Cellar to Glass: Glassware

Taste matters most of course but branded glassware is integral to the customer's perceptions on the quality of your pub's beer.We drink with our...

Taste matters most of course but branded glassware is integral to the customer's perceptions on the quality of your pub's beer.

We drink with our eyes, they say, and serving beer in the correct glass can have a direct impact on the way people perceive the quality of your beer, indeed your whole pub.

Nucleated glassware, for instance, helps to maintain the head on a pint, and in recent years has transformed the look of draught lager.

Less obviously, research shows badged or branded glassware also has a positive effect. Branded glasses are part of the drinking culture in countries such as Belgium. They have been slow to take off here, but steady progress is being made in persuading brewer and licensee alike of the benefits.

Speaking at last week's Cellar to Seller conference, Oscar Buizza, sales and marketing director of font and glassware firm Alumasc, argued that branded glasses should be a part of a pub's efforts towards improving beer quality. "Today's consumer expects better," he said. "Leisure time is precious, they demand a first class experience - and 75 per cent of them prefer to be served their beer in a branded glass because it suggests quality."

Half of drinkers perceive beer in a branded glass to be of superior quality, and - particularly interesting to licensees - 37 per cent would be happy to pay more if their beer was served in badged glassware.

"It adds to the theatre of dispense, it makes people believe they are drinking something special," said Oscar. "In its way, the right glassware is as important as good cellar management."

Branded glasses for lager are usually nucleated, laser etched to create a rough surface at the bottom of the glass that controls the break-out of carbon dioxide, sending bubbles to the surface of the beer to continuously form a head. "Brewers put in great efforts to get a perfect beer only for it to be served in an unnucleated glass - and the customer gets a flat pint," said Oscar.

There are, of course, other benefits to brewers when a brand is served in the right glass. The fact that half their customers won't decide what to drink until they reach the bar is a familiar one to licensees. But did you know that 35 per cent will review that decision every time they order?

So while the font is the biggest influence on the first trip, if your customers are drinking from a branded glass it's a constant reminder - the brand name will be literally under their nose. Some brands, such as Heineken on its relaunch, have gone further by incorporating a message that goes straight into the consumer's hand.

Brewers have consistently reported sales uplifts into double figures on occasions when they have introduced a branded glass, and there is evidence that drinkers are more likely to be brand loyal.

Publicans, too, have an interest in influencing what their customers choose to drink. But more than that, Oscar believes a branded glass "enhances the product, the brand and the venue".

It can, for instance, "make beer with food a more credible option - draught beer can have a place at the most refined tables".

"It doesn't just add theatre," Oscar added. "It lifts the drinking experience out of the dark and can actually help the on-trade reverse the home drinking trend by making drinking beer in the pub more exciting."

That figures...