Huh? v. 2.0

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Huh, indeed.

It seems that article defines "craft beer" as just Brewdog and a handful of other small British breweries.

I briefly glanced at the GBBF site, and in just that couple seconds it is clear to see that there are tons of craft beers that are going to be at the fest.

I read this article today, and it describes the current situation in the UK pretty well. Essentially, you’ve got CAMRA (the Campaign for Real Ale) maintaining a hard line on what they consider ’real ale’ (naturally carbonated, served by traditional methods, etc.) and a new wave of breweries eschewing cask ale and instead opting for keg. As these new breweries don’t fit neatly into CAMRA’s definition of ’real ale’, they are not included in most of CAMRA’s festivals.



The article does well to not alienate CAMRA and recognize the good work they’ve done over the last 40 years. At the same time, the article acknowledges that CAMRA is missing a chance to embrace the emergence of craft breweries like BrewDog, The Kernel, Camden, Magic Rock et al., and their failure to include these breweries in their campaign will likely hurt them somewhere down the road.



N.b. The Kernel and Magic Rock are, in the eyes of many UK craft beer drinkers (and especially myself), two of the best breweries in the UK.

Originally posted by kryptic
Huh, indeed.

It seems that article defines "craft beer" as just Brewdog and a handful of other small British breweries.

I briefly glanced at the GBBF site, and in just that couple seconds it is clear to see that there are tons of craft beers that are going to be at the fest.

GBBF happened a month ago.

The author uses the term ’craft’ to describe a group of new breweries that have sprang up in the last couple years who take a vastly different approach to brewing than their predecessors, i.e. making more progressive beers, using alternative forms of branding and marketing and, most importantly where CAMRA is concerned, kegging their beer rather than putting it in cask.

Originally posted by Leighton

Originally posted by kryptic
Huh, indeed.

It seems that article defines "craft beer" as just Brewdog and a handful of other small British breweries.

I briefly glanced at the GBBF site, and in just that couple seconds it is clear to see that there are tons of craft beers that are going to be at the fest.

GBBF happened a month ago.

The author uses the term ’craft’ to describe a group of new breweries that have sprang up in the last couple years who take a vastly different approach to brewing than their predecessors, i.e. making more progressive beers, using alternative forms of branding and marketing and, most importantly where CAMRA is concerned, kegging their beer rather than putting it in cask.

OK. I was confused as I saw dozens and dozens of craft breweries on the GBBF site when I looked. They must use the term over there to only mean local British breweries, not in the way all of us on this site use the term.

Originally posted by kryptic

OK. I was confused as I saw dozens and dozens of craft breweries on the GBBF site when I looked. They must use the term over there to only mean local British breweries, not in the way all of us on this site use the term.


I doubt you would find a consensus on RB as to how ’craft beer’ is defined; however, this article doesn’t stray from my definition of craft beer, that is, beer from a brewer that brings a higher level of care/ingenuity/progressiveness to their brewing than their forebears. The author doesn’t say anything about ’local beer’ being craft. Indeed, BrewDog is located in northern Scotland while The Kernel is located in southern England (London).

I’d be curious to know if the author of this article considers breweries that make cask beer craft breweries. I would, as there are a number of outstanding, progressive breweries that focus on cask beer (see Buxton, Dark Star, Bristol, Marble).

Originally posted by Leighton
I doubt you would find a consensus on RB as to how ’craft beer’ is defined; however, this article doesn’t stray from my definition of craft beer, that is, beer from a brewer that brings a higher level of care/ingenuity/progressiveness to their brewing than their forebears. The author doesn’t say anything about ’local beer’ being craft. Indeed, BrewDog is located in northern Scotland while The Kernel is located in southern England (London).

The article specifically states that the GBBF excluded "craft beer". Just looking at the first few foreign beers on their (GBBF) site I see 10 Barrel, Ballast Point, Boulevard. All of which not one person on this site would argue are not craft breweries. If you scroll down further, you see dozens of other craft beers listed too.

Originally posted by kryptic

Originally posted by Leighton
I doubt you would find a consensus on RB as to how ’craft beer’ is defined; however, this article doesn’t stray from my definition of craft beer, that is, beer from a brewer that brings a higher level of care/ingenuity/progressiveness to their brewing than their forebears. The author doesn’t say anything about ’local beer’ being craft. Indeed, BrewDog is located in northern Scotland while The Kernel is located in southern England (London).

The article specifically states that the GBBF excluded "craft beer". Just looking at the first few foreign beers on their (GBBF) site I see 10 Barrel, Ballast Point, Boulevard. All of which not one person on this site would argue are not craft breweries. If you scroll down further, you see dozens of other craft beers listed too.

I agree - the author does himself something of a disservice there. But the inclusion of American breweries at GBBF is kind of funny, because all the American breweries put a beer in cask especially for the festival, and only because the beer is served on cask are they permitted. None of the American breweries that have come to GBBF (as far as I know) specialize in cask beer. If these American breweries wanted to send over kegs, I can all but guarantee they would not get served at GBBF.

The definition of ’craft beer’, though, is not the point of this article. The article is about the growing rift between old school and new school; the author takes a shortcut by using the catch-all term ’craft’, but I would hope most people can understand his meaning.

It is not true to say that Brewdog was excluded from the festival. In fact CAMRA entered into a contract with Brewdog for them to have their own bar. Something went wrong and, in the end, the contract was canecelled. Whose fault that was depends on whose side of the story you believe. However, at least part of problem was that Brewdog didn’t cough up the cash on time.

Im with kryptic here. Brewdog makes some naturallyfermented beers served by traditional manner (keg cask and bottle). The article implies the ony difference as they having new marketting strategies and being more open minded to the the brewing technique and style. The latter. Ould be argued as a discent against real ale, but the poin is that there are beers on the list that do the same.

Originally posted by Leighton

Originally posted by kryptic

Originally posted by Leighton
I doubt you would find a consensus on RB as to how ’craft beer’ is defined; however, this article doesn’t stray from my definition of craft beer, that is, beer from a brewer that brings a higher level of care/ingenuity/progressiveness to their brewing than their forebears. The author doesn’t say anything about ’local beer’ being craft. Indeed, BrewDog is located in northern Scotland while The Kernel is located in southern England (London).

The article specifically states that the GBBF excluded "craft beer". Just looking at the first few foreign beers on their (GBBF) site I see 10 Barrel, Ballast Point, Boulevard. All of which not one person on this site would argue are not craft breweries. If you scroll down further, you see dozens of other craft beers listed too.

I agree - the author does himself something of a disservice there. But the inclusion of American breweries at GBBF is kind of funny, because all the American breweries put a beer in cask especially for the festival, and only because the beer is served on cask are they permitted. None of the American breweries that have come to GBBF (as far as I know) specialize in cask beer. If these American breweries wanted to send over kegs, I can all but guarantee they would not get served at GBBF.

The definition of ’craft beer’, though, is not the point of this article. The article is about the growing rift between old school and new school; the author takes a shortcut by using the catch-all term ’craft’, but I would hope most people can understand his meaning.

I agree with most of what you said here. That really has nothing to do with my initial comment though.

My only point was the author of the article immediately starts out by saying craft beers were excluded from the fest, when even a cursory glance at the GBBF site shows that not only were they not excluded, but dozens and dozens of craft breweries were invited to the fest