, the sales team are also hitting to road to help our customers get the gist of liquid hops. They’ll use case studies and technical advice from local and international brewers to demonstrate how Flex®, Incognito®, Spectrum, HopAid®, HopHaze® and Euphorics™ can be used to improve brewing efficiency, sustainability and profitability. The roadshow will have something for everyone, whether they’re new to the world of liquid hops, or wanting to learn some process optimisation tips from an award-winning brewer. Check out the recap of last year’s roadshow here.
We’ve seen some strong wins this quarter, a few examples:
- Stone & Wood launched a new product, Easy Pale Ale, backed by a solid commitment to Vic Secret and Eclipse.
- Sawmill Brewery, one of our key NZ customers, decided to once again contract their annual hop demand exclusively with HPA.
- Hobart Brewing Co renewed their hop contracts, reaffirmed their support by continuing to source Galaxy, Topaz, Vic Secret, Cascade and Eclipse, along with their US hops through HPA.
- Seasonal Brewing in WA secured a diverse mix of Australian, US, and European hops, alongside some of our innovative hop products.
- Yepp Brewing in QLD committed to a selection of Aussie hops and Haas LupoMax pellets through HPA
With plenty sales irons still in the fire, we remain optimistic and focused, continuing to support our customers through their brewing journey.
International sales update
Support for our international distribution partners continued to ramp up over the past few months. We delivered Aussie Hop Workshops for Ohnishi Shoji in Japan and Hops Connect in Canada. These workshops represent important face-to-face time with distributors who are promoting our Aussie hops in international markets. They receive a deep dive into HPA’s operations, our 6 proprietary hops and our leading experimental hops. Looking ahead, we plan to deliver a similar workshop for Bision in Korea and Bronson Jacobs in Thailand.
We also met with 4 large Japanese brewers, alongside BarthHaas and Haas, to learn about their needs and offer technical brewing advice. And we hosted Suntory for an audit of Hop Central, accompanied by Katie, Michael and Jess. This multi touchpoint experience for our visitors puts us firmly on the path toward certified supplier status.
Sales in China exploded due to US tariffs, which created the opportunity for Chris to support BarthHaas China at Beijing Brew, including customer visits to CRB and Yanjing – the 1st and 4th largest breweries in the country. At least one of these breweries is currently evaluating our Aussie hops as potential substitutes for European hops in their beer recipes.
Efforts later this year include joining Haas for a series of customer visits on the East Coast of the US and supporting BarthHaas at BrewAsia in Thailand.
Our Aussie hops are also featuring in high-profile collaboration beers around the world:
- United States – our regional distribution partner HAAS recently showcased Galaxy and Eclipse in a series of collaboration beers at the Craft Brewers Conference in May. This included a Cloudburst IPAfeaturing Galaxy T90, Galaxy Spectrum, a Sun King and Three Floyds IPA featuring Galaxy T90, Galaxy Spectrum, Eclipse T90, Eclipse Spectrum, and a Jack Abby’s Lager featuring Eclipse T90. They also plan to showcase Galaxy and HPA-033 in collaborations beers during the US Hop Harvest in September.
- Canada – our regional distribution partner Hops Connect have been working on a series of Galaxy collaboration beers with their customers across the country.
- Germany – our regional distribution partner BarthHaas is brewing an HPA-033 collaboration beer with Italian brewery Busa dei Brigantifor Drinktec in September.
One BarthHaas Brand Project
HPA has been a member of the global BarthHaas group since 1988, alongside BarthHaas in Europe and Haas in the US. Together, we are the world’s largest supplier of hop products and services, leveraging shared resources so our brewing customers have their choice of high-quality products and technical advice. Historically, each business has successfully served its respective markets under its own name. However, it is becoming increasingly evident among growing competition and cost challenges that our diverse brand architecture makes it difficult to celebrate our affiliation and effectively communicate the scope of our products and services. This has prompted our respective Boards and management teams to explore stronger synergies by operating under one unified global brand. To ensure cost-effectiveness, they are supportive of adopting the BarthHaas name. It’s important to note, that this re-branding project will not directly result in any change to HPA’s current ownership, organisational structure, or employment conditions, nor will it significantly impact your day-to-day workload. It will be a long-term, multi-stage project, rolled out over 12-24 months, with careful consideration for everyone involved.
We have partnered with Biesalski & Company, a world-class B2B brand research firm, to complete the initial stages of this project:
- April 2025 – one-hour interviews with key people from each business to develop a clear and forward-looking Guiding Principle that will serve as a shared understanding across the group and provide a unified direction for all employees. This included Jane, Owen, Kate and Simon, who provided their insights on the key topics of trends shaping the future of the industry, corporate goals and strategic areas for development, vision for the company’s future, mission and motivational drive for employees, core values and social contributions.
- May 2025 – every customer on our mailing list was invited to complete a global customer survey.
- June 2025 – full-day, in-person workshop in Yakima which Owen will attend.
- July 2025 – half-day remote workshop to capture thoughts and feedback as to how any potential changes may impact each department which Jane, Owen, Kate, Simon, Nic, Chris, Michael, Jeremy and Grace will attend.
- September 2025 – half-day remote workshop to define a comprehensive list of measures, effort and timeline associated with rolling the brand update out.
- October 2025 – Biesalski will deliver their final recommendations as a result of all the research done up to that point.
- 2026 to 2028 – we will commence the rebrand process.
