Manchester brewer JW Lees has launched The History of Beer – an interactive timeline depicting the story of beer.
The digital timeline takes a reader through the various stages of the history of beer, starting 3,000 years ago in 1350BC with ancient Sumatrans consuming home-made brews using special drinking straws.
The journey takes a user through Roman Britain’s tabernacles, the birth of bottled beer, the brewing revolution of the 19th century, through to the formation of CAMRA in 1971 and Gordon Brown’s 2002 budget which led to the growth of microbreweries.
William Lees-Jones, JW Lees’ managing director, said: “We wanted to celebrate the incredible evolution of the world’s most popular tipple by producing a fun-filled, fact-laden, ‘pub ammo’ style piece of interactive content and so ‘The History of Beer’ was born.
"It’s certainly not an exhaustive account but has been designed to spark debate and banter in pubs and on social media. We hope that drinkers and lovers of beer trivia will take pleasure in immersing themselves in the timeline."
The timeline was launched to coincide with the production of JW Lees' new seasonal ale, Pioneer, a 4.1% ABV pale ale, which will be sold throughout JW Lees’ pub estate and free trade pubs during March and April.