Monday 5 January 2009

Bland Brand Beer


I'm working hard to get the gents loos back together. The new purlin is cemented in and the ceiling joists are now 60% installed. This is only happening by me spending more hours than I should doing hard physical work. But, as my brothers are now accusing me of having a beer belly, and my weight being the greatest it's ever been, I guess exercise allows me to drink beer with less guilt.

Last night, after soaking off the various building debris in the bath I looked for a beer. Ann had already settled down to watch some strange psychic thriller on the TV, so I had to put up with that, plus the only beer I could find was Sun Lik that was given to me as a sampler at a trade show.

Now the best bit about this beer is that it is at least brewed by Shepherd Neame. But why? Why brew a beer that tastes just the same as every other oriental fermented rice water? Thinking about it, the only good thing about this beer was that it was brewed by Shepherds Neame.

Then came along the commercial break in the film. Who was the film sponsor? It was Carling. Oh joy! More bland beer that tastes the same as the next bland beer.




Oh, but look, they care where they get their barley from. Pity the regular Carling drinker probably doesn't give a xxxx.

But still, it shows that these big brands are getting concerned about provenance. The pictures show rustic, country scenes that would be more suited to the imagery associated with a small craft brewer.


We already know that the big boys are running scared of the increase in success of the smaller breweries. Consumption of major brands is falling and the sales of beer brewed in small breweries is growing. This I guess is the fight back. Subliminal messages of hand craft given is by the horse drawn farm cart to give the consumer an impression of quality.

The Carling can looks so out of place though, don't you think?

I did find a couple of bottles from Heather Ale Ltd. The Gooseberry and wheat ale 5% was good.



4 comments:

Whorst said...

I see the UK is using the US' marketing strategy(brainwashing). Make something that cost nothing to make, than spend a load on advertising so the stupid masses gobble it up. Budweiser's the King of Beers ya know!

Whorst said...

Damn, I forgot to mention.....I've dropped out of the Safale-04 camp. There's a tartness there that I don't care for. I'm going to use Safale-05 for pretty much everything now except for lager. The 05 is supposedly derived from the Nottingham strain, so there ya go.

Paul said...

The first impression I got of that Carling photo was 'yob goes to countryside'.

Rob said...

Hi Dave just to make some points:
The term 100% british barley is false but true advertising,it should be readas meaning 100% of the barley used is probably british (because its obviously cheaper than imported barley). Secondly i would be willing to put money on that grist for carling is far from 100% barly but more like 40-70% corn syrup, rice or what ever cheap fermentable substrate that can be obtained. I also get quite infuriated by those adverts