Diageo Price Increases

squonk · 13-01-2026 05:30PM #1

Poor old Diageo need to raise providers again to keep manufacturing costs sustainable! Guinness to rise by 7c a pint wholesale cuts. The VFI mention that could be effectively doubled at the bar due to tax. Dong see much tax being on 0.0 though.

https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2026/0113/1552890-diageo-guinness-price-increases/

What’s unusual here is Guinness 0.0 going up 10c. For something that’s basically flavoured water that’s just looking like gouging.

Naturally the VFI are up in arms. I have very little sympathy for them. They led the charge on MUP to protect themselves while failing to diversify or offer any kind of serious innovation.

Personally at this stage I’d rather a few craft beers at home or a few good G&Ts at home of an evening. Put the money into the quality of my at-home drinks selection and meet friends out for a meal or coffee. They can always come back to mine if they want.

BeerNut · 13-01-2026 06:10PM

There isn't a huge difference between the cost of making 0.0 and full-fat Guinness. The excise duty, including VAT, accounts for about 70 cents. Shave a bit off that for the cost of dealcoholisation and a squirt of fructose syrup.

Whether it's gouging depends on where you decide to draw that line. A pint of the beer itself costs pennies to make in the volumes that Diageo makes it. They could sell it for €2 a pint and still make a profit, but they know that punters will happily pay €7+ for it, so they don't.

The VFI will put out the same press release as every year; the media will run the same story as every year; the internet will complain about it for a week or two; and the customers will continue to buy Guinness, in quantity, at whatever the new price is. None of it is news, and nothing changes.

Maybe this year Changing Times will have something to say. Its reason for existence is Diageo price hikes. Will they say theirs will hold steady, making them the budget option, or will they quietly hike theirs too, to maintain brand equity?

dominatinMC · 13-01-2026 08:09PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124144415#Comment_124144415

Well said. It's almost like clockwork at this stage. And you'll have the usual contributors with cliched statements like "the pubs are dead" etc., despite them being packed any weekend I'm out. Despite all the manufactured controversy people are still happy to pay for it.

squonk · 13-01-2026 08:18PM

That’s kind of why I posted really. Pubs are still busy and I feel between them Diageo and the local pub could demand people’s first born as payment for a pint and there’d be the usual controversy but everyone would just go along with it. Definitely, put up or shut up and vote with your feet if you don’t like it.

Not being in my 20s or 30s anymore I haven’t as much interest in paying €7 a point to listen to the usual claptrap you get in some places. They’ll keep up this annual charade unless people decide they’ve had enough and decide regular pub trips aren’t for them anymore. The ten cent increase on 0.0 is a very cynical move.

dominatinMC · 13-01-2026 08:45PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124144801#Comment_124144801

I'm lucky in that my local is €5.5, will probably go up now but I'm willing to accept it. Everything is going up, I don't understand all the outrage when a pint does. Not directed at you BTW, just the usual articles in the media. I suppose as a nation, we're still obsessed, so it's easy click-bait for them.

FWIW, in this era of supposed hyper connectivity, where the reality is that everyone is only superficially connected via screens (and I get the irony of me posting this message anonymously on my phone), the pub is like the last bastion of actual social interaction. That's why I view a pint as more than just liquid in a glass, and am happy to pay a premium for it.

autogrow · 13-01-2026 09:06PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124144415#Comment_124144415

Changing Times are not increasing theirs

BeerNut · 13-01-2026 09:17PM

Huzzah!

zoobizoo · 14-01-2026 09:03AM

I worked In a pub where a 5c increase by the pub on the price of a pint would drive the older regular daily drinkers to other pubs. They lost 10 regular daily drinkers with such an increase and they never returned.

The price increase doesn't have a massive impact on anyone other than heavy drinkers.

If you drink 5 pints a week, it's only an extra €52 per year. If that effects your budget, drink 7/8 fewer pints across the year and you'll be grand. If you drink 10 pints across the week, drink 14/16 fewer pints across the year.

Jorge Jorgesson · 14-01-2026 10:10AM

https://www.who.int/news/item/13-01-2026-cheaper-drinks-will-see-a-rise-in-noncommunicable-diseases-and-injuries

Could it be Diageo saw this coming and got in ahead of another forced rise in drinks. Alcohol and tobacco getting thrown in with the 'sugar tax'.

BeerNut · 14-01-2026 11:04AM

No, they do the same thing every year. The anti-alcohol lobby's continuous call for higher taxes on drink gets balanced by the industry saying they're too high already. The Irish government listens to both and does nothing.

Hodors Appletart · 14-01-2026 11:08AM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124144958#Comment_124144958

yet

squonk · 14-01-2026 01:51PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124145842#Comment_124145842

Personally the price increase wouldn’t affect me that much and agree that it’s the heavier daily drinkers that will suffer.

My contents in the VFI were mainly around the crocodile tears they shed every year. If you’re in business and a supplier hikes their prices where it’ll affect your own business you’ll shop around for another supplier. The reality though is Diageo have a hold on the market as Guinness drinkers won’t switch to anything else so they can effectively charge what they like. The reality also is the VFI members can assist stealthily hike the prices now under cover of free Diageo announcement. I’d wager there is a big crud section in VFI members and food establishments who also received the 9% VAT rate stay at tge last budget.

If the VFI were of any use you would think they could negotiate blanket deals with the breweries on behalf of their members.

