Rooney Anand, formerly with cake giant Sara Lee, is the new managing director for Greene King's brands. Ben McFarland met him in Suffolk
Some time ago I was informed by a normally reliable source that the company which owns Mr Kipling, maker of exceedingly good cakes, was until recently the proud owner of the American company Smith and Wesson Guns, purveyors of exceedingly deadly automatic firearms.
As useless conversational gambits go, this was a pretty good one. Not as good as the claim that a duck's quack doesn't echo, but nevertheless a good one.
However, efforts to propagate this fairly banal bit of trivia had been repeatedly dismissed out of hand by friends and colleagues as "rubbish," "balderdash" and other uncultured responses.
So imagine the overwhelming sense of vindication and smugness when Rooney Anand, the new managing director of Greene King's brands and brewing division, confirmed that the buns and guns connection was indeed true!
Following my own investigations he's not pulling my leg. The 37-year-old from Walsall is a man who knows his profiteroles from his pastries having joined the Suffolk brewer from cake conglomerate Sara Lee Bakery UK at the beginning of August. It was a time when Greene King was in the throws of a tumultuous brouhaha with CAMRA - a situation Koffi Annan, never mind Rooney Anand, would hardly relish!
Aside from this controversial episode, the jump from cake to cask was, according to Rooney, an easy one.
Rooney's formative years were spent as a Black Sheep follower and his commitment to traditional beer has remained steadfast ever since, save a brief conversion to the fizzy side during his student days at the University of Bristol - the city which is also home to Smiles Brewery.
"I couldn't get used to Smiles beers! I was used to a nice creamy head and it was just too floral for me. I'm afraid I turned to lager, but then that's what students tend to drink."
At Greene King's first photoshoot Rooney admitted feeling considerably more comfortable posing with a nice pint of beer than with a slice of chocolate cake in his hand. "Well, it's more masculine isn't it," he said. But surely in an ideal world you'd have both?
"No, not chocolate cake," he said. "Perhaps a bit of cheese or a pork pie, but not chocolate cake".
It's clear that this "no frills" approach to beer is both a personal and professional one. In what must be a first for a "marketing" man, Rooney has no plans for any sweeping changes or drastic measures having inherited a strong portfolio of ale brands that are performing extremely well in a sector that continues to struggle.
What Rooney brings to the party, as it were, is a strong background in retail and a vision of how to sell and shout about brands - something that regional brewers rarely number as one of their strong points.
"We've got four fabulous beers driving the business and we need to maintain the momentum of last year and continue to concentrate on growing the core brands," he said.
These core brands, or "fab four" as Rooney calls them, are JD Wetherspoon boss Tim Martin's favourite Abbot Ale, IPA, and the former Morland contingent, Old Speckled Hen and Ruddles County.
No doubt to the chagrin of CAMRA members, sales of Old Speckled Hen have continued to rise since its switch from Morland and it is now the number two premium bottled ale in London.
"If lager is a lad then Old Speckled Hen is about being a cad," Rooney said, finally giving in to marketing sound bites. "It's a strong humorous brand and Greene King recognised that when it brought the entire team over from Morland. We're not so arrogant as to completely change something that obviously works."
The same could not be said for Ruddles. Before Greene King's acquisition of the brand, it had been regarded as a bit of a hot potato and had suffered from a long list of negligent owners including Dutch brewer Grolsch.
However, when Greene King relaunched Ruddles earlier this year with a lower ABV of 4.3 per cent, it marked Greene King's first foray into the mid-gravity market and meant that the Suffolk-based brewer could finally compete in every category of the cask ale sector.
"We aim to restore Ruddles to its former glory," vowed Rooney. "It's a brand that has a huge tradition and since the relaunch it has been gaining listings and better distribution all the time."
Since the repositioning, Greene King showed its commitment to the Ruddles brand by expanding it with the launch of two new bottled beers, Ruddles Wheat and Ruddles Organic, into the take-home sector.
However, a decision has been made to restrict their availability to within Greene King's own estate, although a cask version of the Ruddles Wheat beer will soon be available as a short-term guest brand.
But rather than launch these brands into the on-trade, at a time when both wheat and organic beers are in vogue, Rooney insists the core four must take precedence.
"It's a short-term solution to say 'hey, look, there's a thermal let's jump on it!' It's more a case of concentrating on the things we know we do best and make sure that the right brands are in the right places. We realise marketing is an important element but we're by no means driven by it," said Rooney.
Rooney criticised as misleading a recent article in the marketing press which welcomed the launch of Strongbow Spice as a refreshing move in a beer industry that lacks innovation.
He said: "Having gained a huge share of the cider market through some pretty racy advertising Strongbow can afford to experiment and launch offshoots such as Strongbow Spice.
"We've still got a lot of work before we have a big enough share to be able to do that or get to that stage."
He emphasised the need for improvement in quality, distribution and service not only from a Greene King perspective but for the cask ale market as a whole. "We're not arrogant but we realise that our role is about growing both our brands and the category as a whole and educating the consumer and the publican.
"Most publicans are professional about cask ale and you know that nine out of 10 times you're going to get a good pint, but there are some that you can tell are truly passionate about it and it's this passion that we've got to promote."
Rooney, who is himself married to a French woman, suggested the English should look across the Channel for inspiration. "The French are intensely proud about their wine. My father-in-law is from the Burgundy region and it's a struggle to get him to drink wine from the Languedoc let alone Australia!
"The English don't complain enough. If you think back 20 years ago, no one complained about food but now we're a lot more discerning about what we eat and I don't see why it should be anything different for beer - it's very do-able."
Related stories:
What was Greene King's tumultuous brouhaha with CAMRA? Find out:CAMRA sticks by cask ale ban (3 August 2001)