The death of craft?

The Daily Star has recently posed the question of whether craft beer is dead in the UK. This is actually a considerably more informative and in-depth article than you might expect from that particular source.

It is certainly true that, compared with ten years ago, the excitement surrounding craft beer has very much worn off. And that is perhaps a key point, that it was a concept that was all about novelty and innovation, but there is only so far you can take that before you enter the territory of embracing unusual flavours and ingredients purely for their own sake. People inevitably became a bit fed up with it all and preferred to return to tried and trusted favourites. Plus the drinkers who fuelled the initial boom have grown older, bought houses, had children, got more responsible jobs and don’t have so much time for it any more.

From the start, a key problem was always that “craft” is, as the article states, “an unclear marketing term”, and there have been endless debates over how it should be defined. As I wrote last year, “Is it the type of beer, the kind of ingredients used, the size of the brewery, the independent status of the brewery, the ethos of the brewery, or some kind of nebulous combination of all these factors?” For many drinkers, the term has come to be synonymous with a particular type of heavily-hopped, astringent and possibly hazy keg IPA.

The issue was further clouded by some of what were perceived as the leading craft brands, such as Camden and Beavertown, being acquired by the international brewers. To counter this, SIBA launched a campaign to stress breweries’ independent status, but the problem with this is, that while it’s useful to know, of itself it says nothing about the character or quality of the actual beer.

Craft has also suffered from an often justified perception that it is expensive. As Matthew McAloone of 40ft Brewery says:

“It's the more expensive part of the bar and the charges that have been levied on hospitality in terms of duty the government has put in, it has made it impossible for bars and restaurants to do what they want to do, so they’re consolidating range, which is normally into mainstream products and they’re sacrificing craft… it makes commercial sense and you sell a lot of beer, big guys will give you money just to stock their beer, and their stuff’s cheaper… its the safe bet”.

It’s certainly the case that “craft keg” in pubs tends to sell at a considerable price premium over equivalent cask beers or mainstream lagers, and the craft section is by far the most expensive part of the supermarket beer aisle. So, at a time when many people’s budgets are stretched, it’s hardly surprising that they’re less willing to splash out on it.

Craft is also characterised, almost by definition, by stronger and more distinctive flavours than mainstream beers. This may have encouraged people to try it out of a spirit of experimentation, but are they going to decide that it’s something they want to drink on a regular basis? And it isn’t helped by many craft offerings being hazy or cloudy. There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with that, but it remains something that is perceived by most beer drinkers as offputting.

Craft beer became associated with the stereotypical image of the “hipster”, and was seen as being surrounded by pretentiousness and pseudery. Some craft brewers also saw themselves as engaged in a socio-political crusade rather than just brewing interesting beer, which to some extent limited their appeal and has come to be increasingly at odds with the current Zeitgeist.

In the middle of the 2010s, there was a wave of enthusiasm around craft beer, which could almost be described as a feeding frenzy. Staid family brewers were jumping on the bandwagon in the fear that they might end up being left behind, and all kinds of wacky brewing projects were being launched. I wrote about what appeared to be the peak of the bubble in 2017. As Matthew McAloone says:

“We were expecting it to grow and grow and grow and take over everything, but it just wasn’t what the market wanted and now we know were it’s at, we know how much is up for grabs, there just won’t be as many people able to compete for it."

The craft boom also caught CAMRA like a rabbit in the headlights, and resulted in the ill-advised Revitalisation Project, which didn’t at the end of the day resolve anything. CAMRA beer festivals can now sell keg beers that do not qualify as “real ale”, but there is no clarity as to what is acceptable and what isn’t. “Real Ale” at least is something that can be objectively defined.

The froth had very much gone off the top by 2019, and it was clear by then that expectations for the growth of craft had been grossly over-optimistic. James Watt’s assertion that IPA would eventually replace lager, as lager had replaced bitter, sounded questionable then, and with hindsight seems risible although, as is usually the case with BrewDog, it was probably mostly just a case of courting publicity. The Covid lockdowns and pub closures of 2020-21 dealt a further blow to the market.

There remains a definite niche for interesting, innovative keg and canned beers sold at a premium price, but it’s only a small segment of the overall beer market, and the excitement of ten years ago has pretty much entirely dissipated. I’ve made the point in the past that the enduring legacy of the British craft beer movement is likely to be the presence of a hoppy keg IPA on many bars, of which Neck Oil is possibly the prime example. There recently been an new entrant in the form of Alpacalypse, a collaboration between the independent Salt Brewery and Molson Coors. But the question has to be asked how many of these beers will still be on bars on twenty years’ time. I’m pretty certain Guinness will be, though.

It has to be remembered that beer is a product that is generally consumed in a social context, and drinkers will inevitably be influenced by the choices made by their companions, and feel some kind of desire to fit in. This applies to home drinking too. Most off-trade beer is still drunk in company, not in isolation. And craft, for many people, now comes across as either highly idiosyncratic or just old hat.