With St. Patrick’s Day coming up this week, I decided to go with the brewing industry and the role AI plays within it. The brewing industry has been around for centuries, but it is only recently that artificial intelligence (AI) has started to play a significant role in the brewing process. AI is being utilized in the beer industry in various ways, including recipe creation, marketing, and predictive analytics. It is embracing artificial intelligence to improve operations and enhance the quality of products offered. A large player that you may know of is Anheuser-Bucsh InBev. (Think Budweiser, Corona, Michelob, Modelo, etc)
Recipe Creation
One of the most exciting ways AI is being used in the beer industry is in recipe creation. IntelligentX is utilizing AI algorithms and machine learning to help adjust its recipe. IntelligentX produces 4 varieties: Black AI, Golden AI, Pale AI, and Amber AI. These are delivered to customers, on a subscription service, using a delivery frequency. The customer provides feedback afterwards which feeds data points to IntelligentX’s AI algorithm. The algorithm revises the recipe to provide new customized beers for the next delivery, creating a truly personalized experience.
Carlsberg, a Copenhagen-based brewery, began their Beer Fingerprint Project in partnership with Microsoft. Carlsberg create 1,000 different beer samples daily and the fingerprinting project aims to change the way new beers are created. Sensors are used to determine the flavor fingerprint, accurately gauging the nuances and aromas of the beer, and analyze the different yeasts used. The data is collected by their AI system and the information can be used to explore new brewing organisms, resulting in the creation of new beers.
Champion Brewing Company, based in Charlottesville, teamed up with Metis Machine to develop their beer brewed using data science and machine learning. The beer, dubbed ML IPA the ML stands for machine learning is essentially what a computer believes the ideal IPA would be. The beer was created using the parameters used to judge IPAs at the Great American Beer Festival. The parameters Champion Brewing provided were based on Standard Reference Method (what gives the beer its color), International Bittering Units, and Alcohol by Volume. Information about the 10 best-selling IPAs and 10 worst-selling IPAs were also factored into the recipe creation. The result? an IPA with 6% ABV, 60 IBU, and 6 SRM (a deep gold color).
Marketing
AI is also being used to improve marketing in the beer industry. Companies like Heineken are using machine learning algorithms to analyze customer data and create targeted marketing campaigns. This includes analyzing customer behavior and preferences to create personalized marketing messages that are more likely to resonate with customers. In 2017, Heineken partnered with Walmart to analyze the behavior of customers in front of their shelves. With this program, Heineken gathered data on how every six-pack or can of Heineken left the store. This allows Heineken to adjust their sale and determine the best location in store to sell beer and when.
Predictive Analytics
AI is being used to reduce costs, increase efficiency, and minimize waste within the industry. Companies like Anheuser-Busch are using machine learning to analyze data from sensors on their brewing equipment, predicting when equipment is likely to fail and proactively scheduling maintenance. This reduces downtime on their machinery and improve overall efficiency.
AI helps optimize supply chain management, a great deal post-COVID where many industries struggled due to supply chain issues. By analyzing data from sources like weather forecasts, crop yields, and shipping data, breweries are able to adjust for these potential bottlenecks/disruptions and adjust accordingly. For example, AB InBev uses weather patterns and crop yields to optimize their supply chain. With this, they are able to reduce water consumption and decrease carbon emissions.
Conclusion
AI is becoming an increasingly important tool in the beer industry, providing brewers with new and innovative ways to improve the brewing process. From recipe creation to quality control, marketing, and predictive maintenance, there are many ways that AI is being used to streamline processes and improve efficiency. As AI continues to advance, we can expect to see even more innovation in the beer industry, as brewers explore new and exciting ways to utilize this powerful technology. Cutters Thursday night.
This is awesome, love the relevance. I like that AI used in the culinary process isn’t cheapening the process of taste curation. Additionally, it is wonderful to see that AI is beneficially impacting the supply chain of its production. Like the piece, happy to have this factoid now.
Great topic, I am a huge st paddys fan so this was what I needed. I really didn’t think about the fact that AI had the ability to understand nuances in aromas and flavors. That’s incredible and I want to try these now to see if they have any specific flavor differences that make them better.
This is so cool!! I had no idea AI was used in the brewing process but can see how it would lead to better, more consistent brews to perfect the flavor. It is interesting to think about how this technology can be carried to other CPG companies to improve consistency among products and boost overall customer satisfaction.
Being from Savannah, St. Paddy’s Day is a really big deal so this is a timely post. I’m really curious to try what an AI-created beer tastes like so I might have to sign up for their subscription offering. The use of AI in supply chain management is also really interesting. I didn’t expect AI to help with water consumption in the growing process, particularly in the beer industry. That type of implementation helps both the company and the environment. Will definitely try to find that subscription brewing service, I’ll tell you whether it was worth it or not on Twitter.
This is an awesome idea to add innovation into the mix with something like brewing! Enhancing the products with AI is such a cool concept and I wonder if they’ll be able to take the best ingredients from other drinks and come up with a product that everyone would love. Now, I don’t know how realistic this idea would be but I think technology in this field is super cool.
