Plymouth Beer Festival

Happy Beer Festival folk

Always a highlight of the South West beer scene, Plymouth Beer Festival took place at Plymouth Pavilions last weekend. Normally this event is full to the brim of thirsty drinkers, but this year's event corresponded with a heat wave and although the Pavilions is air-conditioned, the lure of the beach and the BBQ was probably too great for some and numbers were a little down this year.

Beer Festivals are really important show cases for brewers and their brands, a chance for new brewers and beers to make a name for themselves or old favourites to confirm their status. They are also good fun and we must not forget that above all else, drinking beer should always be a social and enjoyable business.

At Plymouth the entertainment was Dr Feelgood, a fine band from the 1970's who I'm delighted to say were really rather good on the night. As for the beers, then I was there with my day job promoting and show casing St Austell Brewery brands. I've learnt over the years that at these events you need both your established brands, but also some new kids on the block to spark some interest. Luckily St Austell have a vibrant new product development programme and this year we took 1913 Stout on draught and a special treat, Proper Job's big brother - BIG JOB!

The heat wave meant stout was always going to be a tough sell, but the Big Job double IPA, even at 8.5% abv got lots of interest, although we did limit servings to a maximum of half a pint. Big Job is a wonderful craft beer in the American IPA style, full of lashings of citrus hops. The flavour is full and zingy but the balance is quite good and its not a real bitter beer.

There were lots of new local beers I'd not tasted before and it was good to see Tavy Ales, of which their Ideal Pale Ale is a very good beer, had three beers on show. Other local brewers included Plymouth Beer Co and also a brewer from Lee Mill called Garage whose beers I did not get to try.

St Austell Brewery Tribute bar

As a marketing man and one that is justly proud of the success of St Austell Tribute, the one thing that was reinforced yet again at this festival was the power of brands. The first beer on our bar to sell it's first barrel was Tribute. Customers love to try new innovative or more likely oddly named beers, but they always come back for a beer they know and love. Many people who go to these events are also bamboozled by a range of beers they have never heard of and often they don't understand the difference in beers styles. So they go back to or stick with the brands they know, enjoy, trust or simply have just heard of before. So I was very pleased to say that Tribute was one of the most popular beers at the event.

Another really pleasing factor was that Tribute came through the beer judging as winner of it's category and will now be short listed for the GBBF 2014. The judging process was interesting. I sat on one panel and was head of my table. Other judges included local radio host, Gordon Sparks, who has a keen interest in real ale; a couple of licensee's and a host of local councillors. An interesting choice but to their credit Plymouth CAMRA had done their homework and used the process as a chance to highlight the plight of local pub closures to their local government representatives.

All told, even thought the wonderful sunny weather had an impact, the festival was a popular local success so well done to CAMRA for organising this once again.