Pub Bitch: Is blonde the new black?
The new black
Product innovation, as any fule kno, is an integral, nay essential part of today's brewing game. Take Stella Artois Black, AB InBev's latest brand wheeze. With its sleek, ebony font, its handsome, flute-like glassware and AB InBev's avowed intent to see it served in a select group of on-trade outlets, Stella Artois Black has all the hallmarks of a star product in the making. But let's be clear about one thing: black it most definitely ain't. Anyone expecting a 'dark' lager, say like those made by Czech establishments, will be disappointed. Then again, maybe blonde is the new black. As for AB InBev's talk of a "reverential pouring ritual", one can only take so much of such marketing flim-flam before taking to one's bed, citing dropsy…
Come on England!
With England's dreams of winning the World Cup lying in tatters across the Veld, it's down to a plucky bunch of amateurs from a Luton-headquartered pub company to fly the football flag in South Africa. The Town & City Pub Company footy team ran out UK winners of the Bud Cup at Old Trafford last month, their prize the chance to represent England in a special international football competition in South Africa. The tournament was taking place as The Publican went to press, but before the team jetted off Simon Lucas of T&C said: "If we lose, unlike Fabio we already have our excuse prepared. Brazil has got the mighty Cafu, player in two World Cups, training their team. We've got our InBev account manager, Richard Holt." No pressure there then…
Flow wars
Smartcellar, the Abingdon-based supplier of beer flow monitoring equipment, last week highlighted a thumbs-up its gear had received from the National Measurement Office (NMO). Not content with this, Smartcellar founder Mike Lawton referred to what he called his company's "principal competitor", rival outfit Brulines perhaps, saying "[it] has yet to produce an independent analysis of their product's accuracy". Lawton — who wasn't stirring, honest — went on: "I'm genuinely surprised they haven't done what Smartcellar has — a submission of equipment for independent lab tests to remove the doubt and quash the arguments." Unfazed, Brulines pointed to the (oft-publicised) fact that it's been working with the NMO for yonks…
One step forward
There are some things one simply cannot ignore, despite wishing one could. Last week The Publican profiled Gordon Ramsay's rollercoaster experience in the pub trade and how he and his team were starting to put things right. Citing the Devonshire, a Ramsay pub in Chiswick, West London, Justin Whitehead of Gordon Ramsay Holdings said he recognised its regulars wanted a pub experience, not Claridges. Similarly, staff more accustomed to dealing with fine diners had learnt not to ask incoming visitors if they'd booked a table, he noted. Past mistakes had been corrected, he added. "It's certainly going in the right direction," he opined. The day after the article went to press the pub closed with debts of £4.3m. Timing, as they say, is everything…
Here's the science bit
Hurrah! Scientists have come up with an explanation for 'beer goggles'. Apparently we respond to people whom we find attractive thanks in part to activity in a part of the brain called the 'nucleus accumbens'. This, researchers have found, can also be stimulated by alcohol; therefore observing a person while 'under the influence' can often render the observed far more attractive than might have been the case had the observer been stone cold sober. All of which reminds me of a poem by US wit Dorothy Parker:
I like to have a martini,
Two at the very most.
After three I'm under the table,
After four I'm under my host.
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