Cold-y Lookin' Chain.

You’ll have heard about cold chain and beer. It might have been an American brewer talking about his new imported beer range, or it might be a Scottish Brewer who has just invented it, it might even be a wholesaler who has a new cold store, or a really good publican who actually cares what happens to his beer before it ends up in his (low temperature, direct draw) cellar. But you’ll have heard about it.

But what the hell does it mean?

I’m not being patronising, it’s a deeply misunderstood and misrepresented subject so when you hear brave claims of ‘full cold chain’ you ought to be clear about what you are being sold.

But first, let's have a quick look at WHY it’s important. Why cold beer is better and how badly the UK gets these things wrong.

For years we’ve been told that ‘cellar temperature’ is the right temperature for beer, and indeed for service of certain styles of cask beer it’s a reasonable compromise, but it’s probably not ‘traditional’ as average temperatures inside buildings in the past were far lower than they tend to be today, and it certainly isn’t low enough to protect the beer from premature aging in transit or storage. So we can do away with the 12 degree thing can we?

And let's talk about ambient temperatures for a minute as well, people say that the UK ‘never gets hot enough’ to worry about chilled distribution and storage, but last summer (albeit a particularly hot one) we had six weeks when the daytime temperature was above 30 degrees centigrade, and the average temperature was almost 16 degrees. I’ve seen days in December last year here in Bristol where the mercury has blown through the 12 degree ‘Cellar Temperature’ level.

So why does it matter? Well, to quote Dr Charles Bamford (Professor of Brewing Science at the University of California, and general brewing and beer quality Godlike genius) when the temperature goes up “Beer ages three times faster for every 10 degrees rise in temperature” so when it was really hot back in the summer, your beer is aging at ten times (or more if you lived in Faversham where it hit 38 degrees, the hottest recorded in the UK ever) as fast as that stored in a cold store.

Why pay for those cool hops, when the temperature has kicked all the flavour out of them?

Vinnie Cilurzo of Russian River (The Plinny guy) said that he worries about his Hoppy beers because they are the first to change, and Paul Jones at Cloudwater Brewing Company claims that team members at Cloudwater can identify changes within 24 hours in some of their most volatile beers.

So, back to cold chain.

Done properly, every element of the transport of beer from the brewers cold store (another story, there are still brewers out there who don’t have one) to the consumer is temperature controlled. The truck or container, the warehouse at the distributor, the van to the retailer, and refrigerated in the shop or bar that you buy that beer from.

What temperature? Well Yvan Seth, owner of Jolly Good Beer claims that 4 degrees is the way forward, it’s the best compromise for quality versus energy use, in the early days having worked down from 12 degrees to 9 degrees and finally to 4 as he learned more and ignored the ‘old cellarman’s tales’ that predominate. Jolly Good Beer has always used chilled storage, and now is moving towards full cold chain.

So for your imported beer, you want a chilled ‘reefer’ container (or for the properly flash, chilled air freight), you’ll find people claiming that they only ship in winter, or that they ship ‘below the waterline’ and therefore at a lower temperature, but frankly that’s a fudge for most importers. Once the beer gets to the UK, you simply use the reefer to transport the beer to your cold store.

Ah yes, coldstores. Ten years ago when I started talking about and selling Craft Beer the best you could hope for as a ‘cellar temperature’ cold store at a brewery for the most part, and when I started looking at old meat packaging warehouses to coldstore the beer we sold at the time, people said it was mad.

Yvan Seth did a bit better than I managed and came to the market five years ago with Jolly Good Beer, and a small yard with one, then two and eventually three 20ft Reefer containers, before moving to the current (former fruit & vegetable warehouse) site with 1,500 sq ft of 4 degree coldstore in 5,000 sq ft of space to grow into, and others like The Bottle Shop in London and now Brewdog also installing fully chilled distribution storage, and some others using partially chilled facilities. There are still the vast majority of beer wholesalers in the UK who are using ambient storage for keg and smallpack, and sometimes even cask.

The final part of the chain are the delivery and retail functions. The delivery side is simple in theory, you just get a chilled van. In reality it’s a bit more complex than that as the biggest issue in beer wholesale is weight, beer weighs quite a lot and so does a refrigeration unit and insulation, so if you chill your van then you lose ability to carry as much beer… more so when you start considering weights over 3.5 tonnes (those big white vans everyone uses to deliver beer) and start considering >3.5 tonne “HGV” vehicles that need an Operators Licence, a tachograph and a special drivers licence (even old men like me with a class C licence still need to get ‘qualified’ to drive one for commercial use) All this ‘stuff’ makes beer cost more, and remember you are competing with people who have an ambient shed and a warm 3.5 tonne van...

The last thing is where you buy your beer. We have a small group of bars who use 4 degree cellars and direct draw dispense which is the JGB ‘gold standard’ but ask your local landlord what temperature his Cellar is at, look at how packaged beer is stored, and if you like your beer as fresh as possible, remember that those cheap cans in the supermarket will have been through their ambient supply chain and are sitting in the warmth of the shelf, no point looking at the BBE date on these babies, two months from production in 20 degree heat?? Remember what Dr Charlie Bamford said, ‘Three times faster for every ten degrees’ but he also said ‘The first step is to educate the consumer’ I hope this helps a little.

Charlie Bamforth Podcast on the BN - https://www.thebrewingnetwork.com/session-dr-charlie-bamforth/

Data on Summer temperatures - https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/sep/03/summer-2018-uk-joint-hottest-on-record-met-office-says

Justin Rivett - www.jollygoodbeer.co.uk