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Beer (not craft beer) thread

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Gibbo

Ron Walden (29)
CUB bought Bluetongue purely to shut it down as it was competing with its products. Capitalism at its finest.
 

Lindommer

Steve Williams (59)
Staff member
Those of us with long memories would recall Tooheys doing exactly the same thing with Millers in the 60s. About the same time Tooth's bought Courage in Melbourne before it was swallowed up by CUB in 1983. The sad thing about these so-called "consolidations" is they denied the beer consumer choice. And that's why we've revolted and grasped the modern craft beers with both hands.
 

boyo

Mark Ella (57)
Who owns your beer?
Lion, Foster’s, Coca-Cola, Woolworths and Coles are all muscling in on the craft beer business.
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Brewery beer battle
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Until recently, the last time Aussies consumed less than 100 litres of beer a year, World War Two had just ended. But while we’re drinking less beer, we’re getting better at it. Our demand for quality is higher than ever with a record 150 breweries now producing craft beer.
  • Is your favourite craft beer Aussie owned?
Homebrewed craft beer
The definition of craft beer depends on who you ask. Chuck Hahn’s Hahn Premium arguably began the current craft beer boom in the late 1980s before he was bought out by Lion Nathan (now Lion). The Hahn brewery was then renamed the Malt Shovel Brewery which today produces Australia’s biggest selling craft beer James Squire.
Crediting the large brewers with nurturing the craft beer industry, Hahn argues craft beer has several definitions.
“Part of it is delivering on flavour that people expect and having the credibility of a brewmaster behind it who identifies with brands and controls all stages of the process," he says.
But the Australian Real Craft Brewers Association disagrees. For them, a craft beer must be independent, traditional, and 100% Australian owned with no ownership or control by a major brewer, such as Lion.
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Last year’s Australian brewer of the year Shawn Sherlock of Murray’s Craft Brewing Co, also lists independence, as well as a smaller batch size, allowing more control of the brewing process, as key characteristics of a craft beer. But he contradicts Hahn reluctantly.
“Chuck has done so much for the industry, it’s difficult to criticise him.”
Sherlock is also quick to point out that American craft beers such as Sierra Nevada and Dog Tooth are now large breweries with a bigger market share in the US than Coopers have here, “but you can’t not see these as craft beers”.
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Brewery swill
Breweries swallow each other almost as often as we swallow a brew. An IBISWorld report says the Australian brewing industry is still one of the most profitable in the world, making it attractive to multinationals.
Japanese brewer Kirin acquired Lion in 2009 and the world’s second largest brewer SABMiller engulfed Foster's (now CUB) in 2011, leaving Coopers as the largest Australian brewer with a 3.5% market share. And Lion and CUB have been busy gulping craft breweries, most recently with Lion’s acquisition of Little World Beverages, brewers of Little Creatures.
In 2012 Coca-Cola Amatil sold its local alcohol arm to CUB and stayed out of the market until December 2013 as part of the deal. But it wasted no time in re-entering the market, securing rights to a range of international craft beers and forming the Australian Beer Company to produce locally brewed craft beers.
Even the supermarkets are in on the game, Woolworths owns a 25% stake in Gage Roads, which produce private label beer for Woolworths Liquor such as the craft-branded Sail & Anchor while Coles offers its own private label beer, Steamrail Ale.
Beer pong
Sherlock told CHOICE the better margins on tap beer can help grow a business and make it successful. Murray’s pays
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$32 in excise tax per litre of pure alcohol on the keg compared to $45 for the bottle. Add to that the extra packaging costs and it’s clear tap beer is where the war is won.
However the ACCC launched an investigation into the industry this year querying shady practices in the breweries contracts with pubs.
Most publicans have contracts with the major brewers which commonly offer kickbacks such as rebates or installation and maintenance of lines and taps by the brewery. So the battlefield shrinks to one or two leftover taps known as ‘floating taps’ which the pubs use for craft brews.
But the common experience is that a big brewer sales rep notices an independent craft beer on the floating taps and, several new umbrellas for the beer garden later, the independent’s beer has been bumped off the tap in favour of the big brewer’s craft beer line.
Smaller breweries can’t compete with these services. The best they can offer the publican is the beer at keg price but Sherlock says the beer is winning the war.
“It used to be that craft brewers could only hold a tap for one to two weeks but now we’re able to access and hold the taps better than ever,” he says,“As long as the public understands that some of the craft brands they are consuming are big brewery brands, that’s all that matters. Let the beer stand up in the glass for itself.”
 

Hugh Jarse

Rocky Elsom (76)
Staff member
Good article.

I don't have too much issue with the big boys buying up the craft brands if they keep the recipes going, and are not doing it to shut the brewery/recipe down like appears about to happen to Bluetongue.
 

Lindommer

Steve Williams (59)
Staff member
ONLY $20,000? :mad: These bastards have been deceiving customers for years calling their industrial muck beer! Having worked for one of the two major Australian brewing groups I can tell you they both brew their beers down to a price, THAT'S why their mainstream brands taste like crap.

I'll tell you about it one day, over a decent beer. ;)
 

Lindommer

Steve Williams (59)
Staff member
The Inner West Chapter of the Sydney Twitchers Club noted the black-beaked, blue-banded, bare-breasted barmaid hasn't been seen for some time, the last reported sighting was in Stanmore about 2010. Last Saturday night NtA and I sallied forth to the Oxford Tavern, field glasses and notebooks at the ready, eyes peeled. Despite close examination, and many enquiries, there were no specimens of the rare bird to be found. Some of the regulars opined this beauty might be extinct, sad if that's the case. :(

Whatever the new owners have done to this seedy old pub certainly seems to be working, it was chockers with young people enjoying themselves including a couple of delightful young lasses decked out in Tahs gear. Not a derro, desperate perve or bogan was encountered. Some decent beers on tap (Young Henry's brewery's just down the road in Enmore), music not too loud, those present reckoned the food was good. Must make a return visit when it's not so busy. ;)
 

Hugh Jarse

Rocky Elsom (76)
Staff member
Pretty sure that the Illinois Hotel on Parramatta Road in Five Dock still advertises events that would get the Inner West Chapter of the Sydney Twitchers Club salivating at the prospect of sighting an endangered species.
 

Lindommer

Steve Williams (59)
Staff member
Prospect Hotel Motel has a jelly wrestling sign up on the Great Western Highway, but you'll need a cut lunch, a compass and a camel to get to Prospect, Bh.
 
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