Paul Nunny: Beyond the quest for quality

From its launch as a modest one-man operation, Paul Nunny has turned Cask Marque into an ever-progressing champion of cask beer quality with industry-wide influence.

If there was a Cask Marque for chips there's one central London pub that's definitely not going to get through its inspection. Lord Horatio Nelson himself would have rejected these specimens for his grapeshot. "They're just too hard, Hardy."

Perhaps there ought to be a Cask Marque for chips. A Chips Marque would set some standards and actually help pubs like this one. As it stands, there are at least two of us who won't be ordering chips here again.

But the beer was good. Pints of Adnams Gunhill for Paul Nunny and myself, from Nunny's old brewery, a company he clearly remains affectionate towards. And it was certainly more comfortable here than our first encounter, all of a dozen years ago.

We met at the Institute of Directors where Nunny was to reveal plans for a new accreditation body that was to save cask ale. Except we couldn't find a proper seat and had to perch at an occasional table in the lobby.

"You'll have to tell that story in your article," he laughs, and I always do what Paul Nunny tells me now. For some years I was sceptical about his project. But it's beginning to look like he was right, and I was wrong.

In fact, Nunny has proved almost the whole industry wrong — with notable exception of then Adnams chairman Simon Loftus who, he reveals, thought the whole thing could be sorted in five years.

Those early days were anxious ones for Nunny, sitting in his bedroom trying to get Cask Marque off the ground, and the handful of brewing industry figures around him.

"Twelve years ago a lot of the industry were sitting on the fence. They thought what we were trying to do would be a one-day wonder. It frightened a lot of people, too, because we'd raised all those issues."

The elephant in the room Nunny was pointing at was, of course, that the cask-beer market was dying. And the reason behind it was no less disturbing — poor quality.

In the early 1990s one result of the Beer Orders was a sharp upturn in cask ale that was built on sand.

"Everyone waded in and put in hand-pumps, but there was no know-how to back it up."

So Cask Marque's initial research was a shock, and not what many wanted to hear. The Beer Orders had snipped the umbilical cord that linked most of the country's pubs to a brewer, the relationship that had been some sort of guarantee of quality. Finding an alternative to that was a daunting challenge.

But against the odds, Nunny stuck at it. He's a resilient sort, and as an accountant by trade he was well equipped to make the arguments for investing in quality. As he says: "Everything you do has to have a commercial, financial benefit. Investment in quality is expensive, and it has to bring benefits. Our job is to get people to better understand that you can take out costs, but in the long term it's to your detriment. There are no short cuts to beer quality."

He also put himself about. You could hardly visit an industry event without bumping into him. He walked the talk, and talked some more, putting Cask Marque right into the faces of the decision-makers. And eventually he won the argument.

Now, he complains that he's not getting out and about enough. There's too much to do.

"Today we're getting tremendous support from the industry. We've put quality on the agenda and there is an awareness of quality among retailers. In the past six months we've been approached by two major brewers about taking part in quality initiatives. And that's all because we've made quality an issue."

These past six months have seen cask beer return to growth for the first time since the early '90s. Pub operators big and small are seeing it as a vital part of their business. Nunny cites the example of Enterprise Inns, which now has a dedicated website (caskalepubs.com) using cask's success as bait to recruit licensees.

From just Paul Nunny in his bedroom, Cask Marque itself has grown into a nationwide organisation with 45 assessors and 15 trainers in the field, plus support staff.

Setting a quality benchmark is still the core of its work — new accreditations are up 17% on last year with a total of more than 6,400 licensees earning the right to display the Cask Marque plaque.

Over the years the organisation has taken on increasing amounts of project work for members, notably providing cellar-management training for pub groups such as JD Wetherspoon and Mitchells & Butlers.

Most recently Charles Wells has recruited Cask Marque to offer a beer line-cleaning service to its tenants. Forty have so far taken it up.

"More companies are outsourcing and that's been to our benefit," says Nunny. "We're established as the experts, and it leaves them free to focus on the offering."

This reflects another factor in Cask Marque's success — it's trusted by everyone. "Independence is certainly one of our strengths. People know that we've no axe to grind."

Another nut he's started to crack is consumer awareness, making sure Cask Marque has that pull from the other side of the bar. Latest research shows 46% of cask-beer drinkers recognise the blue plaque, and real gains have been made in taking the scheme digital and into social networks.

The website is about to be relaunched, and Cask Marque will soon make its debut on Facebook and Twitter. There's also the sat-nav and long-established text-message service. But the surprising success for Nunny has been the iPhone app.

"In the first 14 days we had 3,000 people sign up, and the average dwell time is eight minutes! That means they're really making use of it."

Yet, when asked if his work is done, Nunny is indignant. "We've only just started!" he snaps. "All we've done is made quality an issue. Now the industry needs training. This is a great time for cask ale. We must ensure we don't throw it away, that we make the best of the opportunity. Licensees have a responsibility for that, supported by brewers.

"The big challenge is to get to barstaff. We can promote quality and train people in cellar management, but there's 100% turnover in barstaff and somehow we need to make it a professional job."

To that end, Cask Marque has set up a new online training programme called Bar Excellence.

"We could just tell staff how to pour the perfect pint," explains Nunny. "But if we can add other things, things they need to do a professional job, it's a much more attractive proposition for the pub operator. As they recruit they can put new staff members on this course.

"So we've included service of all drinks, including coffee, plus customer service and all legal requirements of working behind a bar. And we've some big hitters behind it: Diageo, Coca-Cola, AB InBev and Poppleston Allen, licensing lawyers."

Cask Marque has also launched a training course for pubco business development managers (BDMs).

"The idea is that they take it on the same day as their sales meeting — 65% of what a pub sells is still beer and BDMs need to understand how best to make a profit out of it. It will get them to ask questions: is the beer range appropriate to that pub's customers? How's the quality?

"The consumer is more demanding now, and we have to rise to the challenge. Pubs will survive, and they will thrive, because they've got a proper consumer offering."

My kind of pub​

"I'd choose a community pub, a place that brings the community together. And ideally cask-ale driven. If there's none, I default to Guinness.

"My local is the Hospital Arms in Colchester. It's got Adnams beer and a great community feel; all types of people get in there. It's what I call a 'real' pub. Every town centre should have one.

"I have a pet hate, too. It's when there are so many beers on the bar you can't see the barstaff. It means there's been a lack of retailing thought by the operator."

Key dates​

• 1967 — Paul Nunny qualifies as a chartered accountant, working for a top London accountancy firm

• 1973 — Joins wine merchant Lay & Wheeler as