Booker beer sales surge
Food and drink wholesaler Booker is now supplying over 18m pints of beer and cider to the on-trade a year.
Booker said it was selling around 350,000 pints a week — 4,000 kegs — as licensees use the wholesaler as an emergency top-up service at weekends and in the evenings.
"Customers can rely on Booker with availability of kegs over the summer months," said catering sales director Ron Hickey.
"Forecasting is very dependent on the weather, so Booker can help licensees when the sun shines or they receive an unexpected party booking.
"We are finding this is particularly helpful over the weekend, where customers can simply come in and top up or ring and reserve their keg order for collection."
Meanwhile, Booker has also refreshed its £2.99 value meal offer, which now include jacket potato with tuna and mayonnaise and salad, Ham, Eggs & Chips and Spaghetti Bolognese.
It suggests pubs could sell two meals for £5 and still make a 50% GP. Booker is also providing a free point of sale kit and 10 table cards by logging on to www.promoteyourpub.co.uk/booker.
"These meals change every eight weeks so consumers remain excited about them and publicans keep boasting their sales," said Hickey.
"They are traditional favourites and with a cost of no more than 91p per meal this is a fantastic opportunity to pubs to drive their sales of food. Any publican who would like to introduce the meals can contact their local Booker branch who will be happy to help."
