Door stops and livery of GWR diagram O4 5-plank opens - questions, questions...

[41516]

Decided to do a little more reading (again, can speak only for Bass from the sources I have to hand).

 

Bass only opened agency offices in Exeter and Plymouth in 1895/6 to co-ordinate sales and promotionof their ale and beer. These agencies were typically only opened in areas expected to show good returns, so there must have been a concerted push in the south-west to expand or maximise sales given a generally declining market and significant drop in sales from London at the time.

 

Probably also should be noted as Sir Micheal Arthur Bass (1837-1909) was a director for both the MR and South Eastern Railway, anything arriving from Burton in a LNWR van was probably from another firm!

 

 

Edited April 30, 2022 by 41516

[magmouse]

25 minutes ago, 41516 said:

Probably also should be noted as Sir Micheal Arthur Bass (1837-1909) was a director for both the MR and South Eastern Railway, anything arriving from Burton in a LNWR van was probably from another firm!

There is no end to the factors we have to try to take account of when working out a realistic traffic flow!

 

Nick.

[Compound2632]

51 minutes ago, 41516 said:

Probably also should be noted as Sir Micheal Arthur Bass (1837-1909) was a director for both the MR and South Eastern Railway, anything arriving from Burton in a LNWR van was probably from another firm!

 

But Bass was far from being the only brewer in Burton! (Were any of the other brewers directors of the LNWR?)

 

25 minutes ago, magmouse said:

There is no end to the factors we have to try to take account of when working out a realistic traffic flow!

 

Indeed. Surely your fictional location is big enough to support at least two pubs, tied to different breweries? There's scope for a SER van from Canterbury...

[magmouse]

Just now, Compound2632 said:

There's scope for a SER van from Canterbury...

There you go again - tempter! 
 

// starts researching SER van prototypes and 7mm kits… //
 

 

[41516]

2 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

But Bass was far from being the only brewer in Burton! (Were any of the other brewers directors of the LNWR?)

 

I should have really said 'Bass from Burton' - 90% of traffic via the MR seems to be the figure repeated, and there are postcards with LNWR opens and vans and the odd NSR open in Bass' sidings on the Hay sidings by the river. I'm sure I had a copy that I had scanned, but can't find it at the moment.

 

There appears to be no representation from Burton brewers on the LNWR board if the Wikipedia list is correct(...), but Burton's 2nd largest brewer by annual output had Samuel Charles Allsop elected to the GNR board, becoming  Deputy chairman in 1884.

 

To give indication of the scale and commercial power Bass had at the turn of the century, it was producing ~1.4million barrels per year with Allsop's second largest in Burton with ~460,000 barrels pa and Worthington as the third, only producing ~200,000 pa.

 

Allsop's don't seem to have had a major footprint in the south west outside of Plymouth looking through this pubs list, as despite the scramble for brewers to acquire licenced properties in the late 1800s, the lack of tied houses was one of the reasons for Allsop's financial difficulties and eventual recievership in 1911.  Worthington also seems to have little presence in the south west and Bass slightly better.   Trumans, Salt's, Marston's & Ind Coupe all seem not to have had tied properties in Devon or Cornwall.

 

So we're back to my original comments around loan-tie agreements, selling Burton beers within in the premises of local smaller breweries, a high likelyhood of bottled beer being predominant, with bottles being brought in from the nearest regional bottler* rather than from Burton (in this case, Plymouth).

 

 

*(competition between the Bass and Worthington in the bottled beer market reached a peak where Bass had to issue an ultimatum to major bottlers to have to refuse to do business with Worthington if they wished to continue bottling their beer, starting in London and then spreading elswhere)

 

 

Edited April 30, 2022 by 41516
missing words

[Compound2632]

3 minutes ago, 41516 said:

but Burton's 2nd largest brewer by annual output had Samuel Charles Allsop elected to the GNR board, becoming  Deputy chairman in 1884.

 

And indeed you have pointed out the Great Northern's presence in Burton, on my wagon-building thread.