How to run a beer festival

If you've never taken the plunge, heed a bit of friendly advice from some of those who have boosted their sales of ales

Have a good reason for doing them

John Lawrie, the Swan, Hoxne, Suffolk: "We want to be known for beer festivals because it ties in with building a reputation for being a cask-ale pub. We're not an entertainment centre. You have to decide what you're doing. Are you having a beer festival, or a jazz or food festival with a bit of beer thrown in? Our winter festival is tied in to St Edmund's Day because he was killed in the village and we may have a few folk musicians come down and play on an ad hoc basis, but that's aside from the main purpose."

Chris Jones, co-licensee of the Britannia Inn at Elterwater in Cumbria: "We have a fireworks party on the Saturday nearest to bonfire night and then we start the beer festival the following Friday, for 10 days until the Sunday. We chose that time of year because the tourist season traditionally ends around bonfire night and this was a way of extending it. Any earlier and it would be too busy and put a lot of pressure on staff."

Check the long-range forecast

John Lawrie: "We hold a beer festival on the May bank holiday, which is not always the best in terms of the weather, but we have it then because a nearby pub stopped doing them and no-one took the slot. Obviously if you're going to hold it in a marquee in the garden, the weather will play a part. It could be steaming hot so you can't keep the beer cool, or it could be teeming it down with rain and nobody comes."

Try to have a theme

John Lawrie: "We try to theme them to an area of the country and go for beers from micros from that area. It's more appealing if people can try beers from outside the immediate vicinity. We had a very successful one with the Highlands and Islands of Scotland, and even our Scottish customers were coming in and saying they didn't realise there was such a Scottish microbrewing industry. We did one for Staffordshire, which didn't work so well, maybe because Staffordshire doesn't conjure up an image in people's minds. If we were to hold one with local beers we wouldn't use Adnams or Greene King ­ not because they're not good beers, just because they're so readily available."

Chris Jones: "Our festival is always the Champion Beers of Britain from all of the past Camra festivals; it's the best of the best. If you go to a beer festival you can have some really nice beers, but you can also try others that are a bit bland. We're saying that at least you can come to ours and know that you're going to get something with a bit of pedigree."

Use your contacts

John Lawrie: "We've been very lucky because we have a personal contact on the East Anglia Daily Times who will write a feature for us, and the other local newspapers then pick up on it from there. We also have a local person who prints posters for us so we don't have to fork out large sums of money on them. If we did, we might not be able to continue. Advertising is potentially the biggest expense of all."

Plan your stock carefully

John Lawrie: "You have to sit down and try to decide the balance between having a big enough range of beers to create interest but not having so many that you become overstocked. There was a time when you could do sale or return with brewers but those days are gone. The 4.5-gallon pins have also gone, which is a shame because they were ideal for festivals. In the spring festival we do 24 nine-gallon firkins and that means you've got to get rid of 2,000 pints of beer. At the winter one we do more like 10 or 12."

Chris Jones: "We did 18 beers last year, but because it's all of the Champion Beer, we'll have to add one every year. I try to make sure that from day one we have none of our normal beers on, so it's just Champion Beers. That means when a beer runs out on the days before the festival I'll replace it with one of the festival beers. I'll also want all festival beers on the last day, so there'll be some overlap at the end too, otherwise it makes a mockery of the whole thing. There are some beers that will sell well and I'll have a nine-gallon, but others will go very quickly and I might order two 18-gallons. Some of the darker ones and milds just aren't going to sell as well as some of the lighter citrusy ones."