Craft beer booming but divisions damaging industry, CEO warns

Phil Tate of CGA Peach said craft brewing was one of several “green shoots of recovery” visible in the industry.

He said: “We have seen a lot of growth in the pubs that are selling craft ranges. Its 62% growth in craft beer. World lagers have grown about 5%. While that has come at the expense of some of the more traditional categories one of our messages is don’t completely supplement the standard brands. This is about enhancing your offer. Giving people the opportunity to trade up to those brands but not alienating the people looking for tried and tested products.”

Meanwhile Nick Miller, chief executive of Meantime Brewing, said he was looking across the Atlantic for his growth forecasts.

Growth​

He said: “I take the American model. They are predicting craft beer to be 20% value of the American market. That is larger than the whole of the British beer industry. That trend is growing at about 14% a year and on a much bigger base. I think it’s here to stay. I think craft beer, if it’s to the required quality, will have a sustainable future. I think the problem is there’s a lot of ‘craft beer’ out there that doesn’t have the required quality because they’re not investing in the technology.”

However, he warned against destructive rivalries within the industry.

“One of the big problems is there’s been so much knocking of the big products it has actually been damaging to the industry. If you look at the trackers for the last 25 years you will see beer volumes have declined by over half and that’s because as an industry we’ve been too busy knocking it. Craft beer whether traditional or modern can breathe new life into an ailing category within the licensed trade.”