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Smaller Brewers Relied on RateBeer.com. Now Bud’s Maker Owns a Stake.

Shane Welch, the founder of Sixpoint Brewery in Brooklyn, asked that RateBeer.com remove the reviews and ratings of Sixpoint’s beers from its website.Credit...Harrison Hill/The New York Times

From the rooftop patio of his growing brewery in the southwestern elbow of Brooklyn, Shane C. Welch, the founder and “chief visionary” of Sixpoint Brewery, appeared to have staked a nice corner of an intensely competitive beer market.

But the constant worry of being crowded out by the big brands, like Anheuser-Busch InBev, the world’s largest brewer, intensified this month when it was revealed that ZX Ventures, an incubator operated by A.B.I., had purchased a minority stake in a popular beer review website, RateBeer.com.

For smaller breweries like Sixpoint, RateBeer had become an invaluable barometer for the marketability of their products, reaching a global audience of like-minded enthusiasts. There they could promote new items or events, follow trends and interact with customers in forums.

Now, Mr. Welch worries that the playing field has shifted.

“It purports to be an objective, consumer-driven site,” Mr. Welch said. “But there is a massive conflict of interest.”

Mr. Welch joined Sam Calagione, the founder and president of the Dogfish Head brewery in Delaware, in asking that RateBeer promptly remove the reviews and ratings of their beers from its website. As of Friday, RateBeer had not complied.

Their concerns, echoed by other independent brewers, ranged from whether individual ratings will truly be independent, to the potential for favoritism in the placement of reviews on the site, to the lack of transparency about the deal, which was consummated in October but was only recently made public.

In a telephone interview, Pedro Earp, the chief disruptive growth officer for ZX Ventures, insisted that RateBeer would maintain its independence, recognizing that “the whole success is going to depend on the credibility of the platform.”

As far as transparency, Mr. Earp said ZX Ventures typically did not disclose its investments.

“In hindsight, we should have anticipated the controversy around that acquisition,” he said. “We should have been more upfront in addressing that concern.”

A Pew Research Center survey in December found that 82 percent of adults read online customer ratings or reviews before purchasing a product for the first time. Yakov Bart, assistant professor of marketing at Northeastern University, said the platforms that provide these reviews had exploded in influence for businesses.

“It’s better than advertising,” Dr. Bart said. “Not only is it free, but consumers trust it more than regular communications coming from firms or businesses.”

But he added, “One can have doubts whether consumers are going to trust the platform after they realize it’s been acquired by a large brand.”

The lack of transparency could become problematic for A.B.I. if it does not quickly address its ownership arrangement so consumers can recognize it, said Marc Edelman, a professor of law at Baruch College’s School of Business.

“One could make a reasonable argument that failing to disclose that information might constitute some form of misrepresentation,” Mr. Edelman said.

He added, though, that Sixpoint and Dogfish Head would have a hard time forcing RateBeer to remove its reviews until they could prove that their products were somehow being wronged.

When reached by phone, Mr. Calagione said his unease had to be viewed in context. Last fall, A.B.I., which owns Budweiser, Corona and Stella Artois, among hundreds of other labels, bought Northern Brewer, one of the largest home-brewing supply businesses. More recently, A.B.I. added its 10th craft brewery, Wicked Weed, to its portfolio, in the same month it was reported that it might be squeezing out other breweries from access to hop farms in South Africa. (A.B.I. said the issue had more to do with low hop yields in the country this year.)

Now, with the RateBeer purchase, competitors say they worry that A.B.I. could potentially have access to customer data, which could give it a competitive advantage. However, it is unclear whether A.B.I. will have access to the site’s data.

Joe Tucker, the site’s executive director, said in an email that the site was an open platform and that it could not simply remove certain beers or breweries from review.

“RateBeer’s community is derived of beer lovers who appreciate the service we offer,” Mr. Tucker said. “Nothing about this investment changes who we are and what we provide. We will just be able to give our community of beer drinkers an even better experience.”

Still, when Mr. Calagione’s vice president of marketing, Neal Stewart, posted a statement on the Dogfish Head page on RateBeer explaining why the company wanted its reviews removed from the site, the statement was deleted the next day.

Mr. Tucker first chalked it up to a misunderstanding, owing to vandalism that the site had experienced in recent days.

“Our solution was to temporarily remove editing powers to brewers and restore all pages affected,” he said. “It wasn’t our intention to limit Dogfish Head’s ability to communicate freely with our audience.”

Later, however, Mr. Tucker sent another email altering his explanation.

“The brewery pages are not the place for this discussion,” he wrote, “and per our terms of use, the message was removed.”

Dan Kenary, the founder and chief executive of Harpoon Brewery, has also been critical of RateBeer’s new ownership situation. His main concern is that A.B.I. could pressure RateBeer to put its products front and center on the site, influencing a browser in the beer aisle who pulls out a phone to check reviews.

“They could do it in ways that consumers wouldn’t even know how their decisions are being influenced,” Mr. Kenary said. “It’s all about transparency and authenticity — show enough respect to consumers to disclose this information.”

Like Mr. Calagione, he has taken stock of the industry landscape and believes it is important to speak out.

“If we don’t do it, nobody else is going to do it,” Mr. Kenary said. “This market that is incredibly fun and vibrant, where we’ve seen 5,300 breweries sprout up across the country, is at some risk. Over time, because of these big breweries’ size and control of distribution, you will see choice starting to go away. That is what we’re fighting for.”

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section B, Page 5 of the New York edition with the headline: Small Brewers See Conflict In Review Site. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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