Drinkers Turn Away From Beer

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johnno

It's YUMMY
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Was reading this article here.

Maybe we can work out the AHB forum average on the number of brewers that are registered.


Drinkers turn away from beer
November 28, 2004

AUSTRALIA is fast losing its reputation as one of the world's biggest beer-drinking nations.

Latest estimates place our annual per capita consumption around 90 litres per person, down from the 1980s when beer was king, and the average hard-drinking Aussie knocked back 125 litres.

Australians have abandoned beer to such an extent that we are in danger of falling out of the top 10 beer drinking countries in the world.

We are currently ranked ninth behind countries such as Luxembourg and Belgium, with the Czech Republic on top at 162 litres per person.

One of the key reasons for the decline is highlighted in a report by the National Institute of Health and Welfare, which shows wine consumption has quadrupled over the past 40 years, but beer has dropped below 1961 levels.

Sydney master brewer Dr Chuck Hahn said Australians have begun to "drink upstream from the herd".

"Australians drank 125 litres of beer per person every year in the early '80s," he said.

"That's levelled off now to about 90 litres.

"The fact that the premium beer market - people who would never touch a VB - has climbed to 10 per cent from about two per cent says that Australians are drinking for quality not quantity."

Distilled Spirits Industry Council of Australia president Gordon Broderick said the decline in beer consumption was due in part to younger drinkers preferring pre-mix spirits.

Another reason for the decline of beer has been the rapid rise of cafe culture within Australia, with drinkers opting for a caffeine fix rather than a cleansing ale.

According to figures from leading coffee brand Lavazza, Australians now drink an average of 2.4kg of coffee each year, or 288 cups.

The Sunday Telegraph
 
Hmm maybe if the megaswill factories started putting out a decent drop, and stopped calling beers like "Crown" a premium beer, then the consumption wuld increase again.
 
Don't forget that these are figures for commercial beer and do not include the megalitres of homebrewed non-megaswill produced and consumed (mostly) quietly by individuals.

I agree that the public and the market need to be educated about what beer is, was and should be.

Case in point, my Social Club at work (about 150 members and about $10K in the bank) was having a problem seeing a clear path to purchasing some decent beer for the Christmas party. I advised that people had been contributing their $$ all year and deserved some special beer for the party/ event. I suggested LCPA, Mountain Goat, Pils Urquell (on special) and Coopers. I spread the word and got some other consumers to provide feedback to the Social Club.
They (the treasurer) went and purchased what she considered to be a fair compromise. Along with the wannabe beers such as VB and Karlton Kold, we got 1 case each of Hahn Premium, Crown and a Coopers Pale (yay!)
Needless to mention that the beer with taste disappeared first, and the Crownies were consumed by those who deluded themselves that they weren't drinking re-labelled VB and thought they were drinking a posh beer. Seeing the Coopers being consumed early, the treasurer patted herself on the back for having the vision to have purchased it. I laughed quietly to myself.

Ah well, they saw how it went, and who drank what. Maybe the future holds better beer. At least we made some progress. I offered to supply a seasonal beer, produced by moi, for any Social Club event and the silence was deafening.

I will still bring my beer to Social Club events and happily share it with those individuals to whom it appeals.

I am encouraging homebrewers at my work to brew and share beer and ideas. I'm even helping a colleague who will be moving house soon by allowing him bring his gear and brew at my house until he gets set up in the new place. We'll be having a brew session (extract Weizen, nothing 2 difficult), and a bottling session when the batch is ready.
Party on
 
crown is crap but people love it. each to there own. who are we to tell them what to drink.
 
It's a shame, but sometimes a beer gets by on image or historical factors, rather than merit.

Has anyone else noticed that Crown retails for about the same price as it did 10 yr ago, but most of the cheaper standard beers have increased by about $10+ per case.

It doesn't take a genius to work out that there is cost-cutting, dilution, or an adjustment to the real value of the Crown. Yes?

I'm off the soapbox now...
 
There could be other factors. Eg it doesn't cost anymore than fosters to make and pricing is just what the market will bear.
 
eerrk crown lager what a joke.people up my way use it to make bets with like it holds some magical power.

anyway back to the topic.i wonder if they ever go north and try the population to see if the demographics of beer consumption have changed.reckon it is either static or on the rise.it surely never drops in the tropics.

cheers
big d
 
maybe its just me being naive, but i would think its more people drinking wine than mega-crown. at least thats what i hope, as crown lager just makes me dry heave thinking about it. anyway, if it is wine, i can understand. wine does have a much better reputation than the average beer in...well, anywhere (not rightly so imo).
joe
 
Just heard a radio interview with Chuck Hahn on his subject , according th chuck wine consuptuon has doubled since the 80's and premium beer has gone from 2% in the 80's to now being 10%. Then the interviewer asked " so we are drinking more beers like crown lager now", Chuck had a laugh and said ,no we are drinkingh more like James Squire and Hahn premium.
 
My work supplies free beer for the occasional work function. We have to buy Lion Nathan for some catering contractual reason so they buy Hahn Premium. I pointed out that some James Squire products would be nice for a change. They politely declined. I did the research and found out that for an extra $5 per case we could get the Squires. They politely declined. I offered to pay the difference - even if we just got one case as a trial. Guess what! :blink:
 
you could do alot worse than hahn premium though.
 
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