Ale Houses/tied Houses/outlets/brewbars

[eamonnfoley]

I've been reading a bit on the web and noticed that a few decent sized NZ microbreweries such as Mac's appear to have several ale houses countrywide where their beers are sold exclusively. I love this concept and have also seen it in America and Europe. Good way to showcase a microbrewery in my opinion. Does anyone know why we don't have this sort of thing going on very much in Australia? I would imagine a few Matilda Bay ale houses, or a couple more LC would be good for the industry.

Most I have seen in James Squire with a few ale houses in Melb & Sydney, and Little Creatures with Freo and Melb. A lot of our breweries are focussed on getting the stuff into bottle shops, and on taps at pubs where most people will not touch it anyway.

I love the alehouse concept and would pick such places over regular pubs on most occassions. Am I the only one who is of this opinion?

 

[Thirsty Boy]

used to be the case very often

but breweries stopped wanting to run pubs and only wanted to make beer. Thus brewers like fosters sold hundreds of pubs not all that long ago - mind you, I expect thats not what you are really talking about

perhaps its coming back into vogue for smaller breweries and yes...I would keep an eye out for Matilda Bay version of the James Squire brewhouses - it was a definite "maybe" prposition less than 12 months ago, not so sure now though.

The more pub/breweries the better in my books. Cant get any less "carbon miles" than brewed 10 feet away can you?

 

[matti]

The publican doesn't necessary have to be brewer and vica versa.
Cost of running a pub and brewing the beer for that particular pub would be one of the biggest hurdles.
As you mentioned there would be lovely if there were more of them.

Unless there is a tax reform on craftbrewed beer, I believe they are going down one by one, once people start holding on they're money a bit tighter.

Though I really enjoy visiting them , when my budget allows, I can't say that every brew pub I've been to, have served great beers.
What great beer is another debate and I am not going to bring it out here and where those brew pubs were.

I haven't seen the trend for purchasing of craftbrewed beer lately but i am quite sure it isn't moving fast upwards.
The cost of buying a 6 pack is well over $16 for the cheaper range and you tend to pay a a bit extra for it on tap.

I think I just concentrate on keeping cost at home done so I can support the craft bewing community out there when I do hit the town.

 

[Tim]

Tied houses are killing the smaller brewery's off in the UK. Larger regional breweries like Fuller's, Greene King etc are buying up all the pubs and selling only their wares. the number of freehouses are decreasing which means the number of outlets/market for small producers is also decreasing. This is at a time when the overall market segment (real ale) is growing.
On the other hand you have pubco's such as Punch, JDW, M&B etc which own about 75% of all pubs. They use their position to demand lower prices per cask/firken which makes it even harder for the small guys to compete.
One microbrewer approached the buyer from JDW (Weatherspoons/Lloyds) about sales and was told that they will sell his beer, but want to buy it for 44 a cask where the brewer regularly sells it for 70 a cask.

In Australia the same thing happens but on taps. If a publican puts a microbrew on one of the taps the big boys (LN or SC) start to give the publican a hard time saying that they will stop supplying their pub. As megaswill is >99% of the trade they are pretty much forced into a tie with either LN or SC.

I think the NSW governements moves to ease licence restrictions in cafe's is sensible. Microbrewers can approach cafe's as potential outlets. The cafe's business is diverse enough to not be affected by pressure from the large brewers and are a better outlet /potential market for craft beer than pubs anyhow.

 

[PostModern]

Macs is not exactly a micro brewery. iirc, it's owned by Lion, in the same way they own JSB here. There is megabucks behind them, which is why they have one branded pubs all over the place. Get your little micro with a million in capital behind him to compete with that. Just can't happen.

Not that I mind the James Squire Brewhouse in Sydney, I just would not like to see one in every suburb, like the McDonalds of beer.

 

[Guest Lurker]

Colonial microbrewery have done it in Perth, buying a pub (The Royal) as an outlet for their beers. But it hasnt worked that well because it seems to still have a semi independent setup. Apparently the people running the pub decide which beers they want on tap, which means Deans best seasonals didnt make it, and there didnt seem to be any effort to educate the bar staff about what they were serving, or to do anything about the incredibly poor level of service in the place before and after they bought it.

 

[mika]

Empire no longer owns the Royal. It's been sold off, along with the pub to one of the board directors I think.
The Flying horse in Warrnambool has also purchased their own pub I believe.
Personally I'm a bigger fan of 'the local taphouse' concept and places like Mrs Parma's in Melb, who sell everyone's beer.

 

[Bribie G]

Tied houses are killing the smaller brewery's off in the UK. Larger regional breweries like Fuller's, Greene King etc are buying up all the pubs and selling only their wares. the number of freehouses are decreasing which means the number of outlets/market for small producers is also decreasing. This is at a time when the overall market segment (real ale) is growing.
................................................................................
..

I thought there was a 'guest beer' law in the UK that made tied houses offer other products?

 

[Fermented]

The brewhouse pub concept is great and I love it to death, but in all seriousness it's more difficult to generate a profit from it for the owner, except in the case of a corporation.

Having spent a fine afternoon drinking Mr Squire's best with BribieG and Quantocks, not to mention an afternoon or few with my wife at the Lord, it's very nice but very costly. At $7 - $8++ a pint, there's not going to be as many clients can afford it, let alone the resistance to try something different to that which they are already accustomed. Sure, they may be phillistines for not being willing to enjoy quality, but then again most people think Jacobs Creek is a 'top drop' thanks to marketing. Also, economic pressures were bad enough for the most part but now they are, or at least perceived to be, becoming much much worse.

