After meeting with the organisers of the Perth International Beer Festival, I looked at the website for the event (http://www.beerfest.net.au) and am quite pleased to see what beers they are claiming to have for sale.
Abbott Ale Draft
Augustijn Grand Cru
Barbar
Blond
Winter
Becks
Belhaven
Best Ale
Scottish Stout
Boags Draft
Boddingtons
Coopers
Coopers62
Original Pale Ale
Sparkling Ale
Dark Ale
Mild Ale
Premium Lager
Premium Light
Best Extra Stout
Vintage Ale
Floreffe Double
Gage Roads
Wahoo
Kutt
Premium
Pils
Indian Pale Ale
Green King IPA
Guinness
Heiniken
Hofbrau
Original
Oktoberfest
Hefe Weizen
Dunkel
James Squire
Amber Ale
Golden Ale
Jupiler
Kilkenny
La Chouffe
Little Creatures
Bright Ale
Pils
Rodgers
Pale
Pip Squeek
Maes
Monteiths
Golden
Summer
Radler
Pilsner
Original
Crushed Apple Cider
Celtic
Black
Old Speckled Hen
Pauwell Kwak
Satan Gold
Tiger
Twisted Thisle Ale
TUI
Weihenstephan
Hefe
Kristall
Pilsner
Westmalle Dubbel
Wexford Irish Red Ale
XX Porter
As a man that likes his beer, I can honestly say that there are quite a number of beers that I haven't tried before and some I haven't even heard of.
The claim is that more beers will be coming soon and the ones listed are "some" of the confirmed beers.
Thursday, December 17, 2009
Thursday, December 3, 2009
My meeting with the bar organiser for the Perth International Beer Festival
As you know, I met with the organiser of the bars at the Perth International Beer Festival, which is to be held on February 20 and 21 in 2010.
I would like to say at the outset that I did point out that I don't represent any breweries, as he had thought, and I was simply a member of the drinking public with some strong points of view.
The meeting was very cordial and I put a couple of suggestions to him as to things that could take place. I also offered him the opportunity to pass my contact details onto the main organiser (who came up with the idea) if he wanted to speak to me about entertainment and the like.
I can report a number of changes for next years festival.
The Venue
The venue is now the Supreme Court Gardens, a recommendation I made in my initial letter.
Tickets and general size
Tickets are capped at 5000 each day. They will be $25 each. This will make it easier for the organisers to predict required stock levels on a day by day basis.
Queuing
I discovered in my discussions a number of different things. Firstly, they were in charge of the bars at Stereosonic, where 1 in every 4 drinks was a vodka Redbull. Considering that all the drinks have to go into plastic cups with ice (that is my understanding), it took them longer than expected to serve people, hence the queues at Stereosonic.
Further to that, beer can only be poured out of a tap at the rate of 80mLs per second.
Essentially, there will be some queuing but they have separated the can and bottle sales from the tap beer sales, to prevent cross overs and ideally will provide more options when people get to the bar.
On the plus side, a professional crowd control company has been hired to work the event. This company looks after Subiaco Oval, Stereosonic, etc.
Range of drinks
Gage Roads and Little Creatures have come on board for the Festival in February next year and all the Western Australian microbreweries have been contacted. However, there is some reluctance from some operations for a number of reasons. One of these is cost, as they are not likely to cover their costs. Secondly, the license for the Festival operates on a sale and return system. This means that any undamaged and resaleable cartons have to be returned to the brewery/distributor so they can be used again. This prevents the organisers from selling the beer later on in any way.
Further to that, it appears that some of the breweries are not interested in running separate marquees to represent their own breweries. This is partly because of the cost and partly because they need to hire RSA-trained staff to work the bars and pour their beers.
They are trying to get hold of beers not normally available in Australia, but are forced to go through specific distributor channels. They do not hold an Australian importers license and so it is hard to get a huge range of beverages from overseas. Additionally, stock levels in nearby bottleshops and pubs are so strictly controlled that there is not a sufficient stock of certain products around for them to buy to top up.
One thing I did discover is that UDLs have a 3 month use by date... from canning.
Tastings
They are trying to get tastings this year, however their concern is that it will be difficult to properly pour tastes of beer off the tap and similarly some beers will taste different if poured out of a bottle or jug.
In conclusion, it appears that the organisers are doing their best to get it right. They have taken some very positive steps and my discussions indicate that they are looking at a long term view for the festival.
Hopefully, they will slide me some free tickets and I'll be able to judge for myself.
That's what they are doing (or at least saying they are doing)... what are your thoughts?
I would like to say at the outset that I did point out that I don't represent any breweries, as he had thought, and I was simply a member of the drinking public with some strong points of view.
The meeting was very cordial and I put a couple of suggestions to him as to things that could take place. I also offered him the opportunity to pass my contact details onto the main organiser (who came up with the idea) if he wanted to speak to me about entertainment and the like.
I can report a number of changes for next years festival.
The Venue
The venue is now the Supreme Court Gardens, a recommendation I made in my initial letter.
Tickets and general size
Tickets are capped at 5000 each day. They will be $25 each. This will make it easier for the organisers to predict required stock levels on a day by day basis.
Queuing
I discovered in my discussions a number of different things. Firstly, they were in charge of the bars at Stereosonic, where 1 in every 4 drinks was a vodka Redbull. Considering that all the drinks have to go into plastic cups with ice (that is my understanding), it took them longer than expected to serve people, hence the queues at Stereosonic.
Further to that, beer can only be poured out of a tap at the rate of 80mLs per second.
Essentially, there will be some queuing but they have separated the can and bottle sales from the tap beer sales, to prevent cross overs and ideally will provide more options when people get to the bar.
On the plus side, a professional crowd control company has been hired to work the event. This company looks after Subiaco Oval, Stereosonic, etc.
Range of drinks
Gage Roads and Little Creatures have come on board for the Festival in February next year and all the Western Australian microbreweries have been contacted. However, there is some reluctance from some operations for a number of reasons. One of these is cost, as they are not likely to cover their costs. Secondly, the license for the Festival operates on a sale and return system. This means that any undamaged and resaleable cartons have to be returned to the brewery/distributor so they can be used again. This prevents the organisers from selling the beer later on in any way.
Further to that, it appears that some of the breweries are not interested in running separate marquees to represent their own breweries. This is partly because of the cost and partly because they need to hire RSA-trained staff to work the bars and pour their beers.
They are trying to get hold of beers not normally available in Australia, but are forced to go through specific distributor channels. They do not hold an Australian importers license and so it is hard to get a huge range of beverages from overseas. Additionally, stock levels in nearby bottleshops and pubs are so strictly controlled that there is not a sufficient stock of certain products around for them to buy to top up.
One thing I did discover is that UDLs have a 3 month use by date... from canning.
Tastings
They are trying to get tastings this year, however their concern is that it will be difficult to properly pour tastes of beer off the tap and similarly some beers will taste different if poured out of a bottle or jug.
In conclusion, it appears that the organisers are doing their best to get it right. They have taken some very positive steps and my discussions indicate that they are looking at a long term view for the festival.
Hopefully, they will slide me some free tickets and I'll be able to judge for myself.
That's what they are doing (or at least saying they are doing)... what are your thoughts?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)