Cask Marque launches cellar audits for pubs
Shock research from Cask Marque showing that huge numbers of licensees are failing to maintain their cellars correctly has prompted the beer assessor to launch a new service for pubs.
A survey of 200 pubs suggests large numbers are seeing beer fobbing at the bar, counting the costs of increased wastage and calling out technical services unnecessarily as a result of failing to look after their cellars.
The body is now offering a new cellar audit to pubs when its team are carrying out Cask Marque assessments, at a rate of £20+VAT. Managed pub giant Mitchells & Butlers has already taken up the service, with cellar audits now due to be carried out in every one of its pubs that sells cask.
Cask Marque director Paul Nunny said its assessors began carrying out cellar audits over the summer to help determine the scale of the issue.
"We've got a lot of work to do," he said. "We're constantly preaching that you need the Cask Marque qualification so prove you know what you are doing at the bar - people need to ensure that they know what they are doing in the cellar too.
"It's also an educational thing, we'll be showing the licensee what they can do to maximise their profitability in a 10-minute check every week, instead of waiting for an inspection once a year."
The pubs surveyed were from a mix of tenanted and leased, freetrade and managed sites, and were taken from across England, Scotland and Wales.
What the Cask Marque assessors found
• 1 out of 3 cellars are either too cold or too hot - correct temperature should be 11 to 13 DEGREES C
• 1 out of 5 gas cylinders are unsecured - suggesting serious health and safety issues
• 1 out of 4 pubs either do not have an ale python, or have one which is not working properly - making it impossible to guarantee beer temperature
• 1 out of three pubs do not have properly insulated beer engines
• 1 out of 4 pubs have dirty beer lines/fob detectors or keg head connectors - suggesting beer lines are not being cleaned every seven days
