Let’s be honest, its hard to beat a freshly poured pint in a pub with your pals. We all know this year has been beyond ordinary and for the majority of the year beer lovers haven't been able to visit their favourite pubs and still can't or are hesitant to.
With pubs and taprooms closing most of the breweries we work with lost the majority of their business when cask and keg sales dropped to 0. Undoubtedly craft beer breweries had to adapt during lockdown and the few lucky breweries with in-house canning or bottling machines could shift towards small-pack (bottles and cans) fairly easily. Some breweries also continued to supply their loyal local customers with mini-kegs and takeaway pints during lockdown.
Which type of packaging is most common?
The graph below was taken from SIBA’s 2020 British Craft Beer Report and highlights that cask is by far the most used packaging choice for craft beer brewers. Casks have the advantage of being large volume, easily stackable and perfectly reusable if cleaned properly – some of our partners use the same casks since 15+ years👀.
Looking at the graph above, you can see that the relative amount of craft beer packaged in cans has increased over the last few years at the expense of cask and bottled beer sales. Cans are lighter, stackable and easier to recycle and transport. Moreover, beer is highly sensitive to the environment with regards to direct light, oxygen and high temperature. Cans keep the beer safer than bottles in terms of air and also block out UV rays, which can compromise taste over time. Bottles on the other hand are less sensitive to temperature.
Craft beer brewers are undoubtedly becoming more and more creative with the design of their bottles and cans. Special designs, flashy colours, innovative material – our new Bristol selection highlights many of the different things the creative people at craft breweries can come up with.
Overall it seems there is clearly a shift towards small-pack beers in these uncertain times. There are more breweries using bottles than cans at the moment, but could we see this trend towards cans continue as we near 2021? No matter if bottled or canned - we always try pouring our beer into a glass for maximum taste and optimal aroma. What are your thoughts on this? Please let us know in the comments below.
Information taken from:
https://www.siba.co.uk/SIBA-British-Craft-Beer-Report-2020.pdf
https://www.foodbev.com/news/uk-canned-craft-beer-sales-increase-by-327-research-states/
https://www.beerinstitute.org/trends-beer-packaging/
& of course our amazing partner breweries :)
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