At Brewing Services, we are looking forward to 2020, and what the next decade brings

– but what a difference six months makes:

When I wrote the piece below for the Brewing Services website, Covid 19 was no more than a single sneeze in a far-off land, but how the effects of that first sneeze are now being felt worldwide is beyond belief. Even in March, whilst attending SIBA BeerX in Liverpool we were all still laughing and joking about not shaking hands and rubbing elbows instead, but since then it’s become no laughing matter as thousands have since died and pubs across the land have closed their doors, some perhaps never to re-open.

But all is not doom and gloom as breweries have used their ingenuity to sell beer to the great and the good at every opportunity and I hope this has a lasting legacy well into the future even when the pubs have thrown open their doors once again.

Ever since I started working in the small independent brewing sector (for me SIBA still stands for Small Independent Brewers Association and will always remain so) I have advocated keeping distribution close to the brewery; The brewpub, and latterly the brewery tap, always being the best way to taste great beer and the local craft brewery supplying a good local trade based on quality core brands. Now this is fast becoming to be the new norm, but not in the way I ever imagined or would have wished. But this is where we are and will remain for the foreseeable future, and with brewers having to adjust quickly to this new reality with bottle and can sales quadrupling almost over-night and sales of mini-casks and bag in box soaring, at least while the sun shines. And this new reality in which small pack is set to dominate brewery sales for the foreseeable future. So please support your local independent brewer and order some beer today!

http://www.siba.co.uk/IndependentCraftBeer/

At Brewing Services we are looking forward to 2020, and what the next decade brings.

2019 proved to be a bumper year for us with many of our breweries picking up awards for their beers at Regional SIBA and CAMRA competitions. The winning beers were across all beer genres from pale ales and classic bitters to new world IPAs along with lagers and on up to Russian Imperial stouts. The winning beers also covered all types of packaging from cask to can but mostly what these breweries demonstrated is great versatility in their brewing methods and more importantly, about how to brew consistently good quality beer.

We also saw an increase in the breweries we work with successfully obtaining or retaining their SALSA and SIBA FSQ accreditation in order to be able to access new markets for their beers, which is great news all round.

2019 also proved our best year ever for completing new brewery commissioning projects or working with existing breweries to increase productivity with installations of new Brew houses, increasing production capacity or installing more up to date brewing and packaging equipment.

So what can we expect for 2020 and the new decade to come. Well we hope for more of the same with more new breweries entering the industry (Despite there being more breweries than ever in the UK there is always room for more well conceived breweries producing good quality beers with wide appeal ) and existing breweries working towards improving quality and consistency leading to even greater sales. Hand in hand with this is staff training and continually improving the brewing methods to help ensure optimum quality, consistency and overall production efficiency.

So we will continue to offer technical advice, experience and expertise in equal quantities and look forward to continuing to work with our existing brewery clients and working with many new ones.

All the best for 2020 from David and Rob.