Phil Mellows looks at how the content of Interbrew's cellar training has changed, and at how Hall & Woodhouse staff are being offered free training in cellar management and the understanding of beer.
Interbrew on course
There are many licensees, of course, who take a real professional pride in serving that perfect pint of beer.
But there is more to it than self-satisfaction. As standards rise and consumers become more demanding, beer quality has become an important commercial consideration.
Interbrew UK, in common with other brewers, has run cellar courses for publicans for many years in its previous incarnation as Whitbread. In the past year nearly 2,000 people have been through its one-day training held at different centres around the country.
But while the beer and the basic techniques of keeping and serving it have changed little, the emphasis has shifted towards what doing it right can mean for the health of a business.
"Course content has evolved over the years," explained the man responsible for Interbrew's cellar and dispense training, Alastair Leaver. "We have cut down on stuff about how beer is made, for instance, and included more on the commercial benefits.
"The main message we want to get across is that by improving quality you can be more profitable. We have a lot of research that shows people will look for a good pint - 33 per cent of customers will change pubs if they get a bad pint - and good cellar management means there is less wastage and you can improve your yields."
In fact, Alastair likes to shock them with some statistics. On the basis that an average of a pint a day goes into the drip tray under each tap, licensees on the course are told to calculate, with the help of a special chart, how much money they lose in a year.
"We recommend that when they get back to the pub they measure ullage every day and feed back to staff how they are performing," he said.
From ordering the right amount of stock to the moment the glass leaves the barstaff's hand, the course is very much geared to commercial considerations and licensees are trained to spot faults, analyse what's wrong and do something about it.
While the course, which is accredited by the Hospitality Awarding Body, is aimed at licensees themselves, they are encouraged to involve staff in the drive for quality.
"We ask them whether all their staff know what a perfect pint should be like," said Alastair. "It should be so simple but barstaff don't always recognise what a perfect pint looks like.
"The point we make is that it takes 18 months to make a pint of beer, from the barley to the tap - and only 18 seconds to pour it and ruin it."
While too many dispense heads on the bar remains a common cause of poor quality, the most frequent issues raised by licensees on the course relate to line cleaning, Alastair believes that the biggest cause of problems is actually the glass!
"If people use too much rinse aid, for instance, it leaves an invisible film on the glass and that will cause the beer in the glass to go flat," he said.
You can see that calling out the technical services team or sending the keg back in a situation like this is not going to win any friends at the brewery, so the Interbrew course takes pains to not only get across best practice but to explain exactly why you should follow the instructions on the glass washer.
"We give reasons for what we are saying," said Alastair. "Then it all gels for them and they actually do it back at the pub."
Interbrew has recently introduced an advanced, two-day course with the second day concentrating on the procedures required to make sure the lessons learned on the first day are put into practice effectively.
That includes, for instance, not only staff training but keeping training records that can help discipline the licensee to take each member of staff through what they need to know.
On returning to their pub, people who have taken the advanced course carry out their own audits on beer quality, from cellar to glassware, and act on any failures. They only receive a certificate when their audits achieve an 85 per cent pass rate - "and that can take up to three months after the end of the course," said Alastair.
Nearly 60 licensees have so far come through and Interbrew is looking at extending the follow-up audits to the one day course.
Badger set for excellence
Staff throughout the Hall & Woodhouse managed and tenanted estates are being offered free training in cellar management and the understanding of beer.
Courses at the Badger School of Excellence, created to help raise the expertise of people working in the brewer's pubs and in its headquarters in Blandford Forum, Dorset, are based on the results of a training needs analysis questionnaire sent out around the estate.
Employees have the opportunity to sign up for a free course on basic cellar and product knowledge. Other courses available include ale appreciation and tasting, merchandising and cask and bottled ale retailing.
As part of the package, everyone attending the course will receive a work folder which is added to each month to build a comprehensive understanding of beer.
Training manager Sarah Miles explained that one key aim of the Badger School of Excellence was to get all the brewer's pubs accredited by the Cask Marque quality standard. "Our aim to develop a world class drinks business can only be achieved if our pubs provide quality products with good customer service," she said.