Guinness sales in decline

alibabba

After listening to this topic on the Last Word recently, it reminded me of the conversation I had with a rep who told me the following story :

When the brew is been made, any mistakes which results in the overall performance & shows up in the overall taste is noted by the company. This in turn causes different grades of the brew to be established. The rep said that it was possible to order three different grades of the brew from the company because of this brewing error.

We all know the pub around town that has mighty porter 24/7.
And we also know the pubs to stay out of if we are looking for good porter.
And I dont buy the excuse about how the lines aren't cleaned. I worked in a bar where I cleaned the lines myself and still didnt improve the taste compared to the taste in Murphys Bar, Galway.

Has anyone else ever heard of this story about different grades of guinness or is it just a fable ?
How else can the inconsistency be explained ?

Blub2k4

I call a fable on that one.

Why would they bother with the whole quality team thing if it was just a case of sending out good guiness?

alibabba

Blub2k4 wrote:

I call a fable on that one.

Why would they bother with the whole quality team thing if it was just a case of sending out good guiness?

I asked the quality team when they called one day to explain this exact same fable ....... he put it down to a 'bad barrel'.

SO guinness dont deny that there are bad barrels !

Blub2k4

alibabba wrote:

I asked the quality team when they called one day to explain this exact same fable ....... he put it down to a 'bad barrel'.

SO guinness dont deny that there are bad barrels !

Of course they wouldn't deny a bad barrel, that's why they have a system for refunding ullage, or bad barrels.
But that isn't the same as having different grades.

MrPudding

Blub2k4 wrote:

Of course they wouldn't deny a bad barrel, that's why they have a system for refunding ullage, or bad barrels.
But that isn't the same as having different grades.

Agreed. I have come across bad barrels but never heard of the grade thing. Is this supposed to be Dublin only?

I did ordering and dealt with reps for a hotel I was deputy manager for in the North a bunch of years ago. I never heard any such thing.

MrP

fillmore jive

I've never once had a bad pint of Guiness, but I've numberous bad pints of beer, so I think it's a fable. You don't even get bad cans of it, but you do with beer etc.

stepbar

Is a lot of it not got to do with the chilling facilities in the bar / hotel ? However its rare that I would come across a bad pint of Guinness, The only time I remember drinking a bad one was when I was having dinner in Captain America's on Grafton St... Pure ****e ....

noby

Not 'bad' pints per se, but you do notice a better quality pint. Stepbar, I agree with you on the chilling. Alot of bars/hotels chill their beer so much you can't even taste your drink.

As for the thread title, if not the topic, I read about the decline in sales in the times last week. They're blaming the decline in pub trade, and increase in OL sales, and how Guinness isn't traditionally a 'drink at home' beer. While I can't remember the figures they're talking about 10% or so drop in sales the last few years. Pretty substancial, if you ask me. But I never think it's a bad thing for one of the majors to be doing badly. It means (a) the smaller guys must be doping a little better and (b) they might pull the finger out, and do something about it. Like AB in America, releasing several different, and seasonal, beers to target the craft brew market. Kind of how the Brewhouse series should have been.

Saruman

I have noticed some places have bad guiness... not sure if what you were told is true though..

Anwyay whats with the title? Sales in decline??? It was not even mentioned in the post... did you forget to mention it or did you make a mistake with title?

Louise77

Worked for Guinness for 4 years and can categorically deny the existance of this ridiculous fable, why would we jeapordise our sales by sending out inferior product? I hate these urban myths...

The Sweeper

Louise77 wrote:

Worked for Guinness for 4 years and can categorically deny the existance of this ridiculous fable, why would we jeapordise our sales by sending out inferior product? I hate these urban myths...

Just a point - I think you'll find that the ridiculous fable exists no matter how much you deny it (semantics), but feel free to continue to refute people's wild assertions about how certain brews are made.

noby

Guinness, of all people, are surely well aware of the vast quantity of ridiculous fables, or urban myths, that surround their beers. It works better than any marketing campaign.

rubadub

I have recently been steering clear of guinness, I have been getting nothing but crap, and pints I see people drinking do not look the best. I think it is more to do with untrained bar staff than anything else. I have turned to decent beer on tap and bottles, far more pubs have a good selection these days.

BLITZ_Molloy

Some bar staff just don't give a ****. Ordered a pint of Guinness for the first time in ages in my local (usually raiding the exotic beers fridge instead) and the girl poured it in one go.

alibabba

I cant believe that some of ye in this thread cannt notice a big difference in the pint. The person who said they never ever tasted a bad pint should get their taste buds checked out ... im serious.

