Beer in the CBC news archives

[Derek]

I thought some of these clips were interesting.

50 years ago...

"E.P. Taylor on the future of brewing

Broadcast Date: June 6, 1961
It's 1961 and E.P. Taylor, legendary Canadian businessman, has just opened "Ontario's largest brewery" in Toronto. The CBC wants his opinion on the future of Canada's brewing industry. The future is very bright, he believes — as the population increases, so do the number of beer drinkers. "I think [the industry] will continue to expand as the country grows," says Taylor, owner of the Canadian Brewing Corporation."
http://archives.cbc.ca/economy_business ... lips/8729/

25 years ago...

"Designer Beer

Broadcast Date: Sept. 26, 1985
For all those Canadian beer drinkers disenchanted with the major breweries, there's a new option on the scene. Called "microbreweries," these small breweries are starting to offer an alternative to giants Molson, Carling and Labatt. At microbreweries like British Columbia's Granville Island Brewery, beer purists are thrilled with brews that adhere to the Bavarian Purity Law of 1516 — beer must only be made with barley, hops, water and yeast. This 1985 clip from The Journal raises the question: could this be the beginning of a microbrew renaissance?"
http://archives.cbc.ca/economy_business ... lips/8733/

[SteelbackGuy]

I only believe stuff on Fox news.

[LondonBeer]

Is there anyone who single handedly changed Canadian brewing more than E.P. Taylor? If he didn't do it would someone else have stepped up?

[phirleh]

Is there anyone who single handedly changed Canadian brewing more than E.P. Taylor?

Well, Frank...but that's another thread.

After reading Brewed in Canada: the untold story of Canada's 350-year-old brewing industry, By Allen Winn Sneath and Brew North, by Ian Coutts, two really good books that give insight into how the Canadian beer scene developed and the influence (Frank excluded) they had on the industry.

[ErkLR]

From the first clip, regarding the closing of other plants with the addition of this new one "two minor, small plants which only made draft beer which has become completely out-moded."

Heh, every bar I've ever been to must be more than 50 years behind the times.

[Lackey]

The dude doing the story doesn't seem too sold on the virtues of craft beer, calling it "trendy" and "for yuppies" but I can't blame him too much, the beer enthusiasts and even the brewers seem a little unsure of the potential of the beverage that they are reviving. They repeatedly refer to the Reinheitsgebot and the lack of chemicals in craft beer but rarely mention the potential for diversity of styles and flavor or, indeed, a return to the great pre prohibition/industrialization history of beer.
I was more impressed with the Molson guy who obviously seemed more comfortable in his own skin (I doubt if Molson would agree to be part of a story like this today). Unfortunately, Molson's market research let them down again by telling them the trend was moving toward lighter, slightly sweeter beers and craft beer would continue to remain the bastion of a few lunatics.

[Derek]

I do wonder what Taylor would think today. The only market that's really expanding is 'craft', so he might've jumped on that bandwagon... or maybe he'd have an empire of sweet malternatives? Perhaps he would've jumped into the price war and bought up places like Lakeport to keep them going? Or maybe he'd continue closing them & building his own brands...

Like they are today:
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/ ... ml?ref=rss

But yeah, back in '85 you'd think the micro brewers must have had thoughts about fuller-flavoured, European styles... perhaps they just didn't think the market was ready?

Here's a 1989 tasting of 5 fizzy yellow lagers. Surprisingly, they were able to pick out the "American" because it was lighter and the "micro" because it was fuller-flavoured... tougher to distinguish the Canadian Macro's though (still is):
http://archives.cbc.ca/lifestyle/food/clips/8734/

[G.M. Gillman]

E.P. Taylor's comment about draft beer is interesting. A person as smart as he was didn't mean that lightly. I think he was referring to the fact that draft beer in his time was largely an unbranded product. Everything he worked to do was build solid regional, national and even international brands; draft went against that idea. Also, he was perceptive, as his other comments show, on the demographic for beer. Even if per capita consumption was not rising, I believe the share of beer consumed at home was growing in relation to beverage room because of the closure of many plants in city centres and the development of the suburbs. Branded beer was king in the home, so again draft beer looked outmoded for the future.

