GBBF preview: Being Champion Beer of Britain
Being Champion Beer of Britain is an honour but the winner should be ready to deal with the resulting demand.
The first beer to sell out at this year's Great British Beer Festival will in all probability be the Champion Beer of Britain (CBOB). Finalists for the competition, nominated by CAMRA members around the country, are judged by panels of experts throughout the Tuesday morning and the winners of each category, plus the supreme champion, are announced during the trade session that afternoon.
The brewer of the supreme champion can expect plenty of attention. Last year Harviestoun's Ken and Ingrid Brooker were leaving the stage after collecting the prize for Bitter & Twisted when Ingrid had a call on her mobile. It was London brewer Fuller's ordering 80 firkins for its pub estate.
In common with other small brewers which have won the award the glory was tempered by the fact that it was impossible to satisfy the customers that continued to batter at the door of the Scottish brewery over the following weeks.
Fuller's got what it wanted because it shipped up its own containers - Harviestoun certainly didn't have enough. Other customers weren't so lucky.
"We brewed our socks off to keep up with demand - but we failed," says Ken. "I believe that the Champion Beer of Britain is the pinnacle. The beer is chosen by drinkers on the basis of consistent performance over a year. The problem - if it is a problem - is that we were already brewing to capacity so we couldn't take full advantage in terms of sales."
Ironically, Harviestoun moved into a new brewhouse in April, and has increased its capacity five-fold.
Lancashire brewer Moorhouse's experienced the pain of winning when its Black Cat mild won supreme champion in 2000. Its effort to satisfy demand for the winner actually hit production of other, normally better-selling, beers in its portfolio and indirectly led the brewer to review its whole marketing strategy.
On the positive side, winning the CBOB enabled a dark beer to succeed in a light beer marketplace, but general manager David Grant has a warning for any small brewer which might take the title this year.
"Watch out," he says. "As soon as it is announced you will come under pressure, on your equipment, your raw materials, your ability to make deliveries beyond your usual trading area. Your costs will rise.
"Moorhouse's has been through the pain. It cost us volumes in our better-selling brands. But it also meant that we took a longer term view of what we wanted to achieve."
After struggling for a year or two, Moorhouse's got back on track and has doubled its turnover and the capacity of the brewery thanks to a more controlled and manageable expansion. Its beers were rebranded and promoted systematically to the trade and distribution was improved following a deal with wholesaler The Beer Seller.
For other winners of CBOB supreme champion, however, the happy ending comes along sooner. Caledonian, which took the title in 2002, was already of regional brewer size and was able to satisfy the increased demand.
The result has been phenomenal growth for Deuchars IPA over the past two years and is now pretty well a national brand, breaking into The Publican's Top 200 brands chart this year.
Pictured: Ken and Ingrid Brooker celebrate Bitter & Twisted's win at last year's show.
