Ale brewers join forces to revitalise beer
Leading ale brewers have formed a think-tank dedicated to breathing new life into the declining cask market.
Called "Why Handpull?", the new group comprises seven brewers who will be pooling research and focus jointly on solutions to drive ale sales.
They are: Adnams, Caledonian, Charles Wells, Everards, Fullers, Greene King and Wolverhampton & Dudley.
Other brewers and interested groups will be encouraged to contribute to initiatives and a twice-yearly report.
Key objectives for Why Handpull? are to help licensees decide how many ales they should be selling, and over time "premiumise" ale in order to reduce the gap between ale and lager on-trade prices.
One initial but controversial proposal is to rename real ale as handpulled beer - a name that it's suggested means more to the general drinker than the often confusing terms ale or cask.
Research already carried out by Why Handpull demonstrates that by converting the nation's 1.5 million light "handpull" drinkers to slightly more regular handpull drinkers, £700 million of extra sales could be generated.
The group's credo is "to serve the hundreds of thousands of beer drinking consumers who believe handpulled beer is best - and to give these drinkers every reason to choose handpulled beer. And at the same time, we want landlords and pub owners to make a good return from selling handpulled beer."
Alistair Darby, managing director of WDB Brands, said: "Hundreds of thousands of people are passionate about classic British handpulled beers. It is up to us to look after them and to show a new generation of drinkers that there is something unique about enjoying a handpulled pint at your local pub."
John Roberts, managing director of Fullers Beer and Brands, added: "Great handpulled beer is quite simply one of the best drinks you can have. We want to share the vast diversity of handpulled beers with drinkers and ensure that every pint is sold in great condition to them."
Keith Bott, chairman of the small brewers organisation Siba, welcomed the new think tank and said he accepted that pubs must be realistic about how many handpulls they offer. But he added that for real improvement in cask quality, dispense equipment issues and over-lengthy supply chains must also be addressed.
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Your CommentsStuart Janes via email 06/06/2006"We have just had a weekend real ale and wine festival with 9 ales including Greene King, Adnams, Charles Wells and others as mentioned in your article.
The response from the general publ;ic has been fantastic-people love GOOD real ale served well. We have even challenged entrenched lager drinkers who enjoyed with surprise-Charles Wells-Summer Solstice. The beers available are a treasure that people do enjoy exploring, they just need a bit of a nudge to try them! "Handpull beer" could be a useful marketing ploy to beter describe this wonderful product. stuart Janes, General Manager, The Kings Head Hotel, Beccles, Suffolk"
John Ellis via email 06/06/2006"I'd give this a cautious welcome. It's good to have brewers trying to get more people to drink real ale but it's only a few years since some brewers were using fake handpulls to sell keg beer, so consider carefully. Also, let's not lose CASK Marque and initiatives such as Ask If It's CASK.
I'm also worried about the "Premiumisation" of Real Ale, especially from some who were recently bleating about small brewers "offering as much as £45/barrel discount" and then posting record profits! I'd rather continue to sell good ale to a full pub at £1.90/pint than charge £2.40 to a handfull of customers."
Hugh Madgin via email 06/06/2006"What's wrong with 'Draught'? It always was 'draught beer' before CAMRA came along, and to myself and most people I know, always will be. Granted, the marketing names of some keg beers (notably Draught Guinness and Miller Genuine Draft) can be a source of confusion, but nothing else describes the UK's national style of non-packaged beer quite so aptly.
Although the term 'real ale' was a great idea 35 years or so ago, when draught beer was on the way out, its sell-by date has long ago been passed, and today the term 'real ale' brings with it a whiff of the 1970s, Morris dancing and beards. However well-intentioned, the words 'I'll have a real ale please, landlord' have a cadence to them, which will never help to dispel the myth amongst non-draught beer drinkers that the real stuff is nerdy, old-fashioned rubbish.
I don't think the term 'hand-pulled' will get the cause of draught beer very far either, for a start it has one rather unfortunate connotation (! - see the 'Real Ale Twats' in Viz), and there are other forms of dispense - the traditional tap straight from the cask, as still to be seen in some country pubs, and (although increasingly rare) by electric pump.
As for the tendency for some areas of the trade to refer to draught beers as 'ales' or the 'ale sector', this is a little off-target too. Surely ales were the old brews of history before hops were introduced to this country - to describe beers which are very often well-hopped Burton style bitters in this way always makes me wince slightly.
Maybe the word 'real' should be used in tandem with 'draught' occasionally to ram the message home, but alongside such 'fake half-timbered' terms as 'cask' and 'hand-pulled', there can be no substitute for the real thing - Draught Beer.
Hugh Madgin, Stevenage
