Kmflett's Blog

From ‘craft’ to independent beer. Where are we in 2026?

I attended the annual conference of the Campaign for Real Ale at the weekend. It was in St Albans, but other commitments meant I was on-line. It was a decent experience. All contributions could be seen and heard, and I was able to vote on motions and ask questions.

Given the matter had not been mentioned I did ask the EC what the view was of the impact of Brewdog’s failure on ‘craft’ and independent beer. The response was that Brewdog was over-leveraged and that given the surviving outfit is now owned by a US company an important issue was that consumers might take beer produced by global big beer as something independent. The case of Beavertown’s Neck Oil (Heineken) was correctly mentioned.

I take it, understandably that ‘craft’ was not a popular word at the conference, ‘cask’ and ‘independent’ being preferred.

SIBA has for a while promoted the idea of independent beer produced by independent companies. It is an important battle against Big Beer’s ‘craft’ brands, although how enamoured it is itself of ‘craft’ these days I’m less sure.

It must be said that in the interesting panel on independent beer and access to market ‘craft’ did make an appearance, and at the conclusion of the conference there were suggestions about where to go in St Albans after the conference bar shut. This included pubs with a range of Deya and Verdant beers. Both of course are independent and both to do produce cask beer, but both are mainly keg/keykeg.

When it comes to it, perhaps the point is that good beer is good beer. Its bit more than a tautology!

While industrial breweries can produce drinkable and reliable products, indy breweries surely have the edge in terms of innovation, brewing to local and regional tastes and flexibility of production. In 2026 we can perhaps leave craft to big beer.

As Roger Protz noted in a conference speech while the Big Beer companies of the 1970s did know how to produce good cask beer and reverted after CAMRA campaigns, the Big Beer companies of the 2020s have no interest in brewing cask beer. For them its at best an inconvenience (perhaps we can exclude ABI’s current efforts on Draught Bass). As ever though contradictions abound. The producers of some of the biggest selling cask beers, Sharps and Greene King are not independent