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It’s Saturday morning again, so here, as per, are links to some things that have caught our eye in the past week.

→ ‘Hardknott’ Dave Bailey explains some of the nitty-gritty behind getting his beer into supermarkets, and agonises*over the ethics of doing so.
→ There have been*many posts in the last week about the relaunched Let There Be Beer campaign, aka There’s a Beer For That, but we thought Ruari O’Toole’s was most useful, as it actually helps to explain why the TV ad*is so bland:
This isn’t just ten million badly spent…*The deck in the UK is stacked against beer advertisers. Stacked heavily. The Advertising Standards Agency makes a point to say that the UK has some of the strictest alcohol advertising rulesin the world…
→ Barm explains how three different tribes regards Tennent’s Lager and how their attitudes have prevented the success of a premium product under the same brand.
→ For*Draft magazine, Joshua M. Bernstein writes about Jeff Mello’s mission to broaden the horizons of brewers by capturing and cultivating entirely new strains of yeast, and getting them to join the fun. (Via @thirstypilgrim.)
→ Bob Arnott’s epic 3000 word post about his first attempt at making cider is definitely one for Pocket. (And this is only part one…)
→ David ‘Broadford Brewer’ Bishop wrote something tranquil and poetic, inspired by the idea of the ‘firm favourite’. Its meaning isn’t immediately obvious, and is open to interpretation, which makes rather a nice change from what people reckon about stuff.
→ Who wants popcorn?
Oh no, Untappd have given breweries a "right of reply". There goes my day.
— Stringers Beer (@stringersbeer) November 6, 2014
Not (directly) about beer

→*This long piece from Medium on how US pasta chain Olive Garden operates isn’t about beer, but it’s a good read anyway, and this particular point did bring to mind big breweries:
The report attacked Darden for throwing away money on ineffective ad campaigns, wasting food, and trying to rebrand shoddy dishes in favor of scrapping or reformulating them.
→ Meanwhile, John DeVore’s piece for Eater’s Life in Chains series*contains a reminder for food and drink snobs that fast food might be ‘devoid of nutritional value’ but that doesn’t mean it can’t be ‘richly emotionally satisfying’.
News, Nuggets & Longreads 08/11/2014


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