Im in Galway, and I can explain a very simple test to back up this so-called myth / fable.

Four pubs in town, all busy pubs.
Two of them have excellent guinness, very good quality, ALL the time.

The other two, you know before even going into the pub, that you cant order it, the quality is that bad. Mouldy pints i call them.

And in the pub I worked in for years, the guinness barrell was directly under the bar, the lines were cleaned and maintained excellently, and we still couldnt match the quality and taste compared to the good guinness in the good pubs. Why is this ........... can someone please explain this ?

I understand there are certain conditions in the bar that influence the taste, but I for one have worked in a bar that tried their best to get it right, but couldnt improve the taste to the class of 'a mighty pint'.

Civilian_Target

alibabba wrote:

And in the pub I worked in for years, the guinness barrell was directly under the bar, the lines were cleaned and maintained excellently, and we still couldnt match the quality and taste compared to the good guinness in the good pubs. Why is this ........... can someone please explain this ?

Crap pouring technique? Too much gas? Not fresh enough?

alibabba

Civilian_Target wrote:

Crap pouring technique? Too much gas? Not fresh enough?

Ah come on, we are talking about a HUGE difference in quality/taste here, nothing that can be explained from poor pouring technique? Too much gas? Not fresh enough?

Like I said, i worked in this pub, I didnt use a poor pouring technique, it was fresh, there wasnt too much gas. Myself and the owner couldnt not do anything to improve it. What we were tasting was what was coming out of the barrell. FACT. And it wasnt as good as other guinness we tasted around town. THat would imply a DIFFERENCE in quality or a DIFFERENCE in taste. Some would describe this a DIFFERENT GRADES.

And until someone can explain this difference to me, im a bit skeptical on the matter. But I would love to be proved wrong, cos Im not against guinness by all means.

BTW :
Walk into the Kings Head in Galway , taste a pint for yourself ...
Then walk out the door and across into Murphys pub. Taste a pint in there.

HUGE HUGE difference. And nothing to do with your explainations.

The Sweeper

alibabba wrote:

Like I said, i worked in this pub, I didnt use a poor pouring technique, it was fresh, there wasnt too much gas. Myself and the owner couldnt not do anything to improve it. What we were tasting was what was coming out of the barrell. FACT. And it wasnt as good as other guinness we tasted around town. THat would imply a DIFFERENCE in quality or a DIFFERENCE in taste. Some would describe this a DIFFERENT GRADES.

So did the owner not phone guinness, by this reckoning, and ask if he could get one of their 'higher grade' barrels and pay a bit more for better product?

alibabba

Minesajackdaniels wrote:

So did the owner not phone guinness, by this reckoning, and ask if he could get one of their 'higher grade' barrels and pay a bit more for better product?

Of course he complained about it, guinness just told him to leave any barrells aside with labels on them and they would replace them at next collection.

The Sweeper

alibabba wrote:

Of course he complained about it, guinness just told him to leave any barrells aside with labels on them and they would replace them at next collection.

Surely that makes no sense. Wouldn't that be a prime moment for a sales rep to say "but sir, if you would like to buy some of THIS variety"? If guinness had different grades of product, surely someone in the business would be informed of this so they could buy these grades - at a premium - for their own business?

alibabba

Minesajackdaniels wrote:

Surely that makes no sense. Wouldn't that be a prime moment for a sales rep to say "but sir, if you would like to buy some of THIS variety"? If guinness had different grades of product, surely someone in the business would be informed of this so they could buy these grades - at a premium - for their own business?

Yes, I agree, none of it makes sense. If it was me that owned the bar, Id ask Guinness to give me whatever barrells they are giving to Murphys Bar, Id like to see the difference then.

My brother in law had a house party once, I bought a barrell of guinness off a bar in town that was famous for its guinness and brought it out to the house. My brother in law borrowed a line / cooler from our local, which doesnt have good guinness. The line & cooler was actually taken from the bar, and was not a spare one. Everyone was gob-smacked at the difference in taste. It actually ended up been the main topic of conversation at the party. Even the bar owner asked me where in the name of god did I get that barrell of guinness from, he said he could do with a summer's supply of that stuff .... FACT

Like I said before, im not against guinness really, just would lke to get a good answer to my query.

The Sweeper

Hmmm - I have no idea if this is a potential theory - does anybody know how storage temperature and use-by dates would affect kegs of guinness and therefore potentially the quality of the product therein? I know you can buy kegs of beer closer to it's expiry date for a cheaper price on special sometimes...

