A few alternatives to the Great British Beer Festival

After the shock news regarding the massive loss racked up by last month’s Great British Beer Festival, and the rather less shocking follow-up, that next year’s planned event, will not now be going ahead, it’s time for more than a little soul-searching. That’s something to leave to CAMRA’s national executive, their advisors and their accountants. What follows instead is my own take, not so much on what might have gone wrong, but on what I see as an undercurrent and change in public perception, which will almost certainly mean that 2025’s festival, is the last of these “big ticket” events.

CAMRA as a campaigning organisation, representing beer lovers, has been running festivals in praise of our national drink, for the last half century. The honour of holding the first UK beer festival, belongs to CAMRA’s Cambridge branch who, in July 1974, organised a four-day event at the city’s Corn Exchange. With 6,000 eager drinkers in attendance, the festival was a great success, and proved to the sceptical big brewing concerns that cask ale (Real Ale), could be kept and served in good condition at venues other than a pub.

Three months after the Cambridge event, Stafford & Stone CAMRA branch, organised a similar festival of their own, and a year later the first Kent Beer Festival took place at Canterbury's Dane John Gardens. The event was held in a marquee and was organised by a lady called Gill Keay (nee Knight), who I first met a year earlier, when a former school friend and I attended our first CAMRA meeting at the City Arms, close to Canterbury’s imposing cathedral. In an extraordinary feat of endurance, Gill went on to run a further 40 Kent Beer Festivals, before finally stepping down for a well-deserved rest in 2014.

1975, saw CAMRA holding its first national beer festival, held at the old flower market in London’s Covent Garden. Billed as the Covent Garden Beer Exhibition, the event was a huge success, that helped introduce the delights of cask beer to a much wider, and appreciative audience. I attended the Friday lunchtime session with a friend from university, and we were bowled over by the number of independent breweries with beer on sale at the event. We returned the following evening, but with queues snaking right around the outside of the building, we were unable to gain admittance. 

Two years later, the first "proper" Great British Beer Festival was held at London’s Alexandra Palace. During the 1980’s the event moved around a bit, with events taking place at Bingley Hall in Birmingham, the Queen's Hall in Leeds, and the Brighton Metropole. The latter venue was handy for those of us living in West Kent. The festival returned to London in 1991, when the event was held at the Dockland's Arena. This was a short-lived concert, sports and exhibition centre on the Isle of Dogs. The venue was totally unsuitable for an event like GBBF, and I remember my friends and I coming away feeling very disappointed. (CAMRA ought perhaps to have remembered this disastrous flirtation with a modern exhibition centre, even if it was over 30 years ago!) Since then, and until this year, the festival remained in the capital using both Earl’s Court and Olympia as its base.

The emphasis at those early CAMRA festivals, was on showcasing beers from the 171 remaining independent brewers, in the UK, most of which were family-owned concerns. Whilst not all of these companies supplied beers to GBBF, many of them did, meaning that even four decades ago, there was plenty of variety for all but the most fastidious of beer drinkers to chose from. Where I think things started to go wrong was the unforeseen, but very welcome appearance of a whole generation of new start-up breweries, bringing a variety of different beers and different styles.

Today the number of active breweries in the UK stands at 1641, a decrease of 136 from the previous year, but still almost 10 times the total existing in 1975. This increase is mirrored roughly, by the number of beers on sale at GBBF – 900, compared the 100 or so available to drinkers at the Covent Garden event. I personally feel that 100 different beers are more than adequate, although I am prepared to compromise slightly for a major event, such as GBBF. Unfortunately, that figure is pure conjecture now, although I’m still convinced that 900 different beers is way too many, in fact it’s pointless, as too much choice is actually less choice. By stocking such a crazy amount, festival organisers are adding to their expenses unnecessarily and are running the risk of the event making a loss, as witnessed last month.

Moving away from the UK and across the North Sea to Germany, and the granddaddy of all beer festivals, Oktoberfest. This world-famous event is over 200 years old, and is also very commercial, but you won’t find hundreds of different beers on sale there. Instead, only six breweries are allowed to sell the beers at the event, and then you will only find two or three brews from each of these companies on sale. Only the six large breweries that brew inside Munich’s city limits are allowed to supply beer to the Oktoberfest, and these concerns are Augustinerbräu München, Hacker–Pschorr, Hofbräu, Löwenbräu, Paulaner, and Spaten-Franziskaner-Bräu.

Normally only one style of beer is served, Festbier, a strong, golden coloured, lager-style beer with an abv ranging from 5.9% -6.3%. In these health-conscious times, a 0.5%, low alcohol, Festbier is also normally available. Mrs PBT’s enjoyed a litre (Maβ) of the latter, during our 2017, family visit to Oktoberfest. Some of the beer tents also stock a wheat, or Weiβbier, from one or more of the six breweries, permitted to supply the festival. You are probably getting the picture by now, the most famous beer festival in the world, only has a dozen or so different beers on sale, but what it lacks in variety, it more than makes up for in the atmosphere, which is electric. people from all over the world gather to celebrate and make new friends from diverse backgrounds as they share a table in one of the massive beer tents.

The hearty "Prost!" (cheers) echoing throughout the grounds creates a sense of unity and celebration that is truly contagious. It’s all very different from ticking off numerous half-pints’ produced by breweries you’ve never heard of, and which after a while, all start to taste the same anyway. Of course, people have fun at GBBF, but it’s a lot more subdued, and ends to take place amongst small groups, most of whom already know each other, and may even belong to the same CAMRA branch.

It’s doubtful that such an approach would work in the UK, but you could still have a slimmed down event with say, five or six examples drawn from the myriad of different beer styles brewed in Britain, today. So why not start with mild (light & dark), bitter – both ordinary & best, golden ale, pale ale, India Pale Ale, porter, stout, old ale, barley wine, stock ale – the list goes on and the possibilities are endless. People would come for the chance of meeting up with friends, mixed with the chance of sampling the best that Britain’s brewing industry, with its long heritage, has to offer. There would be no more furtive ticking of scruffily drawn up, hand written beer lists, instead people would be there for the chance to enjoy beers in all its styles and glories, whilst conversing and engaging with their fellow men and women.

Proper food and decent entertainment would be provided, much the same as at present, but whether such an event will ever take place now, given the recent catastrophic failure of GBBF 2025, is highly improbable. Perhaps the way forward is in more local events, organised by individual CAMRA branches – assuming they’ve still got sufficient fit and able-bodied volunteers available to staff the event. Alternatively, an event staged by a local pub is every bit as enjoyable, as witnessed by the highly successful, twice-yearly festival, hosted by the Halfway House, at Brenchley, whose laid-back event, I enjoyed last Bank Holiday weekend. 

And for those who fancy something a little more livelier, then why not plan a trip to Munich’s Oktoberfest next year? There’s also Annafest- an outdoor event that takes place on a wooded hillside overlooking the small Franconian town of Forchheim, situated roughly halfway between Nuremberg and Bamberg. 

Alternatively, slightly earlier in the year, spend a few days at Frankenfest, another outdoor beer festival, this time held in the spacious moat of the massive castle that dominates the skyline of the old city of Nuremberg. There are many more beers on sale there, than at the other two festivals, with 25 - 30 mainly local breweries exhibiting their wares, so this event is much more like a British beer festival, and with sensible, half litre measures, rather than unwieldy litre Maβ Krugs, there’s something to keep the "tickers" amongst us, happy as well.