World Exclusive - double shock horror: Beer sales up as pub beats the blues

Well now, here’s a little something for the anti-pub lobby to stick in its non-combustible PC pipe.

A headline to bring cheer to February came along with the early spring weather in the Publican magazine (www.thepublican.com): SIBA reports volume growth. Ok, ok, this not the sexiest headline writing ever to hit the news stands, but it gladdened my heart non-the-less.

SIBA, for the uninitiated, is the trade body that represents hundreds of small to medium sized brewers across the country – yes, hundreds – and is fighting a valiant fight for cask-ale lovers. The report shows that ‘despite a challenging beer market’ their members have hit annual retail sales of £320m.

This comes on the back of individual trading reports showing significant growth - some ten per cent - in the face the gloomy pundits’ predictions of economic melt down and the effects of the smoking ban. Moorhouse’s, for instance, announced the best ever festive season sales last month.

So, great news for cask ale then and we can all take heart from that. But that's not all; another wee survey that popped out of the ether the other day had a slightly more racy title – Pub is best for stress-buster Brits. Apparently this research, carried out by a pretty big pub co to help out Camra’s (www.camra.org.uk) Community Pub Week (staring Saturday Feb 16) revealed that 80 per cent of people find a trip to the pub cheers them up, surprise, surprise. Thirty-eight per cent said it was the hub of the community. The pub beat the post office by a clear 11 per cent lead and absolutely hammered the church in to third place, with only 14 per cent of the vote.

Well, to many of us this conclusion is as plain as pikestaff. Even a spokesperson for the pub co admitted: “These findings serve to emphasise what many of us know – that the British pub is something of a national treasure that is highly valued by many.”

Even so it is good to have one's views confirmed. And it swept me back a few years to a debate I had on this very issue with a leading psychologist. For some unfathomable reason, a former and otherwise sensible lady friend of mine arbitrarily decided that I was in need of a few days out to graze on a health farm. Goodness knows why, and we’ll let that pass, but so it was that I found myself on a stress-buster weekend.

The point is, after an exhausting day of being pummelled and sweated I was sparingly sipping a glass of wine (oh yes, it was a liberal-ish regime) as I listened to the learned doctor give her post dinner talk on “How to cope with stress”. It was marginally more interesting than the flower arranging session the previous night (it’s mostly females that go to health farms, it seems) but I admit I was paying scant attention. Until, that is, she stated that ‘going to the pub’ to de-stress after work was bad.

Immediately my hackles were up and I was on my weary feet to challenge her on this issue, explaining that, as a hard-working single man, I was only likely to find the day’s solace over a pint with friends.

She quickly gave me full dispensation – for life, I have always assumed. The rather cynical lady friend thought it was just a ploy to get rid of me, but, be that as it may, I have never looked back.

Mind you, over the years I think I have met quite a number of that other 20 per cent that apparently don’t share the pub cheer. Miserable blighters; perhaps they should see my psychologist?