Hi Andy! Great post. I didn’t know much about the brewing industry (as I despise the taste of beer) and how AI could be a part of it, but your blog post was really informative! IntelligentX’s recipe creation with AI is so cool and unimaginable for me. Furthermore, I can’t believe that AI beers are already taking a part in running competitions!
But hey, look at all of the different things that AI has been able to accomplish. I also think it’s kind of funny (and clever) how most of these beers are named similarly to AI and ML concepts. And who knows, maybe one day these beers will be in our Athens bars and stores!
Andy, this was an awesome post! I liked how you involved the TED talk video in your blog. It is very fascinating all the ways AI is getting involved in every company imaginable. I think it would be super cool if AI could analyze your taste buds and make specifically catered brewing recipes for your taste buds.
Hi Andy. This was such a unique article to read, and I really enjoyed it. Since AI is impacting this industry drastically, I can only imagine the magnitude of industries using AI currently. I thought it was so cool that AI was creating new receipts. I think AI is going to improve the quality of life for all people in so many ways. One that may be having a new delicious beer that had never existed before.
Hi Andy, awesome post to read! I’m definitely going to bring up this topic during my St. Patty’s celebrations at Cutters this Friday. The AI developed “ideal IPA” is fascinating and I wonder how the ML IPA fares in a taste testing contest by humans. The use of AI in the supply chain through using weather forecasts and crop yields will only improve brewing internal efficiency resulting in a better experience and taste for us as the consumers.
Hey Andy! This is such an informative post. You mentioned so many examples of various beer companies using AI to their benefit in places I didn’t even know they could! I knew that AI is heavily used in marketing practices, but I did not know that there are sensors that can detect “nuances and aromas of beer” and whether certain brewing equipment is functioning properly or not. I wonder if Creature Comforts has some of these cool AI practices in their brewery.
Great post. I never knew that AI could be used to improve the brewing process and create personalized beer experiences. It’s cool to see how companies like IntelligentX and Carlsberg are using AI algorithms to adjust their recipes and analyze the flavors of their beers.
Really cool post! Its crazy to think how Ai can really change almost any industry. It will be interesting to see how this technology can be implemented in other areas of the food and beverage industry. Very good timing of this post with St Paddys day coming up!
It is cool to actually see how AI can be applied to every single industry. There are so many ways that it can improve businesses and set them up for the future. The portion about supply chain management is especially big as we have seen this improvement be a big part of improving production.
This was actually a very interesting post and a good topic for AI. It was interesting how they used machine learning to make the MI IPA from the judging of beer festivals and the best and worst selling IPAs. Very good timing for the post and I think we should get our hands on some of these AI driven beers later in the week :)!
Hello Andy! This was a great post to read. I never knew that AI and brewing beers was thing so it was interesting to learn how this can be implemented to improve cost and efficiency. I wonder the impact this will have on the whole beverage industry and hope to try an AI beer one day.
Hi Andy, this was a great topic for your blog post! I find it very interesting to see how AI can reduce downtime and costs while increasing efficiency in the brewing industry. I understood how AI can help with marketing, but I didn’t consider how it can be used to improve production efficiency in brewing. I will definitely be watching to see how AI can continue to improve this industry in the future!
Hi Andy! This was a really interesting post! It was nice to learn more about an example where AI would interact with supply chain, and how predictive analysis is involved in this. I also liked the example you mentioned about AB InBev and how it relates to the environment. I think it’s important that as much as we develop technology, we should also focus on important issues like that. Great post!
Hey Andy, this was a great post! Anytime I enjoy when companies utilize AI to better target their consumers and the example about beer did just that. Although AI is expensive to invest in, the payoffs definitely pay off. As I start working after graduation, I’m excited to see what new business models go hand in hand with AI.
Hey Andy, such a great post this week! I have been to a couple of the breweries here in Athens and Suwannee. It’s always so interesting to see the ingredients and descriptions of the beers. The use of AI in the brew industry is interesting and I would love to see the combinations they will make in the future.
Hey Andy, great post! This is really interesting because everyone has different preferences when it comes to beer so I wonder what the Champion Brewing Company beer ended up tasting like and if people genuinely thought it was the best beer. I think it’s great that breweries are using AI to cut down on waste and increase efficiency during production. I also think it’s so cool that AI can be used to gather such specific data and give the best information about when and how to market beer to consumers.
If you haven’t read “So you want to start a brewery” by the founder of Lagunitas, it’s a great book! My cousin is a big homebrewer and hooked up a raspberry Pi to his fermentation chamber to better control temperature based on his analytics of a perfect fermentation process. Taking it to another level!
Hey Andy this was a great post and really did enjoy reading about this topic. I have been a bartender downtown for 3 years now, and reading about this really peaked my interest. I find with artificial intelligence it is limitless in the world we live in today. In 2023 we have collected enough data on almost any subject for AI to replicate and create its own version of the data given to it. I find it interesting that brewing beer is one of those topics and am looking forward to what other fields AI will have the upper hand against humans.