Six things that have consumers buzzing in the world of beer, wine and spirits this week:

1. Beer BBQ Sauce: Good beer and barbecue are great pairing. Yuengling, America's oldest brewery, is taking the combination one step further. The brewery is partnering with All-N-Food to introduce its own line of beer barbecue sauces made with Yuengling beer. According to Zagats.com, the "sauces are designed to complement Yuengling brews, and come in three different BBQ flavors and three hot sauce spice levels." Owner Dick Yuengling himself has tested and approved the sauces, which will roll out first in Penn., Ohio, N.C., S.C. and Va., before being available elsewhere on the East Coast.

Budweiser Black Crown will make its national television debut in a spot fit for a king.

The new Budweiser brand extension from Anheuser-Busch InBev will be appearing in the highly coveted "A1" spot in Super Bowl XLVII on Sunday, Feb. 3, making it the first commercial to air following kickoff.

The first commercial viewers will see is "Coronation," a thirty-second spot for Budweiser Black Crown directed by Samuel Bayer of Serial Pictures, who also directed Chrysler's Emmy-winning "Born of Fire" ad for the 2011 Super Bowl. The prime "A1" placement is a spot Anheuser-Busch has held since 1987.

In a beer industry overflowing with competition, it can be difficult for a brewer to stand out. But one Southern California-based brewery is hoping that brewing distinct beers grounded in its local roots will eventually bring its beer to faraway places.

"I started thinking: why is someone in Maine going to want to drink a Hangar 24 Pale Ale when there are 300 other breweries in that part of the country that are brewing pale ales?" said Ben Cook, the founder and head brewer of Hangar 24. "Then there is Orange Wheat. You can't copy that."

Orange Wheat, a year-round offering, sources all of its oranges from Southern California's Inland Empire. The beer's success inspired Hangar 24's Local Field Series, a seasonal rotation of brews that rely on ingredients Hangar 24 sources near its home base in Redlands, Calif.

"Sure you can buy oranges anywhere. But the story, the authenticity isn't there," Cook said. "I thought what if we create a whole series of beer that truly represented where we are located — beers that are rooted in our geography."

Next time you're at the mall, count the number of people paying with gift cards. Odds are you won't see many.

Retailers should be buzzing right now with holiday gift card redemptions. But, there's early evidence retailers aren't getting much of a boost from gift cards this year, according to NBG Market Analyst Brian Sozzi.

"Retailers had to ramp up discounts after the holidays. They typically don't do that if gift card sales are very strong," Sozzi said. "This could hit chain-store sales and impact the first-quarter outlook in 2013."

Can lightning strike twice for Anheuser-Busch InBev? The brewer is hoping a formula that worked so well last year can repeat itself in 2013.

Budweiser is rolling out Budweiser Crown Black to retailers on Jan. 21, in advance of a big promotional push that will include a thirty-second spot during Super Bowl XLVII on Sunday, Feb. 3.

One of the dominant themes of the 2012 holiday season was that it wasn't enough for brick-and-mortar retailers to honor the prices offered by their brick-and-mortar rivals, they also had to match online competitors like Amazon.com.

Target was one of the major retailers offering a holiday price-matching program, and Tuesday the discount retailer said its price-matching pledge won't end with the holiday season.

Although new boat sales had a hard landing during the recession, the boating industry has begun to recover. In 2012, sales recorded their first significant increase since the recession, rising an estimated 10 percent, according to the National Marine Manufacturers Association.

As the winter boat show season began in New York City on Jan. 3, manufacturers and dealers have reason to be optimistic because the NMMA forecasts that sales will rise another 5 percent to 10 percent in the current year. Dealers in the Northeast have also reported an increase in traffic in the aftermath of super storm Sandy's destruction as consumers begin their search for replacement boats.

Click ahead for highlights from this year's New York boat show.

By CNBC's Katie Little
Posted 7 January 2013

Fresh off the boating industry's first significant sales increase since the recession, dealers are seeing a boost in traffic in the aftermath of super storm Sandy's destruction as consumers begin their search for replacement boats.

"We had a rush right after Sandy because there were people who were actively starting to look to replace their boats even though they had not been actually called a totaled loss, but they anticipated that, so they started shopping early," said Dick Curry, a salesman at Staten Island Yacht Sales. "And we are feeling a surge of people making phone calls to replace their boats."

The flurry of Sandy-related traffic comes as the U.S. boating industry has finally started to see the tide turn for sales growth. Last year, sales grew an estimated 10 percent after a tepid three-point rise in 2011, according to the National Marine Manufacturers Association.

(Read more: Highlights From the 2013 New York Boat Show)

This increase follows a sharp decline in new boat sales during the recession when sales dropped by nearly half. Pre-owned boat sales fared better, resulting in only about a 15-percent sales drop during the period.

If you vowed to stop smoking in 2013, Big Tobacco won't be caught off guard. The industry is quickly moving into the manufacturing and sale of electronic cigarettes, a business which Bonnie Herzog at Wells Fargo said brought in $400 million to $500 million in sales in 2012 and will "at least" double in 2013.

"We're actually predicting that consumption of e-cigs could surpass consumption of traditional cigarettes in the next decade," she said.

In case you ever wondered, the hype around Black Friday bargains works.

For the third-straight year, consumer electronics sales faded in the later part of the holiday season as shoppers made purchases early in order to take advantage of heavily promoted Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales, according to market researcher NPD Group.

"The hyped-up promotion of Black Friday, Cyber Monday and now Thanksgiving Day has proven remarkably effective in moving sales into the early part of the holiday season," said Stephen Baker, vice president, industry analysis at NPD.