Consuming local: product, place, and experience in visitor reviews of urban Texas craft breweries.

As the craft beer industry has experienced significant growth around the world and particularly in the U.S., research into various aspects of the topic has grown as well. Significant attention has been given to the relationship between craft beer and neolocalism, resulting in three key themes: neolocalism as a driver of demand for the craft beer product, the use of place-based themes by craft brewers to engender neolocalism, and neolocalism as a driver of demand for the craft brewery experience. This paper seeks to examine the extent to which brewery visitors are consuming the local through the themes of product, place, and experience as discussed in the literature. It uses directed content analysis to examine online visitor reviews posted on TripAdvisor and RateBeer for microbreweries in the five largest urban areas in the U.S. state of Texas (Houston, San Antonio, Dallas, Austin, and Fort Worth). Findings show that both the craft beer product and craft brewery experience are significant to brewery visitors. In particular, the opportunity for meaningful social interaction in the brewery experience offers a means of fulfiling neolocal desires for establishing local connections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]