Focus Midlands: Hobson's Choice

THERE CAN'T be many breweries that had their first successful brew on Easter Sunday (apparently the first attempt on Easter Saturday was a washout). But it was on that day in 1993 that Hobsons Brewery came to life.

With its two flagship beers Town Crier and Best Bitter, Hobsons began to build up a steady trade in the late nineties and at the start of this decade.However, the beer that changed the destiny of the brewery was that most unfashionable of beers, a mild. Hobsons Mild thrust the brewer, based in Cleobury Mortimer, Worcestershire, into the national spotlight after it was named 2007 Champion Beer of Britain (CBoB) at the Great British Beer Festival (GBBF).

"The mild was in no way our flagship beer and it was absolutely a shock to win," says Nick Davis, managing director of Hobsons. It has certainly benefited sales of mild. Before the victory at the GBBF Hobsons Mild only accounted for five per cent of the brewer's total beer sales - now it is 15 per cent.

Poisoned chalice

But this success has had to be managed. Many winners of CBoB have found it to be a poisoned chalice - with short-term demand outstripping capacity and no sooner than the brewer finds a solution to the demand issue and budgets for it, than that demand starts to dry up.

According to Davis the best way to manage the situation is to say 'no' to the many tempting offers resulting from the victory. "We had a lot of big requests from large pub companies but we bluffed them off a bit. We didn't have the capacity for it - despite very recently expanding by three times."

But he is still unhappy with the way mild is perceived and believes there is great potential for the traditional favourite.

"We first started brewing a mild as we felt it would fit our portfolio well, but it has such a peculiar image. It's a great product and tastes fantastic. Women love it especially - but you sometimes have to hold people's hands and almost force them to try it," he says. "Someone has to find a better way of marketing milds. They need to put glamour into mild somehow!"

As outlined above, trade is growing at a steady rate for company - the brewery is now shifting 15 to 20 per cent more volume than it was a year ago. Davis feels Hobsons is benefiting from being based in the Midlands, an area of the country which has strong loyalty to local cask beer. "There is a very healthy freetrade here. Unlike some brewers in other areas it is actually growing for us," he argues. "The Midlands has a very strong beer-drinking base with a lot of rural communities that have strong loyalty to local beers in local pubs."

Clumsy legislation

Despite his positive outlook on local trade, there are clouds on the horizon for Davis - not least the Chancellor's decision to put 4p on a pint of beer in the Budget. "It was a clumsy piece of legislation," he says. "Trade was hard enough before."

He believes that the Chancellor could have raised revenue on alcohol without resorting to such over-zealous tactics.

"I would have taxed packaged products and left draught beer in pubs well alone. Bottles and cans are, on the whole, drunk in unregulated environments - that is the key issue to address."