“”So you’ve got heritage beers, craft beers, in some cases very strange wacky new types of beer – those are all doing fine.”
“What is slowly but surely contracting, and has been for decades now, is the bright, shiny, frothy top, see-through lager market.””
Vehlin on
It’s pubs with tied cellars that are killing the industry. There are a raft of new bars near me and they all sell the exact same lineup of beer because they’ve sold their cellar to Heineken or ABInBev.
blisteringbluey on
You can have all the shiny new beers you like. Issue as I see it is the latest generation that simply don’t drink.
oldGuy1970 on
If you make products out of cheaper and cheaper materials, and only compare the output to last years production: things WILL enshitify.
Shockwavepulsar on
People are set in their ways with lager. People will say everything other than their preferred brands are horse piss.
On the crafty side there’s a decent variety within the confines of IPAs and to a lesser extent Stouts. But I’d love to try some stuff outside of that like some sour beers or something which tend to be few and far between.
vexatiousmonkey on
Who can actually afford to go out on the regular drinking pints?
BeardMonk1 on
Its a sign of the times. Its too expensive to go out and drink that regularly and also, many places are just churning out dross beers that are just not worth the price. Do we really need yet another vaguely citrusy drink that claims to be an IPA that has very little body and costs £7 for a scooner?
No_Peach2280 on
I wonder if ultimately this is an end stage failure of capitalism. The market becomes so saturated by so many brands that both the niche and mass markets of products end up becoming unviable. Wonder if we’ll see in our lifetimes a near convergence and only the leading products will be available.
ComfortableTackle479 on
ambition is a problem, instead of winning niche followers and stabilising at that level everyone aims at growth while market as a whole is not growing
jizzyjugsjohnson on
“Is it me? Charging nearly a tenner for a pint of Pisswater?”
“No. It’s the customers who are wrong”
Disillusioned_Pleb01 on
If only one didnt need a mortgage to go out to a pub for the evening.
NoBrother6430 on
£7 for a pint in the pub or about 60p if I get 20 cans for a tenner from the supermarket.
There is such a massive disconnect
BaBaFiCo on
The simple fact is that consumer demand for interesting, quality and independent beer exists.
But well over half of all lines in pubs are tied – either because they’re directly owned by a major brewery, because they’re owned by a PubCo who have an exclusivity contract with the brewery they used to be owned by, or because the publican has entered into an exclusivity contract via the cellar management service they use which are often owned by said breweries.
The government has initially recognised this was a problem and commissioned the Access to Market Review in the budget in Autumn 2024. This was report was finished months ago. But constant reshuffles and other priorities means it’s a well known fact it sits unactioned on the Minister’s desk.
Until the government recognises that majority breweries and PubCos are strangling the market, delivering the illusion of choice while maintaining a cartel control of prices, beer consumption will continue to go down as drinkers choice not to pay through the nose for macro slop.
Thingisby on
Craft beer prices have gone crackers. Saw £6.50 for a 440ml can of locally brewed stuff the other day. No-one in their right mind is paying that.
Ciderized on
I went in my closest “pub” on Friday, one that’s had a significant refit recently, “Sizzling Inns” I believe is the chain.
Little did I know what horrors awaited me when I saw the lineup on the taps. It did not make want to go back, yet I want to support local pubs.
36HertzMastering on
Pubs / Bars are putting themselves out of business these days with ridiculous mark ups on draft products
I run a very small scale specialist beer brewery and kegs of our beer go out the door to bars at a rough cost of around £3.20 to £3.50 per 1/3 pint (high strength beer is normally sold in 1/3)
Bars will then stick that on sale for around £10 for 1/3
Bottles go out for around £5.30 – out of the box and on the shelf / fridge for £13 a bottle
Bare in mind a huge whack of our beers cost price is duty to HMRC
Even i won’t go to the pub and drink our own beer for that price
Yes we have the whole argument of pubs / Bars have all these extra costs etc etc but it makes no difference when no one is buying the beer you put on sale as its too damn expensive
Lots of talk about cutting VAT to pubs to help – if they did the pubs would just pocket it and prices would not drop so that makes no difference
16 Comments
“”So you’ve got heritage beers, craft beers, in some cases very strange wacky new types of beer – those are all doing fine.”
