Drinkers still not keeping count on alcohol consumption

12-Dec-2013 - Last updated on 12-Dec-2013 at 12:32 GMT

Related tags Alcohol consumption Drinking culture

Zolfo Cooper partner Paul Hemming: 'If the government is to make progress in this area then a new approach is required'

Government and health bodies’ attempts to persuade consumers to think about how many alcohol units they are consuming appear to be failing, with the vast majority of UK adults admitting that they don’t keep track, according to new consumer research.

According to a study of over 2,000 adults in the UK, by leading independent advisory and restructuring services provider Zolfo Cooper, 71% of respondents said that they did not keep track of the number of units of alcohol consumed each week.

Men were less likely to keep track of units than women, while the over 55 age group were the most likely to ‘unit count’ (27%). Only 14% of the 18-34 year old age bracket said they kept track of the units of alcohol they had consumed over a week, the corporate advisory firm found.

New approach 'is required'

“In the face of binge-drinking headlines plus significant investment by government and the alcohol industry, the stark reality is that the majority of UK consumers show no interest in tracking their alcohol consumption,” said Paul Hemming, Partner at Zolfo Cooper.

“If the government is to make progress in this area then a new approach is required to bring home the impact our heavy drinking culture often has on people’s health, wealth and happiness.”

Discounted offers

While consumers appear not to bother with counting units, they certainly seem to care about cut-price alcohol offers: when asked in the same survey if ‘supermarkets should be prevented from discounting the price of alcohol as a means of attracting customers to their stores’, respondents voted overwhelmingly against. The majority, 61%, disagreed with measures to prevent supermarkets from selling heavily-discounted alcohol, while 59% were also against the government’s recently-abandoned effort to set a national minimum price per unit of alcohol.

The minimum price policy received the most support among consumers in London and Northern Ireland (36% each).