If you know me, you know I am a tequila person. That being said, I consider myself versed in all things booze news. That being said, even I did not see this transaction coming and I read the trades.

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Larry Bell owner of Bell's Brewery in Comstock and Kalamazoo announced today via YouTube that he is retiring from the beer brewing business and has decided to sell Bell's Brewery. Gasp! According to Mr. Bell, the decision was made due to personal health reasons and what would be best for Bell's Brewery employees. Just from watching the video below, I am guessing Larry Bell was a damn good boss. Additional proof of that is the success of Bell's Brewery.

I am sure you are curious as to what company bought Bell's Brewery. The answer is Lion. According to The Detroit News, Lion is an Australian beer company. Per Larry Bell in his video announcement (see below), Bell's Brewery will be joining forces with New Belgium Brewing Company in Colorado. You may have guessed, New Belgium Brewing Company is also owned by Lion. Yes, it all makes sense now.

Mr. Bell is a gentleman and did not disclose the purchase price of his beloved company. I however am no gentleman and Googled the net worth of the company. I could not find anything concrete but I did see one blurb from 2017 about Bell's Brewery making $100 million annually. As I said, that was 2017. I am sure it has continued to grow profit-wise in the last four years. Not too shabby for a business that started as a homebrewing business in 1983.

I certainly wish Mr. Bell the best. Next time you are drinking a Two Hearted Ale or any other Bell's beer - raise your bottle to Larry Bell. Cheers!

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To find the best beer in each state and Washington D.C., Stacker analyzed January 2020 data from BeerAdvocate, a website that gathers user scores for beer in real-time. BeerAdvocate makes its determinations by compiling consumer ratings for all 50 states and Washington D.C. and applying a weighted rank to each. The weighted rank pulls the beer toward the list's average based on the number of ratings it has and aims to allow lesser-known beers to increase in rank. Only beers with at least 10 rankings to be considered; we took it a step further to only include beers with at least 100 user rankings in our gallery. Keep reading to find out what the best beer is in each of the 50 states and Washington D.C.

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