June 18, 2007
My goodness
Posted by pete at June 18, 2007 11:02 PM
Diageo Plc said today it was reviewing brewing operations in Ireland after media reported the drinks giant may quit the Dublin city centre site where Guinness has been brewed for almost 250 years.
"The Diageo brewing business is considering a number of important investment decisions on upgrading and renewing its brewing facilities in Ireland in the coming years," the company said in a statement.
The review was at a "very early stage" and a report in the Sunday Independent newspaper that the company was preparing to move from its landmark St James's Gate site on the banks of Dublin's River Liffey was "speculation", Diageo added.
"No decisions have been made or will be made until the assessment is completed," the world's largest alcoholic drinks company said.
The site, where Arthur Guinness took out a 9,000 year lease on a disused brewery in 1759, has grown into what the brewer now describes as "a prime 64 acre (25 hectare) slice of Dublin".
The Sunday Independent reported the land could fetch as much as €3 billion if Diageo implements plans to move production to a greenfield site on the outskirts of the capital.
[...]
Guinness is brewed at almost 50 sites around the world but some 500 million litres of the stout are still produced at St James's Gate, which also houses a visitor centre, shop, bars and restaurants.
Original terms of the lease were £45 per year, which - multiplied by 9,000 - amounts to...a lot of money.
When we visited Dublin, the Guinness tour was obviously high on our list. It was okay, but nowhere near as incapacitating as the tour of the Jameson distillery (I'm used to the old school Anheuser-Busch tours where you pretty much drank for free at tour's end). And while it'd be a shame to move something so readily identifiable with Ireland and the city of Dublin out to the sticks, €3 billion is nothing to sneeze at.
One assumes Guinness won't change the brewing process, at least. Other sites that produce Extra Stout blend unfermented wort extract with locally brewed beer, and the results are frankly less than ideal. I always attribute it to the "fresh squeezed" aspect of drinking it in Ireland, but Guinness honestly tastes different when it's served everywhere but the Emerald Isle. It's passable in the States, but drinking a fresh pint in the Brazen Head while scarfing fish and chips from Leo Burdock is as close as I've come in the last 20 years to believing in a benevolent god.
In related news, Houston's Saint Arnold Brewery is looking at moving closer to downtown Houston (via Chuck):
Founder Brock Wagner said he's scouting inner-city real estate to relocate his brewery, which also happens to be outgrowing its 32,000 square feet of space at 2522 Fairway Park, near the intersection of U.S. 290 and West 34th. "We're looking all over town, but my first goal would be to get something as close in to the center of town as possible," Wagner said.
Not too close, though.
"Manufacturing can't afford prime downtown real estate or even just off prime downtown real estate," he said. "I'd like to be within five minutes to downtown."
The 13-year-old brew house, which hosts public tours and an average of 15 special events each month, needs a building of at least 50,000 square feet or 3 to 5 acres of land.
I don't live that much closer to downtown than 290 and 34th, but I've already discussed it with two of my neighbors, and we'd be more than willing to put our lots together and let them build on them, provided we were given modest accommodations and a tap running directly from the main Amber tanks.
I have the paperweight from the Dublin Guinness tour on my desk at work, knowing at anytime I could smash it and drink that little bit of deliciousness…while there last June/July- I drank Guinness on a daily basis, oh how I miss Ireland! Agree the Guinness there is like nothing else.
Guinness gets better!?!?
One of my proudest achievements in my operatic career was winning “Outstanding Guest Artist” at a pub singing competition sponsored by Guinness while I was singing in the Wexford Opera Festival a couple years ago (the General Manager of the festival was less than pleased, by the way). I was awarded a lovely trophy by the Head of Distribution for Guinness, but even better than that, I received instruction from the owner of Simon’s Pub on the absolute correct way to pull a pint, and I’m told that I’ll have free access to the tap whenever I’m at his establishment. Anybody want to meet me there?
I have to agree. I never much cared for Guinness until I had one in Ireland. I figured that having a pint of Guinness in an Irish pub was one of the requirements of my trip, and I have to say, wow! It was so much better there. I liked it enough that now I have developed a taste for stout such that I can even drink what is served over here.