Tuesday, March 27, 2007

Lewe's Arms Race

A story I've been following on the Brookston Beer Bulletin: There's an interesting battle of wills taking place in the Lewes Arms pub in East Sussex, England. It seems large English brewer Greene King has bought the pub, replacing the fine local beer they normally serve with Folger's Crys...er...their own beer.

Needless to say, this has incensed the locals, who love their pub and their brewery. A boycott is in effect and business is off 90%.

I like Greene King's beers, but their attitude sucks. It's good to see a grassroots effort against corporate arrogance working for a change.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Too bad the people of America don't feel that way about their country. When are you and Bits going to come and meet Mr. Nibbles the Sparkly Sailor?

Chemgeek said...

A similar thing happened here in my local locality, but on a MUCH smaller scale. The only local brewpub was bought out by the local microbrewery. Now there are no craft brews, just beers from the microbrewery.

Sure, it's still craft beer (from the microbrewery), but it's not "crafted" beer.

I was hoping the microbrewery would use the brewpub as a place to experiment and make a few small scale batches, but nope. They just sold the brewery equipment.