Time for change on supermarket shelves

Not a supermarket shelf but demonstrates the problem

A visit to your local supermarket and browsing the bottled beer shelves can actually be quiet fun and interesting if you are minded as such. However its not that easy for the general public to understand why a beer is on a particular shelf and position, so perhaps a change is called for in how this is done.

Supermarkets tend to order beers by brewer and traditionally that's how we have looked at the beer market. You may have a favourite brewer and buy their beers or perhaps you have a favourite brand and that encourages you to buy other beers from the same brewer. Its also true that retailers will ensure the beers that earn the most profit will be in the consumers eye-line as will the faster moving beers for the convenience of the customer. However, with the massive presence of social media and keen interest in craft beers, the term beer style as become more relevant.

Annoyingly brewers don't always make the beer style easy to understand. One brewer will call a beer a pale ale, another will call a similar beer a golden beer whilst another might use the IPA term. Brewers also don't make the style of the beer that obvious on the labelling, indeed in some cases its missing altogether or hidden on the back label which confuses both consumers and retailers alike.

Perhaps its time for the retailers to follow the way they display their wines and order the beers by style/variety. All the IPA's would sit together; all the pale ales would be one and the growing band of porters would sit alongside each other etc. What a difference this could make to how consumers buy their beer. The lucky dip element of choosing a beer to try would be gone as consumers buy from within a favourite style, or perhaps choose a new style to try. Brands will of course always be important and consumers may choose those above beers they don't know so their is still room for the brand builders amongst brewers.

A change in the way beers are displayed with retailers would also put pressure on brewers to sharpen up their game with labelling and descriptions on bottles. The latter has become a very confusing area and there is certainly room for improvement.

Some specialist beer shops do already sell by style and if you check out the online beer shops its very common for beers to be listed by beer style, so come on supermarkets and brewers, time for change on the shelves please.