Let's kick off with older of the two tables, wjhich shows the state of play back in the mid-1970s, when the Big Six was a boout at its peak.
Between them the Big Six owned getting on for 40,000 on licences. Now I'm not sure if that's only pubs. I suspect not. I have a feeling, given the size of the total, that there are other non-pub on licences included.
The Big Six weren't all roughly equal. Bass Charrington was significantly bigger than anyone else. They owned more pubs and their share of beer sales was larger. They had almost double the mnarket share of the two smallest, Watney and Scottish & Newcastle. The latter owned fewer pubs than the others because much of the trade in Scotland was nominally free. Though, in practice, most pubs North of the border were tied through loans.
Significantly, the Big Six between them owned almost three times as many pubs as all the other breweries combined. It should really be the Big Seven, but CAMRA generally left them out as they didn't have a tied estate. They had a diifferent model to all the other breweries, providing bottled Guinness for other breweries' pubs.
| Pub ownership 1974 - 1976 | ||||
| Bewery | Uk Breweries | % beer sales | On Licences (1974) | % On Licences |
| Bass Charrington | 12 | 20 | 9,256 | 8.15% |
| Allied Breweries | 7 | 17 | 7,665 | 6.75% |
| Whitbread | 19 | 13 | 7,865 | 6.92% |
| Watney/Grand Met | 8 | 12 | 5,946 | 5.23% |
| Scottish & Newcastle | 3 | 11 | 1,678 | 1.48% |
| Courage | 8 | 9 | 5,921 | 5.21% |
| Guinness | 1 | 9 | 0 | 0 |
| Total Big Seven | 58 | 91 | 38,331 | 33.7% |
| Others | 89 | 9 | 13,800 | 12.1% |
| Tied Trade | 52,131 | 45.9% | ||
| Free Trade | 61,498 | 54.1% | ||
| Total | 147 | 100 | 113,629 | |
| Source: | ||||
| “The Brewing Industry, a Guide to Historical Records” by Lesley Richmond & Alison Turton. | ||||
| Notes: | ||||
| No. breweries and % beer sales 1976 | ||||
| No. on licences 1974 | ||||
The situation today looks very different, with most of the large brewing groups owning no pubs. The exception being Heineken. Though two-thirds of the tied houses belong to just three breweries: Mastons, Greene King and Heineken. The latter two have estates approaching those of the BIG Six in size.
| Brewery-owned pubs in 2017 | |
| Brewery | No. pubs |
| Adnams & Co PLC | 49 |
| Anheuser Busch Inbev UK | 0 |
| Arkell's Brewery Ltd | 96 |
| Asahi UK | 4 |
| George Bateman & Son Ltd | 48 |
| Daniel Batham & Son Ltd | 11 |
| S. A. Brain & Co Ltd | 203 |
| Brewdog | 34 |
| C & C Group PLC | 0 |
| Camerons Brewery Ltd. | 58 |
| Carlsberg UK Ltd. | 0 |
| Donnington Brewery | 17 |
| Elgood & Sons Ltd | 28 |
| Everards Brewery Ltd | 172 |
| Felinfoel Brewery Co Ltd. | 73 |
| Fuller. Smith & Turner PLC | 373 |
| Greene King PLC | 3,048 |
| Hall & Woodhouse Ltd | 188 |
| Harvey & Sons (Lewes) Ltd. | 48 |
| Heineken UK | 2,836 |
| Holden's Brewery | 21 |
| Joseph Holt Ltd. | 128 |
| Hook Noiton Brewery Co. Ltd. | 36 |
| Hydes Brewery Ltd. | 53 |
| J W Lees & Co. (Brewers) Ltd | 141 |
| Liberation Group (Butcombe) | 69 |
| Marston's PLC | 1,421 |
| McMullen & Sons Ltd. | 125 |
| Molson Coors (UK) Brewers | 0 |
| J.C. & R.H. Palmer Ltd | 54 |
| Frederlc Robinson Ltd | 261 |
| St Austell Brewery Co. Ltd | 176 |
| Shepherd Neame Ltd. | 314 |
| Samuel Smith Old Brewery | 300 |
| Timothy Taylor & Co.Ltd. | 20 |
| T & R Theakston Ltd | 0 |
| Daniel Thwaites PLC | 248 |
| Wadworth & Co Ltd. | 224 |
| Charless Wells | 186 |
| Total | 11,063 |
| Source: | |
| BBPS Statistical Handbook 2018, pages 70 - 71. | |
Bass Charrington once owned almost as many pubs as the total number of brewery-owned pubs today.
Ron, As a man who likes numbers would you consider extending your 2017 table? I'd be interested in adding for each brewery volume on trade in own pubs, volume on trade in others pubs and volume off trade. Not sure this data is available but would be an interesting take on the various business models brewers are using today.I would suspect Charles Wells would be about 90% on trade in own pubs while Brewdog would be about 90% off trade.
ReplyDeletePlease excuse the ignorance, but why was Guinness able to sell so much beer while breaking with the standard model of selling through pubs? Did anyone else manage to break wih the pub sale model on a large scale?
ReplyDeleteAnonymous,
ReplyDeletepartly because Guinness allowed the other brewery to do the bottling and so get some of the profit. Also because Guinness got in early before the tied house system was fully in operation and had established their beer as a must have in pubs. And Guinness Extra Stout didn't usually directly compete with a major brand of the brewery that owned the pub.
Bass and Worthington Pale Ale was also commonly available in other brewery's pubs, for much the same reasons as Guinness.
Guinness were worried in the 1980s that the Big Six might screw them over. Especially when they started flirting with other Irish Stout producers like Murphy. Which is why they grassed them up to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, prompting the investigation into the tied house system that ended up with the Beer Orders.
Alan Scott,
ReplyDeletethat information isn't available.
I am sure you are right about the non-pub licences. In the 1970s all the big brewers were keen to get into the hotel trade. S&N had quite a few IIRC and of course Grand Metropolitan originated as a hotels business.
ReplyDelete