What is a healthy beer culture anyway?
Starting with a focus on the city where we live we ponder what a healthy beer culture looks like and whether 2024 is better than 2014.
Before we turn our attention to the UK’s national beer culture in a longer piece we have planned for the spring, first we want to look at the city where we live.
Without quite meaning to, we turned January into Bristol Pubs Month on the blog.
There are links to all the various posts in the round-up below but the gist is that we visited a new venue, a couple of relaunched pubs, a normal pub that was new to us, and a bunch of old favourites.
In addition, there’s a significant anniversary coming up: this spring marks the 10th anniversary of the publication of our book Brew Britannia: the strange rebirth of British beer.
We’re still proud of it – there’s still no better or more accessible summary of the story of British beer in the post-war period, if we do say so ourselves.
But the latter part of the book was written at the height of the craft beer boom, and many of the businesses then riding high are now struggling, or gone.
The latest to announce the calling in of administrators is North Brewing, which spun off from North Bar. North Bar featured heavily in Brew Britannia as the first craft beer in the UK and was, in fact, where we held what turned out to be its only significant launch event.
All of this has got us thinking about the big picture: are things better in 2024 than they were in 2014? And against what criteria?
Back in 2013, when we lived at the far end of Cornwall, we wrote a list of signs of a healthy beer culture:
There is a drinking establishment within walking distance of where you live where you like to spend time, and which serves decent beer.
If you are skint, there is an acceptable drinking establishment within walking distance which sells decent beer at ‘bargain’ prices.
If you fancy something special, there is a pub or bar within reach on public transport (WRPT) which sells imports and ‘craft beer’.
The nearest town/city centre has a range of pubs serving different demographics, and offering between them a range of locally-produced beers alongside national brands.
There is a well-established family/regional brewery.
There are several breweries founded since 1975.
There is at least one brewery founded since 2005.
There is a regional speciality — a beer people ‘must drink’ when they visit.
There is an independent off licence (‘bottle shop’) WRPT.
There is a shop selling home brewing supplies WRPT.
There is at least one beer festival in the region.
We think those still hold up pretty well, although we might change number 7 to “a brewery founded in the past decade”.
So how does Bristol do, from our perspective? Pretty well. The only weak points are maybe:
the lack of a regional speciality – unless you count flat Bass
the lack of bargain pints
One famous pub famous for cheap beer, The Gloucester Road Ale House, is currently no longer trading. A business built on tight margins, with ‘cost conscious’ customers, was always going to struggle in a financial crisis.
Other than that, it’s Wetherspoon, really… but we did enjoy our bargain pints of Jaipur the other week.
Perhaps Bristol is weaker on craft beer bars compared to a decade ago, when we were so bowled over by the run of them on King Street that we featured it in the opening section of Brew Britannia.
Or maybe not. Sure, Small Bar is now dominated by beers from its owner, Left Handed Giant. But elsewhere in town there are now places like Sidney & Eden and The Swan With Two Necks, which looks like a trad boozer but has a run of keg taps on the back bar. And for imports, from Germany and Czechia, The Llandoger Trow has really stepped up.
When it comes to beer styles, despite the dominance of c.4% hazy pale ales, we reckon we could go out this afternoon and find decent, locally-brewed versions of almost any beer style we fancy, from best bitter to Rauchbier.
If it feels unhealthy, despite all that, perhaps it’s down to how the direction of travel skews our perceptions.
A growing scene feels healthier than one that’s consolidating, or shrinking, even if what’s left is objectively better (terms and conditions apply) than at any point in the preceding 70 or so years.
People want to know what’s new, what’s happening, where next?
About Substack
Moving to Substack from MailChimp last year was a huge pain in the bum. It took most of a weekend to manage, but we got there.
Now, because of Substack’s weak policies on far-right content, there’s a general exodus of writers underway, and many newsletters are haemorrhaging subscribers.
We’re trying to work out what to do, if anything.
On one hand, Substack still seems to supply us with a constant stream of open-minded, inclusive content from writers who might otherwise struggle to find an outlet.
And on the other hand, we’re not that convinced by any of the suggested alternatives, which seem to be either (a) expensive, costing hundreds of pounds per year or (b) just as likely to end up in Substack-style pickle over content moderation.
For now, we’re sticking here, waiting to see which way the wind blows. Thoughts and suggestions are welcome, though.
On the blog
In the run up to Christmas, when we took a small break from posting, we shared our usual end-of-year round-ups:
Then, as mentioned above, the past month also turned into something of a close study of Bristol’s pubs.
We snuck in a look at the Blackhorse Beer Mile in Jess’s old stamping ground of Walthamstow, East London, which was helpful in framing our reflections on Bristol. Checking against our list above, Walthamstow has a much healthier beer culture now than it did in 2013. (But does that mean it has a healthier culture overall? Oof. Can of worms.)
And, of course, there were several of our regular Saturday round-ups of beer news, opinion and history – including a cheeky bonus round-up just for Patreon, right before Christmas.
Speaking of Patreon, there were additional notes on beer and pubs in both London and Bristol there, too. Do consider signing up.
And that’s your lot until February.
Cheers!
Ray & Jess