“What is slowly but surely contracting, and has been for decades now, is the bright, shiny, frothy top, see-through lager market.””
It’s pubs with tied cellars that are killing the industry. There are a raft of new bars near me and they all sell the exact same lineup of beer because they’ve sold their cellar to Heineken or ABInBev.
You can have all the shiny new beers you like. Issue as I see it is the latest generation that simply don’t drink.
If you make products out of cheaper and cheaper materials, and only compare the output to last years production: things WILL enshitify.
People are set in their ways with lager. People will say everything other than their preferred brands are horse piss.
On the crafty side there’s a decent variety within the confines of IPAs and to a lesser extent Stouts. But I’d love to try some stuff outside of that like some sour beers or something which tend to be few and far between.
Who can actually afford to go out on the regular drinking pints?
Its a sign of the times. Its too expensive to go out and drink that regularly and also, many places are just churning out dross beers that are just not worth the price. Do we really need yet another vaguely citrusy drink that claims to be an IPA that has very little body and costs £7 for a scooner?
I wonder if ultimately this is an end stage failure of capitalism. The market becomes so saturated by so many brands that both the niche and mass markets of products end up becoming unviable. Wonder if we’ll see in our lifetimes a near convergence and only the leading products will be available.
ambition is a problem, instead of winning niche followers and stabilising at that level everyone aims at growth while market as a whole is not growing
“Is it me? Charging nearly a tenner for a pint of Pisswater?”
“No. It’s the customers who are wrong”
If only one didnt need a mortgage to go out to a pub for the evening.
£7 for a pint in the pub or about 60p if I get 20 cans for a tenner from the supermarket.
There is such a massive disconnect
The simple fact is that consumer demand for interesting, quality and independent beer exists.
But well over half of all lines in pubs are tied – either because they’re directly owned by a major brewery, because they’re owned by a PubCo who have an exclusivity contract with the brewery they used to be owned by, or because the publican has entered into an exclusivity contract via the cellar management service they use which are often owned by said breweries.
The government has initially recognised this was a problem and commissioned the Access to Market Review in the budget in Autumn 2024. This was report was finished months ago. But constant reshuffles and other priorities means it’s a well known fact it sits unactioned on the Minister’s desk.
Until the government recognises that majority breweries and PubCos are strangling the market, delivering the illusion of choice while maintaining a cartel control of prices, beer consumption will continue to go down as drinkers choice not to pay through the nose for macro slop.
Craft beer prices have gone crackers. Saw £6.50 for a 440ml can of locally brewed stuff the other day. No-one in their right mind is paying that.
I went in my closest “pub” on Friday, one that’s had a significant refit recently, “Sizzling Inns” I believe is the chain.
Little did I know what horrors awaited me when I saw the lineup on the taps. It did not make want to go back, yet I want to support local pubs.
Pubs / Bars are putting themselves out of business these days with ridiculous mark ups on draft products
I run a very small scale specialist beer brewery and kegs of our beer go out the door to bars at a rough cost of around £3.20 to £3.50 per 1/3 pint (high strength beer is normally sold in 1/3)
Bars will then stick that on sale for around £10 for 1/3
Bottles go out for around £5.30 – out of the box and on the shelf / fridge for £13 a bottle
Bare in mind a huge whack of our beers cost price is duty to HMRC
Even i won’t go to the pub and drink our own beer for that price
Yes we have the whole argument of pubs / Bars have all these extra costs etc etc but it makes no difference when no one is buying the beer you put on sale as its too damn expensive
Lots of talk about cutting VAT to pubs to help – if they did the pubs would just pocket it and prices would not drop so that makes no difference