Beer is Bust beers

To go with yesterday's post of an advert listing various beers on sale here are analyses of most of them.

The ones described as "all" beers selling for 3 shillings or so a quart are those with gravities in the low 1030ºs. They're things like Brown ale, Light Ale and low-gravity Stouts. A beer selling for 3 shillings a quart would be around 10d or 11d when packaged as a half pint.

1/4 (16d) seems like pretty good value for a beer as strong as Bass or Worthington. I'm sure the advert got it wrong when it spoke of red and green labelled Bass. Their Pale Ale came with either a red label (bottle conditioned) or a blue label (brewery conditioned). It was Worthington which had Green Shield, the brewery-conditioned version of White Shield.

In the strong Pale Ale segment, Double Diamond, Tavern and Ben Truman were less value for money, being only 0.5d per half pint cheaper, despite being considerably weaker than Bass or Worthington.

Beer is Bust beers
Year	Brewer	Beer	Style	Price	size	OG	FG	ABV	App. Atten-uation	colour
1955	Bass	Pale Ale (Blue Triangle)	Pale Ale			1063.5	1003.1	7.96	95.12%	19
1955	Bass	Pale Ale (Red Triangle)	Pale Ale			1063.2	1009.6	7.02	84.81%	19
1953	Bass	Barley Wine	Barley Wine	20d	nip	1104.6	1036.3	8.90	65.30%	80
1956	Ind Coope	Double Diamond	Pale Ale	17d	half pint	1048.3	1012.7	4.62	73.71%	20
1956	Simonds	Bitter Ale	Pale Ale	12d	half pint	1030.1	1010	2.60	66.78%	25
1956	Simonds	Berry Brown Ale	Brown Ale	16d	half pint	1031.9	1011.9	2.58	62.70%	85
1957	Simonds	Luncheon Stout	Stout	11d	half pint	1033.6	1014.9	2.41	55.65%	275
1959	Simonds	Tavern Export Ale	Pale Ale	17d	half pint	1045.8	1013	4.25	71.62%	18
1959	Simonds	SB Light Ale	Pale Ale	10d	half pint	1034.2	1010.3	3.09	69.88%	19
1956	Truman	Trubrown	Brown Ale	10.5d	half pint	1034.9	1016.5	2.37	52.72%	95
1956	Truman	Light Ale	Pale Ale	10d	half pint	1031.7	1011.4	2.62	64.04%	19
1956	Truman	Eagle Stout	Stout	11d	half pint	1034.8	1016.1	2.41	53.74%	225
1959	Truman	Ben Truman Pale Ale	Pale Ale	16d	half pint	1049.9	1010	5.20	79.96%	17
1953	Watney	Yorkshire Stingo	Barley Wine	17d	nip	1089.6	1031.7	7.52	64.62%	110
1956	Watney	Brown Ale	Brown Ale	10d	half pint	1032.2	1011.1	2.73	65.53%	120
1957	Watney	Special Stout	Stout	13d	half pint	1042.3	1009.4	4.28	77.78%	200
1959	Watney	Pale Ale	Pale Ale	10d	half pint	1033.2	1010.1	2.99	69.58%	23
1955	Worthington	India Pale Ale (Green Shield)	IPA			1063.3	1009.4	7.06	85.15%	18
1955	Worthington	India Pale Ale (White Shield)	IPA			1063.7	1002.9	8.02	95.45%	18
Source:
Whitbread Gravity book held at the London Metropolitan Archives, document number LMA/4453/D/02/002.