College Football: Beer Sales Are Bigger in Texas

Longhorns fans are No. 1 in a Wall Street Journal analysis of beer sales in college football

Source: WSJ

By BEN COHEN

Jan. 8, 2017

Texas’s football team isn’t playing for the national title on Monday. But the Longhorns fans already proved this season they’re elite at something else: drinking an enormous amount of beer.

In their six home football games, Texas fans drank 104,106 bottles of Miller Lite alone. They also required 99,865 Coors Lights, 38,174 Bud Lights and 35,629 Blue Moons-but only 89 cans of Budweiser. By the end of the season, Texas had sold $5.26 in alcohol for every fan in attendance.

That was the highest booze-per-capita in the country, according to a Wall Street Journal audit of beer sales in college football. This analysis was based on data obtained through open-record requests of the public schools that offer alcohol in their campus stadiums.

It revealed that most fans are like Texas’s: They want the lightest and cheapest beer they can buy. The most popular beer in this survey was Miller Lite, which beat Coors Light and Bud Light for the title. But all three brands sold more than 100,000 individual units at the schools that provided the Journal with sufficient data. And all three obliterated heavier beers like Budweiser and Coors.

For all the similar tastes of fans across the country, the sport’s drinking habits also reflects the regional quirks that defines college football.

Houston fans prefer cabernet to chardonnay. West Virginia fans like to support a local business better known as Yuengling. They also down a surprising amount of Mike’s Hard Lemonade. Texas fans may be peerless in total beer sales, but not when it comes to certain beers. Their total attendance outnumbered North Texas fans by more than 400,000 people, and yet North Texas fans still drank more Shiner Bocks.

That’s because Texas crowds had dozens of domestic bottled beers, draft beers and craft beers at their disposal. No school earned as much beer money as Texas, whose sales were first reported by the Austin American-Statesman. Texas fans splurged more than $2.8 million this year alone on more than 335,000 beers. They also spent $141,000 on liquor and $128,000 in wine-and that was after their elaborate tailgates.

To be sure, there are some limitations to the Journal’s beer study. Among the schools that are still compiling the relevant data are potential drinking heavyweights like Ohio State, Minnesota and Colorado. Also missing are the schools that don’t track beer sales-because they don’t sell beer. That includes every Southeastern Conference school, which every SEC fan already knew.

But some are so meticulous about their beer stats that they record the exact number of cans and bottles consumed at every game. Which is how we know that fans at West Virginia vs. Oklahoma this season bought thousands of Miller Lites and Michelob Ultras. And hundreds of Fat Tires and Leinenkugels. And one lonely Devil’s Backbone Vienna Lager.