Tuesday 17 August 2021

Town vs. country

Sorry, nothing exciting. Just more ridiculous detail about Dutch interwar brewing.  I find it dead interesting, so you'll have to put up with it. If you haven't simply already buggered off.

The great thing about the Amstel output spreadsheets is that the numbers for Amsterdam and the rest of Holland are listed separately. Revealing very different patterns of consumption. Really very different. Much bigger than I would have predicted. And some unexpectedly popular styles.

In overall sales, Pils was easily the most popular, accounting for just shy of 50%. But that hides very different preferences in the city of Amsterdam. In the capital, Pils was much less popular. And was outsold 3 to 1 by Donker Lagerbier. That was a 3.5% ABV dark Lager. Call my gob smacked. A weedy dark beer was the most popular as late as 1939? I'm now wondering what Heineken's sales were in the city. Did they also mostly sell a weaker dark beer?

It's weirdly similar to the situation in London, where Dark Mild - which was a very similar strength and colour to Donker Lagerbier - was the drinker's favourite. You could call Donker Lagerbier Lager Dark Mild.

Amstel only really sold two beers in Amsterdam: Donker Lagerbier and Pils. Only one other beer managed more than a 1% share: Munchener. While the two favourites took more than 97%.

In the rest of the country, the picture was very different. Sales were still dominated by a small number of beers. Three, in this case: Pils, Licht Lagerbier and Donker Lagerbier. Combined, a mere 95%. With Munchener, again, the only other type breaking the 1% barrier. Though much lower than its share in Amsterdam, Donker Lagerbier was still almost 25%.

Almost forgot. There was a big difference in the proportion of bottled beer: 9.33% in Amsterdam, 18.62% elsewhere.

All this fascinates me. Sorry.

Amstel beer sales in Amsterdam in 1939
Beer production D Stoopenbier total %
  draught bottled draught    
Oud Bruin   6.83   6.83 0.01%
Meibier 78.12 33.76 2.25 114.13 0.21%
Pilsener 11,046.72 1,952.51 227.55 13,226.78 24.78%
Munchener 636.4 234.48 25.05 895.93 1.68%
Bock 229.03 190.88 24.1 444.01 0.83%
Stout 1.77     <1 .77="" td="">
0.00%
Donker Lager 36,565.82 2,116.34   38,682.16 72.48%
Licht Lager         0.00%
Maastrictsch Oud         0.00%
Total 48,557.86 4,534.80 278.95 53,371.61  
Source:
Amstel Litermaat, registers houdende specificaties van de maandproductie, onderverdeeld naar soort van bestemming, met jaaroverzichten held at the Amsterdamse Stadtsarchief, document number 1506 538. 


Amstel beer sales in the Provinces in 1939
Beer production   D Stoopenbier total %
  draught bottled draught    
Oud Bruin 463.39 1,427.93   1,891.32 0.94%
Meibier 249.11 236.63 32.65 518.39 0.26%
Pilsener 84,712.90 14,170.87 2,295.80 101,179.57 50.15%
Munchener 1,816.91 1,288.29 166.65 3,271.85 1.62%
Bock 550.72 862.08 153 1,565.80 0.78%
Stout 86.49     86.49 0.04%
Donker Lager 40,692.42 4,228.10   44,920.52 22.26%
Licht Lager 37,735.07 9,050.41   46,785.48 23.19%
Maastrictsch Oud 1,551.00     1,551.00 0.77%
Total 167,858.01 31,264.31 2,648.10 201,770.42  
Source:
Amstel Litermaat, registers houdende specificaties van de maandproductie, onderverdeeld naar soort van bestemming, met jaaroverzichten held at the Amsterdamse Stadtsarchief, document number 1506 538. 


2 comments:

Thom Farrell said...

Very strange how the decline of dark, low ABV beer in Amsterdam seems to parallel the situation in Britain. Maybe it was part of a trend to drink less, but better?

Anonymous said...

Would be interested to know if Rotterdam and the Hague were more similar to Amsterdam or to the rest of the country.