CAMRA’s report on state of British beer delivers a damning verdict

United Kingdom | Campaigning for pubs, pints and people since 1971, CAMRA is a consumer group representing beer drinkers and pubgoers. As consumers, they are angry. Evidence in the report shows what they have known to be true for a long time: that the decline in UK beer consumption is partly the effect of anti-competitive practices by the Big Brewers and the pubcos, which have been flooding the market with uniform beers. Not only have they prevented independent brewers from market entry and effectively limited consumer choice, they have also taken to fleecing consumers.

This is CAMRA’s first ever report on the state of the UK beer market. The group freely admits to its bias, being the authoritative voice of beer drinkers and pubgoers, and a champion of independent brewers and consumer choice.

Its members are livid: Four global brewers (AB-InBev, Heineken, Carlsberg, Molson Coors) nowadays dominate the UK beer market. Their combined market share is around 80 percent. As if this oligopoly was not bad enough for competition, “[the Big Four] frequently make decisions that destroy or dismantle Britain’s rich brewing heritage,” CAMRA says. They bank on uniform, dull beers and remove consumer choice, while running multi-million-pound marketing campaigns that trick consumers into thinking they are buying an independently produced beer and not just a brand, CAMRA adds.

The numbers

All this has been going on for decades - to the effect that per capita beer consumption in the UK has halved since 1990. Because total alcohol intake has remained more or less flat over the same period of time, many consumers must have migrated to a more reliable flavoursome drink, like wine. Worse still, between 1980 and 2025, beer sales have shifted from the on-premise to the off-premise at a steady rate of 1 percent per year. From serving 90 percent of the beer market for decades, the on-premise now accounts for just over 40 percent. The rest is sold mostly for home consumption. The situation for pubs is particularly dire as they are compelled by their pubcos to serve the same beers as supermarkets - but at far higher prices.

Between 2000 and 2024, CAMRA says, on-premise beer prices increased by 118 percent, slightly above the Retail Price Index, while off-premise beer prices rose by only 27 percent, the increases often being applied to the same brand. CAMRA detects serious anti-competitive practices here.

Keeping independent brewers out

As CAMRA sees it, independent British brewers are making some of the most interesting and exciting beers, focusing on high-quality ingredients, reviving traditional styles or exploring new possibilities. But they cannot get their beers into pubs or shops because they are unable to overcome the stranglehold that global brewers have on access to market, or their mass marketing campaigns. If consumers want beers from independent brewers, they will struggle to find them because the big four brewers benefit from the status quo.

CAMRA also complains about beer consumers routinely being misled about the origins of their beers. Most big brand “foreign” lagers are in fact made in the UK, often to diluted recipes. Not enough, most of the largest “craft” beer brands are made by corporate producers, and many “local” beers come from industrial-scale national plants, far from the locality suggested by their names.

CAMRA is questioning the legality of this “tight oligopoly”, which it says is “a monopoly in all but name”.

The UK government bears part of the blame

A succession of UK governments is blamed for the high beer taxes (among the highest in Europe). CAMRA calls this a “fiscal disincentive to developing beers of character to impress the UK market and boost production for export”. UK beer exports have become insignificant, as the Big Brewers have little reason to export beer brands that they already make in other countries.

CAMRA’s proposed solutions are: The UK beer market must be freed up for smaller independent producers to have fair access to it, and incentives must be found to develop distinctive British beers for export. This requires a market investigation from the Competition and Markets Authority, the antitrust authority.

Additionally, the deception of consumers about a beer’s prevenance must stop. Beers sold in the UK should clearly name the company that owns the brand and the place where it is brewed - either through an industry code of conduct or, failing that, new labelling legislation.

Above all, the UK’s abnormally high level of beer taxation, compared to the rest of Europe, needs to be challenged to justify its purpose. The upcoming review of the 2022 changes to the alcohol duty system could be an opportunity to make the UK industry competitive with other major brewing nations, CAMRA says.

The beer writer Dr Tim Webb, who chairs CAMRA’s Beer and Cider Campaigns Committee and edited the report, explained: “This report has been a long time in preparation. Speaking to politicians from all our main political parties, plus a lot of industry people, there is much agreement around the issues. The financially blessed, large producers of dull beers are not leading the UK industry; our talented independents are constricted on all sides; and Governments turn a blind eye to 99 percent-imported wine replacing 95 percent-domestic beer in bars and shops. Nobody has a clear vision, so CAMRA has presented one.” 

He added: “If the antitrust watchdog were to condemn the dodgier elements of restrictive practice, if brewers could agree on honest rules about provenance, and if the Treasury be led to see that the UK approach to beer tax is counter-productive, the brewing industry might start adding to the UK economy once more. It is absurd that pale ales and IPAs, porters, stouts and other British beer styles now feature heavily in craft brewing worldwide, while their country of origin sees none of that action.”