Where he went wrong was, i) many beer drinkers enjoy draft because it offers a fresher, more natural taste than bottled or canned beer; ii) ultimately retailers branded the draft sold in their establishments, no doubt with brewers' encouragement, and therefore active competition could develop at this level. I remember in Montreal around 1970-80, beer in taverns was rarely advertised in terms of the draft available. Signs sold this and that brand of bottled beer but draft was, well, draft. I remember asking waiters whose beer it was and they always knew, the brewery and often the brand, and occasionally there was a choice, but the kind of draft tap selection we see today even at the macro level did not exist at least in Quebec.

In essence though he foresaw and indeed helped create the macro beer industry as we know it today. What he did has continued apace only at the international level. It is hard to know what he would have thought of craft beer. The concept would have been so alien then. I think he would have proposed that breweries buy the most successful of the craft breweries and indeed that has occurred to a limited degree but probably not to the extent he would have wished. But also, who knows if he would perceive as good a future for beer as for wine or other drinks? Maybe he would have expanded into vodka coolers, or indeed malternatives possibly, or wine or something. It's hard to say, the world is so different now.

Gary

[Derek]

Here's a video of the big haul:


They ought to host a beer dinner in one of those!

[Belgian]

Here's a video of the big haul:


They ought to host a beer dinner in one of those!

Are swimming trunks optional? Because there have been bad incidents...

[Derek]

Beer Deaths...

You just don't see interviewers smoking a pipe anymore:
http://archives.cbc.ca/health/public_health/clips/8739/

With a nice follow-up in Time:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... 16,00.html

All because they added Cobalt salt to stabilize their head.

[Derek]

1979 - Trouble Brewing in the Maritimes:
http://archives.cbc.ca/economy_business ... lips/8741/

(32 years later, the LCBO isn't much different)

[Beermat]

About the EP Taylor comments about draft beer, as always Professor Gillman is on the money. Back in 1961, it's worth remembering, there were no 'pubs' as we know them, certainly not in Ontario or most of Canada. There were beverage rooms, which sold a lot of draft -- or as I prefer it, draught -- to blue collar men and university students. Most middle class people didn't set foot in these places as they were deliberately gloomy, depressing spots -- as mandated by law. Yes, they sold a lot of draught but, as Gary notes, much of the time you had no idea which brand you were drinking. The selection generally rotated among the three big breweries of the time and there was no choice, so even if they did tell you what was on tap that particular day you either drank it or went somewhere else. All the advertising money went into the big-brand bottled beers. A lot of respectable people -- and the increasingly suburban middle class was on the rise in 1961 -- never drank draught beer at all. It all began to change in the mid-70s when we Ontarians got our first faux-English pubs, which made public drinking respectable and certainly more female-friendly.

[G.M. Gillman]

Nick, thanks for your comments. You are absolutely right about class and beverage rooms as I recall it in the mid-1970's. I was buying beer books (even before Jackson's first tome) and trying to interest friends and co-workers in beer choice as it then was. This involved sometimes saying, "you should try this or that tavern, such and such a beer is there, Champlain Porter, say, an old style from the 1800's". Most would react in horror, "I don't go to taverns". They might as you said drink a bottle of beer at lunch of occasion, or at a sports event, but a tavern was foreign territory. I learned of these worthy establishments from student days, but of course not all students went to taverns. It was a minority. The prejudice against the beverage room, and the beverage, finally fell away - mostly but not entirely as you've pointed out in your writing. This was due to changes in society of various kinds including the advent of the English-style pub, and "brasserie" in Quebec. All to the good since the old attitudes were snobbish, i.e., without any inherent logic.

Gary