TOPIC:

Yesterday's [i:3voyuxgs]Sunday Business Post[/i:3voyuxgs] carried an ad addressed to "Suppliers of draught lager beer and draught cider to the on-trade" which said:

[quote:3voyuxgs]Have you experienced difficulty having your product sold in certain bars and restaurants due to exclusivity arrangements with a large multi-national brewer?

Our clients are suppliers of draught lager beer and draught cider which have been blocked from a number of key outlets due to exclusivity arrangements with a large multi-national brewer.

If you are having similar difficulties our clients would like to hear from you.

Our clients will treat any information provided by you in strict confidence and will not use any such information without your express written consent.

Please send details in writing[/quote:3voyuxgs]and then the address of a Dublin law firm.

If I were to guess who's behind it I'd probably say C&C: they're the ones most heavily invested in lager and cider specifically. But it could be anyone. Here's hoping for a juicy public lawsuit.

Oh fun, pity there are no class actions in Ireland.

Strange if its C&C though. We have 2 large multi nationals in pretty much every bar, how would the "multi national brewer" block C&C but not the other?

Both of the others are big enough to fend for themselves without needing to lawyer up. Heineken has moved into the cider game where Diageo doesn't play, and we know from the figures that that's hurting C&C. Being told that there's no room for Bulmers because of Orchard Thieves would [i:39z9hl7q]sting[/i:39z9hl7q]. But I'm just making this up, I've no idea what's actually going on.

"TheBeerNut":y2jfa4k9 wrote: Being told that there's no room for Bulmers because of Orchard Thieves would [i:y2jfa4k9]sting[/i:y2jfa4k9]. But I'm just making this up, I've no idea what's actually going on.[/quote:y2jfa4k9]

Figures out last week (via the radio) suggest that they have already taken some of Bulmers market share

That was mentioned in their annual report in the spring, but it's even more stark in the latest figures[/url:19kat1ec]: in February 2016 Bulmer's accounted for 91% of on-trade draught cider; in August 2017 that was 73%, and it's falling. Ouch!

"C&C":19kat1ec wrote: • Continue to experience distribution losses in draught.
• Competitor activity focused on top tier accounts.[/quote:19kat1ec]
And what can we do about that? Hmmm...