The Morning Advertiser visited the London Wine Fair/BrewLDN/Signature Serve event at Kensington Olympia, which ran from 18-20 May this week to find out the trends a few of the beer and cider producers are seeing now – and what they expect to see in the next 12 months.
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Attic Brew Co sales & marketing director Oliver Hurlow says he is seeing low & no becoming more popular and cask ale staging a resurgence.
“We are certainly seeing lower strength beer become more popular and there’s been a real resurgence of cask beer,” he states.
“We’re seeing some really good success with cask beer and that tends to be more traditional in style. I feel like there’s a bit more of a return to clear beer.”
The buzz for lower strength beer is coming from people looking for a “full experience” when they go out to the pub. “They’re now looking for a broader experience that encompasses good beer as well.”
He suggested fruit beer seems to be “a booming market” but, although the south Birmingham-based brewer makes Harper – an Apricot Pale, Hurlow says the style is not playing into its key plans for the future.
Gravity Theory Cider founder David Bridge-Collyns says its Hazy Pineapple 3.4% ABV cider is “flying” currently.
The business, which was named after Isaac Newton’s theory of gravity – the connection being both Bridge-Collyns and Newton studied at The King’s School in Grantham, Lincolnshire – was pouring its original apple cider at 4.5% ABV and Berry Cherry at 3.4% along with Hazy Pineapple.
Bridge-Collyns says: “You’ve just got the name ‘hazy’ in it and everyone loves it. The Hazy Pineapple is very tropical and naturally sweet. It would be very easy for me to say ‘I’m going to do a peach cider’ because a lot of big brewers are doing it but I don’t want to go with the flow.”
He adds there are hazy is, of course, a really popular beer style and “people are going to be looking for more interesting flavours”.
“It’s always ‘what is the next flavour? Is it grapefruit? Is it lychee?’ You’ve got to do a cider that stands out, a flavour that stands out and pineapple cider is very different.”
Tongham-based Hogs Back brewery was serving eight varieties on its stand, the most of any in the beer and cider BrewLDN area.
Gina Fletcher, head of sales, for the beer producer on the border of Surrey and Hampshire, confirms cask is king in trends currently.
“We’re seeing a resurgence in best bitter on cask but we’re being asked for cask innovation alongside those traditional styles.
“People are asking for milds, stouts, best bitters and those traditional styles that are standing the test of time. We’re seeing they sell well.
“If you’re doing something like a traditional beer, if you’re doing it well and consistently, people are coming back and asking for it.”
Among its offering at the event, Hogs Back Brewery was pouring its best-selling T.E.A. beer at 4.2% ABV in keg, which is a rarity because it is always made for cask only.
On trends in the next 12 months, Fletcher staes: “Milds are going to go mad, fruit beers are going to continue on an upwards curvature and most breweries are looking towards vegan and gluten-free options in cask as well.”
Chance Clean Cider founder John Logue is putting low & no cider’s success down to big beer companies that are paving the way for smaller businesses and the cider category.
Logue says: “The biggest thing for us is that the growth of non-alcohol cider has been driven by beer. The big boys did their ‘zeros’ and that gave confidence to consumers that it didn’t taste like Kaliber – and it was better.
“Customers thought ‘OK, we can see this moving and that’s where Days, Athletic, Lucky Saint all came in.”
Chance, which works with Aston Manor cider-makers to create its 0.5% ABV cider at its Stourport site in Worcestershire, hoped the trend would work its way over to cider.
Logue continues: “The fastest growing non-alcohol brand is Thatchers Zero and once that gets stronger, the category and customers will ask ‘OK, well what’s next? Where’s the dedicated cider? And it’s the same in spirits, wines and foods. Next, will be supermarkets testing it with their ‘own label’ when it gets big enough.”
He predicts there will be more innovation in the cider category as there is already in beer and spirits where we are see more ‘functional’ aspects coming in – whether be in the form of mood enhancers or recovery salts, there’s lots of opportunities just waiting.
