Producer
Yakima Chief Hops
Largest US hop merchant and grower-owned cooperative; sources and distributes hops from Yakima Valley (75% of US acreage) and international origins; major supplier to craft breweries; also involved in hop breeding/development of proprietary varieties
1
Inputs supplied
1
Goods downstream
1
Facilities
0
Stories
What they make
1 input Yakima Chief Hops supplies
Click an input to see every good that depends on it, every country that produces it, and every other company in the supply chain.
Where it shows up
Goods downstream
Essential goods that depend on something Yakima Chief Hops makes — pick one to see the full supply chain.
What else they do
Business segments
The company's full revenue map — where this supply-chain role fits within their broader business.
Pellet and Whole Cone Hops
60%CO2 Hop Extract
20%Proprietary Varieties + Breeding
15%Pharmaceutical + Functional
5%
Intelligence
What's known
Sourced claims about this company's role in supply chains — chokepoints, concentration, incidents, dual-use connections.
Did you know2023
Yakima Chief Hops controls the intellectual property for Citra and Mosaic hop varieties — the two varieties that defined the American craft IPA revolution of 2010-2025 and together represent roughly half of all US craft hop demand. Citra hops were developed through the Hop Breeding Company (a joint venture between YCH and John I. Haas, another hop merchant) and trademarked; growers must be licensed to cultivate them and pay royalties on harvest. Any craft brewery wanting Citra hops must source from YCH-licensed growers or authorized distributors. The same pattern applies to Mosaic, Galaxy (Australian), and other proprietary varieties. This means the IP of craft beer flavor — the reason millions of Americans drink IPAs — is effectively held by two US hop merchants. A trademark dispute, a cooperative dissolution, or a refusal to license to foreign growers could interrupt a significant fraction of craft beer production globally. The most commercially important agricultural crop IP in American craft brewing is held by a cooperative in Yakima, Washington that most beer drinkers have never heard of.
Yakima Chief Hops ↗