US plant-based milk total retail sales

As US plant-based milk sales have grown, the price of a pint of lager in the United Kingdom has risen with almost identical momentum, a transatlantic correlation of 0.995 that connects American oat milk to British beer with the effortless confidence of trends that have never met but look remarkably alike on a chart. The oat milk pours in Brooklyn, the pint pours in Birmingham, and the chart draws a line across the ocean without a passport.

Plant-based milk sales grew from about 1.2 billion to over 2.8 billion dollars between 2012 and 2022 in the US. UK pint prices rose from about £3.30 to over £4.60 during the same period. Both are smooth upward curves driven by inflation and consumer premiumization in their respective markets: Americans pay more for dairy alternatives, and Britons pay more for traditional pub beverages. The shared variable is global inflation and the rising cost of consumer goods in developed economies—the same economic forces pushing up oat milk prices in Whole Foods are pushing up lager prices in the pub.

Nine years of oat milk and lager prices is a transatlantic inflation story told through two beverages that have never been served at the same table. The milk is plant-based, the beer is grain-based, and the economic forces inflating both are identical. The prices rise because everything rises, and the correlation is simply two countries doing the same thing to their drinks. The barista pours, the bartender pours, and the wallet empties on both continents.