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Monday, 1 December 2008

Profiteering Whitbread

As threatened, I've worked out what Whitbread's total margins were on brewing for every year of WW I. The increased margin per barrel more than offset any fall in output. In the year ending July 1919, Whitbread brewed almost exactly the same volume of Ale as in 1915, yet their margin had increased several fold. Cheeky bastards, eh?

Brewing logs are so full of information. I keep finding more in them. Maybe, one day, I'll understand them 100%. Whitbread's have given me a great insight into their finances during the war.



Profiteering 1914 - 1919

Here's an overview of the Ales Whitbread brewed during the war and how much their margin was on them:


It certainly doesn't look as if Whibread suffered financially because of the war.

1 comment:

  1. Zythophile5 December 2008 at 15:53

    To be fair, brewers had to pay Excess Profits Duty, which began, at least, at50 per cent on profits above the pre-war level, though as Gourvish and Wilson show (The British Brewing Industry 1830-1980, pp332-335, brewers' profits leapt by mpre tjhan 50 per cent on average.

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