Bud, Coors Throw Pumpkins at Craft Brewers

DENVER (TheStreet) -- In autumn, the barroom brawl between Anheuser-Busch Inbev(BUD) and Molson Coors(TAP) moves to the pumpkin patch.

At liquor stores throughout the country, Jack's Pumpkin Spice Ale from Anheuser-Busch and Molson Coors' Harvest Moon Pumpkin Ale compete with craft brews like Shipyard Brewing Company's Pumpkinhead Ale and Dogfish Head Brewery's Punkin Ale. Why are these beer heavyweights taking on the cramped world of pumpkin ale?

Todd Alstrom, co-owner of beer publication BeerAdvocate, says Anheuser-Busch and Molson Coors are trying to "capture some market share on a popular seasonal product and diversify their portfolios to appeal to a broader group and gain more retail space at stores and bars."

Big brewers have been selling pumpkin ales for half a decade, but their jostling for microscopic shares of the market grows more intense each season. The first salvo was fired after the Blue Moon wheat beer introduced by Coors in 1995 began gaining momentum -- it was the choice of Cambridge Police Sergeant James Crowley at the White House "beer summit" with Harvard University Professor Henry Louis Gates -- and Anheuser Busch responded with its Shock Top wheat brew.

"When you own as much of the audience of any industry as the macro beer companies do, you can afford to experiment, especially when your research data is showing that they specifically want something other than what you've been providing them for decades," says Matt Simpson, better known as the Beer Sommelier. "So they experiment; creating porters, pale ales and in this case, pumpkin beers."