The Boston Beer Company, Inc. (NYSE: SAM) has retained its niche in the market, driven by its progress on its Beyond Beer strategy, the premiumization of the beer industry and robust trends for its twisted tea brand. Additionally, the company's innovation, intensified attention to pricing and product portfolio expansion efforts bode well. SAM is on track with the expansion of its Beyond Beer category, which includes exploring categories other than beer. Beyond Beer is growing faster than the traditional beer market, and the company expects this trend to continue for several years. SAM's advancement in the non-beer categories, including ciders and hard seltzer, as well as brand-building efforts, is expected to fortify its position in the market. Boston Beer is on track with growth of its Beyond Beer category, wherein it currently holds the second position. The company expects the trend to continue for the next several years. However, weak depletions, along with continued challenges in the hard seltzer category, acted as deterrents. The slowed consumer demand for hard seltzers has been hurting the company's performance, with marked declines noted for the Truly brand in recent quarters. Consequently, shares of the Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) company have lost 17.2% in the year-to-date period compared with the industry's decline of 11.5%. SAM also compared unfavorably with the Consumer Staples sector's growth of 0.7% and the S&P 500's improvement of 7.6% in a year. Image Source: Zacks Investment Research Other Strategies in Focus Boston Beer's pricing, product innovation and growth of ...