Nationally, if there were a tax break offered for the brew house and microbrewery alike, I think we should expect an increase in these. If the city of Sydney could get its act together on small licenced premises, would should see a surge in these. In combination, there would I hope, be a beer renaissance of a kind.

Regrettably, despite our love of fine beer, it all comes down to business. An investor puts their money on the table and wants a return. No reasonable prospect of a profit? No investment. Sad, but this is the commercial world we live in.

Cheers - Fermented.

EDIT: Fixed punctuation.

 

[matti]

Macs is not exactly a micro brewery. iirc, it's owned by Lion, in the same way they own JSB here. There is megabucks behind them, which is why they have one branded pubs all over the place. Get your little micro with a million in capital behind him to compete with that. Just can't happen.

Not that I mind the James Squire Brewhouse in Sydney, I just would not like to see one in every suburb, like the McDonalds of beer.

You are dreaming PM.
Sacreligous to franchise a brewhouse.
While we're in dreamland it should be mandatory that every pub brewed their own beer.

matti

 

[HoppingMad]

Sampled a few Macs at one of the Auckland Macs Alehouses near the marina area and agree, these things are an awesome idea. To be able to see a line of taps of 8 or more quality beers all from one brewery in one place, then sample some that were poured and presented properly in the right glasses was way cool.

Sadly I guess most don't have any brewing capacity on premise and some have equipment that's just for show which while educational to non-brewing punters out there, really just makes me as a Homebrewer annoyed - they're wasting good gear that could be put to good use damnit!

In Melbourne the James Squire Brewhouse has a very nice looking copper & timber micro setup which sits there as ornamentation. At QV, the 3 degrees brewpub had much the same thing (think its gone now though). A few years back now the old Redback hotel in North Melbourne used to have an operational microbrewery till it was decommissioned and just sat there - then it had to make way for pool tables WTF?! And if you want a real laugh on trying to create an illusion you've got an operational brewery on site, go to the new Little Creatures Dining Hall in Fitzroy and view their 'pretend plastic pipes' on the wall that are labelled as if they are coming out of a real brewery out the back. Honestly - I do love Little Creatures but they ain't fooling anyone with that stuff.

More Alehouses that make the ales I say, and less puffery! Viva la revolution! :beerbang:

Hopper.

 

[Tim]

I thought there was a 'guest beer' law in the UK that made tied houses offer other products?

Tied houses get around this by offering products that do not compete directly with a brand. Fuller's seem to have deals with Diageo and Scottish and Newcastle so you get Guinness and Fosters as guest options in their pubs. The deal usually runs further into packaging as well because Diageo owns the patents on widget nitrocans which you can get Fuller's products in now.
I was at the Fuller's brewery last week and they have a ;arge bottl;ing setup. They bottle everything from carlsburg to Budweiser. All this is part of the deals with the mega corps.

 

[big_alk]

it happened in the 80's and 90's with Matilda Bay.

They started off brewing at the Sail and Anchor in Fremantle and then expanded by purchasing a number of pubs so they had retail outlets for their beers.
By the time they sold out to CUB in 1994(?) they had a whole swag of hotels including the Brass Monkey, Queens, Como, Albion.
Fosters ran them for a while and had MB and CUB beers on tap, along with the Sail beers brewed on premises.
They then split the whole brewpub/hotel business off into Australasian Leisure and Hospitality (ALH), which was eventually taken over by Bruandwo, owned by Woolworths (I think).

 

[dig]

And if you want a real laugh on trying to create an illusion you've got an operational brewery on site, go to the new Little Creatures Dining Hall in Fitzroy and view their 'pretend plastic pipes' on the wall that are labelled as if they are coming out of a real brewery out the back. Honestly - I do love Little Creatures but they ain't fooling anyone with that stuff.

Er, dude, those plastic pipes just have beer python in them that brings beer from kegs in the coolroom to the bar. There is no 'hidden brewery out the back' illusion. A dead giveaway for the astute punter is the name Dining Hall, rather than Brewery.

 

[Thirsty Boy]

it happened in the 80's and 90's with Matilda Bay.

They started off brewing at the Sail and Anchor in Fremantle and then expanded by purchasing a number of pubs so they had retail outlets for their beers.
By the time they sold out to CUB in 1994(?) they had a whole swag of hotels including the Brass Monkey, Queens, Como, Albion.
Fosters ran them for a while and had MB and CUB beers on tap, along with the Sail beers brewed on premises.
They then split the whole brewpub/hotel business off into Australasian Leisure and Hospitality (ALH), which was eventually taken over by Bruandwo, owned by Woolworths (I think).

yes - and Woolies or whoever the hell owns all the pubs now, decided at least in Melbourne that they didn't want to do any brewing anymore. So the Gunn island et al all stopped making any beer and just turned into **** yuppy pubs.

The biggest shame of all was 3 degrees in the QV building. They built this really beautiful brewery in there, had Samara Fuss (currently at the Maquarie??) as brewer and had not even managed their first beer out of the new system -- kaput. Brewery gathers dust. Still sitting there going rusty as far as I know.

 

[Fents]

yes - and Woolies or whoever the hell owns all the pubs now, decided at least in Melbourne that they didn't want to do any brewing anymore.

woolworths/alh - basically bruce mathison....my biggest customer