[Edit]

Right I've raided the opinion-bank of one of my CAMRA mates, who is something of a conosser [sic] of fine beverages. He maintains the influential factors on the quality of a pint of guinness - or any beer - is as follows:

• Type of gas the bar uses.
• Stability of temperature in the cellar/wherever the keg is stored.
• Throughput - e.g. how much does the pub sell, does the beer sit in the lines for a long time. (He argues that it doesn't matter how long the line is necessarily, as long as you're pulling pints out of it regularly. If beer sits for aeons in a short line, that's worse than beer flowing quickly from keg to glass through a long line.)
• The cleaning fluid used in the pub glasses.

In other words, if you're leaving a keg under the bar in your non-temperature-controlled pub on the basis that Guinness is better through a shorter line, you may not be doing yourself any favours...

bigears

Most draught setups would put in place a 'balanced' system where the various factors come into play. The combination of these factors (keg temperature, carbonation level, length and width of beer line) can all have an effect on the beer that is dispensed. This can quickly get complicated where different kegs, different carbonating levels etc. are involved. I have heard that the pubs themselves no longer look after all of this and the suppliers would set it all up, but I'm not certain if this is the case. This link gives a summary of what's involved and lists possible answers where the beer is 'off'

http://www.hbd.org/clubs/franklin/public_html/docs/balance.html

Whether this is a factor for Guinness I'm not too sure. It is definitely better in some pubs than others. The same applies to Beamish and Murphy's so I doubt very much that Guinness have different 'grades' doing the rounds. This would be very damaging to the pubs who allegedly serve it (especially where there is no price differential) and to Guinness itself.

Personally I believe throughput is a big factor. I quite fancy a pint of Beamish and I will happily drink it in a decent old man's pub where I know it has a regular flow. However I would never drink it in a superpub/trendy pub as it just wouldn't shift fast enough. Guinness is a safer bet in this case.

rubadub

I heard the grades theory years back from a mate whos uncle worked there, but he said the grades was way back before the 60's.

Minesajackdaniels wrote:

• Type of gas the bar uses.
• Stability of temperature in the cellar/wherever the keg is stored.
• Throughput - e.g. how much does the pub sell, does the beer sit in the lines for a long time. (He argues that it doesn't matter how long the line is necessarily, as long as you're pulling pints out of it regularly. If beer sits for aeons in a short line, that's worse than beer flowing quickly from keg to glass through a long line.)
• The cleaning fluid used in the pub glasses.

.

Those CAMRA lads know their stuff. All the above is very true and the same batch treated differently can make a huge difference.
Gas- supposed to be a blend of nitrogen/carbon dioxide for guinness. Foreign pubs can be totally ignorant of this. The nitrogen gives it the smaller bubble/creamy head. The gas should be set at a specific pressure, many pubs will not bother to have their pressure meters checked/calibrated, so could be using a 30 year old guage which is knackered.

Stability- why beer is stored in cold cellars, should be bunched up together so temp fluctuations are minimised.

Throughput- big factor, I remember getting murphys on offer in college, everybody was drinking it and it was gorgeous. Same went for happy hours, me and the mates would drink the best part of a keg of bulmers in a few hours in one pub in town, was lovely stuff. Sadly most places with high output have bad poureres or glasses, think festivals.

Cleaning fluid- major factor! I was always disgusted with the guinness hop store, some of the worst heads ever. Glasses should ideally be rinsed with boiling hot water several times and then with cold clean water to get ALL residues out. Old glasses with tiny scratches should be tossed. Minute traces of detergen can ruin the taste of a pint and destroy the head.

The Sweeper

My mate also gave me a lecture in his bar cold room recently, I stood there shivering me bits off while he explained how to store, tap and monitor kegs of ale for a consistently good pint.

beardybrewer

Back to the original question, I met a guy once whose sister ran a pub. His theory was that the best Guinness was in the low numbered batches (or whatever numbering system they have). He said these went to the pubs in the country as the farmers were the backbone of the customer base.

Oh, and I've had at least 2 bad pints (separate occassions). I mean undrinkable pints, actually rotten. To me, so-so pints of Guinness are the norm (meaning like a can or slightly better) I know its just snobbery and don't really mind it because after half a pint you don't notice. Speaking of, I absolutely hate when they try to disguise a mediocre pint with the "extra cold" trick. A real test to me is to wait and warm the pint in my hands for 10+ minutes and paying attention to the finish.