The Worker's Beer

"Now a drop of good beer is good for a man
Who's thirsty and tired and hot,
And I sometimes has a drop for myself
From a very special lot;
But a fat and healthy working class
Is the thing that I most fear,
So I reaches my hand for the water tap,
And I waters the workers' beer."

Paul's Beer Blog raised a point about class, intellectualising beer and the future of pubs. I was going to reply there, but hey, I've a blog to fill too, so I won't. I'll expand on it here.

There are still plenty of people that want to drink in pubs and it is likely (with a few regrettable exceptions) that the better pubs will survive. I am no sociologist - or should that be economist - but if like me you have been a pub man for over 30 years, you will have noticed great changes in pub going habits. It isn't all price, but that certainly has something to do with it. When the pubs were filled with working people, not that long ago, the differential between beer at home and beer in the pub wasn't so glaring that when you were strapped it kept you out of the boozer. Then if you could squeeze the money together for a couple of cans, you could probably convert that to a couple of pints down the pub with a quick hand down the back of the sofa. There are wider reasons why the working class have deserted pubs and it would be interesting to actually ask them, but lets just accept that price is one of them.

The suggestion by Paul is that we need to intellectualise beer more, to attract the middle classes much as wine has been turned from the drink of the peasant, to the drink of the toff. It isn't that peculiar an idea, but it does have a kind of elitist element that I don't care for. I too agree that pubs have a bright future, but it ought to be a future for all. Condemning the workers to drink their crappy tinned supermarket beer at home and smoking themselves to death, while us middle class types raise pinkies and glasses of delicious craft beer in our pubs seems a step too far to me, but clearly there is a demographic curve that suggests that may be to some extent at least, where we are heading.

This brings us to the smoking ban. The idea that those who don't smoke are the future of pubs is given more credence by Government statistics (2007 figures) that tell us that 26% of the so called "working class" smoke, as opposed to only 15% of those who aren't. Clearly if you are looking to fill pubs, you need to target those more likely to come to them and that would certainly include the vast majority of those that don't want smoke in pubs and exclude those that object to puffing away on the pavement. Statistically you are likely to attract more non working class, as they in addition to not smoking as much, will have more disposable income.

There seems to me to be an awkward and inescapable trend here. Those pubs at the bottom end that fall out of the market were likely to be the haunt of the working class smoker. Those surviving will mainly offer the middle classes a better environment, more decent food and better (hopefully) but more expensive beer. Of course there will be exceptions, but the social exclusion already felt by many, is likely to extend more and more to pub going.

In this scenario at least and I recognise it need not be so, the pub, that great British leveller, may be heading upmarket and beyond the means of many, like it or not.