What’s worse I see the pub business slipping away without the stakeholders doing anything to stem the decline. They’ve diversified into food now which is something and some have organised themselves into a tour circuit the music around the country but I see a lot thinking “this is what we’ve five the the last 50 years and we’ll keep doing it” which is nuts really.

I know there are threads here on why Guinness is the only thing sone will drink. Maybe if the VFI focused on trying to change that they might earn some respect. Something like do a loss leader with a substitute stout at a cheaper price like 4/5th the cost of Guinness maybe I don’t bite and I won’t solve it but sitting in the middle pretending to be wounded while doing biting about it doesn’t seem to be a strategy

breezy1985 · 14-01-2026 02:00PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124146590#Comment_124146590

Places already do cheaper stouts and always have. It doesn't make much of a dent really.

You are right about the "tried nothing and are all out of options" pubs. The good ones that offer something or have something unique about them are still busy.

cunnifferous · 14-01-2026 02:13PM

Don't understand the brand loyalty to Guinness. Murphy's or Beamish taste better to me.

Pauliedragon · 14-01-2026 02:18PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124146655#Comment_124146655

I find stout drinkers are very set in their ways compared to lager drinkers who a bit more flexible.

BeerNut · 14-01-2026 02:51PM

The people who brought takeaway pints home from the pub during lockdown instead of buying the exact same beer in cans summed it up for me. There is no rational thought in the hardcore Guinness mindset. No other beer will do, and the price is immaterial.

Not the VFI but the LVA did try the bulk-ordering of cheaper beer some years back, with Five Lamps. I guess not enough drinkers were willing to swap from the more familiar brands.

Pubs and breweries also know that there's an innate suspicion among drinkers of cheap beer. A higher price is how you know its premium and therefore better, even though there's zero rationale behind this. I guess there may be an embarrassment factor: being seen in the pub with, say, Beamish or Tuborg might suggest you're not as well off as a Guinness or Carlsberg drinker. A snob and his money are soon parted.

When Guinness drinkers complain about the beer getting too expensive, it's not a call for cheaper stout, it's a call for cheaper Guinness.

Rocket_GD · 14-01-2026 02:54PM

Was out at the weekend, pint of Carlsberg (Diageo) was €7.10, pint of Fosters was €5.

You can be sure that I was on Fosters for the evening.

L1011 · 14-01-2026 02:57PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124146783#Comment_124146783

Stella's "reassuringly expensive" ad campaign to try and move it away from the thug image can likely be partially blamed for this.

I also imagine the Beamish "pensioners pint" in-pub posters of the late 00s actually hurt its chances of getting any other customers.

irish_goat · 14-01-2026 03:05PM

Interestingly, Molson Coors are getting into the UK stout market with a new Caffrey's beer launching this week.

breezy1985 · 14-01-2026 03:08PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124146836#Comment_124146836

They already tried once with Fran Well.

Murphys are trying to make another big push over there too off the back of the current popularity of Irish stout.

BeerNut · 14-01-2026 03:59PM

Ah, but Franciscan Well was a cool craft brand and that's out now. Caffrey's, however, is heritage, and that's very much in. I'm old enough to have drank in the first Caffrey's craze 😮

autogrow · 16-01-2026 06:00PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124146109#Comment_124146109

they have said they are not raising theirs this year last year fixing the price for two years

L1011 · 16-01-2026 06:29PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124153312#Comment_124153312

Won't stop pubs putting the prices up to maintain the "craft tax" / premium margin on craft products.

Pubs that own the sodding brewery in this case.

autogrow · 16-01-2026 07:55PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124146836#Comment_124146836

they are all hopping on the stout market their portfolio of beers is awful , Murphys is flying over there

Blisterman · 19-01-2026 12:20PM

How much do pubs in Great Britain pay for kegs of Guinness? Are we close to a point where other pub groups can start copying Wetherspoons and shipping their kegs in from England?

breezy1985 · 08-03-2026 01:04PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124161528#Comment_124161528

The price can vary wildly because most pubs are not buying direct from Diagio. You are buying from your own pubco. or tied or contracted supplier.

A friend of mine has his primary supply deal with Coors and they sell Guinness at a massively inflated price because it's not their product. He makes no money off it but it's too big a seller to dump it.

rayman10 · 08-03-2026 01:23PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124161528#Comment_124161528

I'd say the bigger pub groups here are on a better dea but you won't hear about it.

Ash.J.Williams · 08-03-2026 01:29PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124144415#Comment_124144415

It doesn't cost pennies to make don't be ridiculous

BeerNut · 08-03-2026 02:29PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124295809#Comment_124295809

I'd love to hear your working-out on this. A home brewer can make a pint of ~1.040 stout for less than a euro. Scale production up to James's Gate level, buying malt directly from the maltster by the truckload and roasting your own barley, and you can shave the per-pint cost down to small change.

Pauliedragon · 08-03-2026 02:47PM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/124295959#Comment_124295959

To be fair the person brewing at home doesn't have staff to pay. A family friend works in the Heineken brewery in Cork and he has to have a science degree to be qualified for his job so I'm guessing he's not on minimum wage and he's part of a massive team all with similar qualifications. I'm not saying brewerys don't make big profits but to say peanuts to make beer is a bit off. The home brewer also doesn't have to adhere to the health and safety guidelines required by law which is also expensive.

Insect Overlord · 08-03-2026 07:55PM

Insane money on advertising as well, probably pushes the price up a fair bit.

Diageo Price Increases

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