Keg watch help?

[Darcey]

Keg watch will prob just want to retrieve any damaged keg for scrap value. As far as I am ware kegwatch is partly funded by the brewerys. A closed brewery will most likely have all its assets purchased by another brewery or divided up by a liquidation firm including all the containers that are 'out in the trade'.

Keg watch will be after this keg to stop the resale value of the kegs increasing. If damaged kegs or kegtles were commonly available for resale on sites such as ebay or this forum then the obvious value of 'removing' a keg from a pub or brewery and 'converting' it cheaply would increase and so continue to undermine the work of kegwatch and effect brewerys.

Second focus for the kegwatches attempt to return all MIA kegs is to stop the second hand trade and resale values.

Its more likely that keg watch will attempt to return the keg to its rightful owner and let them decide what should happen to the keg in question even if it is scrap value or to be written off and tipped! Or maybe legally resold.

I had considered building a 3 tier brewery from legaly purchased 11g and 22g kegs from my employer however the secondhand value of such a set up even with legal ownership is considerably effected so I am opting to source all containers myself.

Hope this is some help to people.
D

 

[Stone Cold]

id like to say that the problem with missing kegs is the breweries them and wholesalers rather than gypos and brewers. id say 5% of barrels we we get to the pub never get collected again, over 20 a year easy. we had a mountain of em outside the pub carlsberg,strong bow, j smiths, Heineken, more black sheep firkins than you can shake a stick at and a load others, if i lent someone my cornie to drink my beer at their party i wouldn't be as dull as to forget i did it.

 

[Darcey]

Agreed, however the logistics of picking up a single 9g barrel for example for a small brewery is quite difficult as it may cost more in fuel to come and collect it than its wort in beer or metal scrap. The I would assume that your dray is Heineken or Carlsberg or a branch of S&N (Waverly TBS?), as they are no long connected to a brewery their concern of returning the kegs is limited to the draymens willingness (and space) to up lift them.

So if you get delivered 2x 22g kegs then it is unlikely that more than 22g will be uplifted on the same day, this has an cumulative effect over xmas and busy periods. We had 19 x 11g kegs left over after the xmas period and we had to contact our dray to come and pick them up (unwillingly).

Jospeh Holts who I work for now count the empties as stock for the pub, any go missing you get charged and as far as I am aware this is being common fold in the managed houses of Punch and M&B which means it wont be long before it is being written into tenancy or delivery contracts. I know of someone who wont be named who was fired from a company that wont be named on a technicality that they were loosing kegs as an excuse to remove them from their position. I have also had dray men accuse me of a damaging 'company' property when kegs have been returned marked or dented.

Thankfully we wont be going back to the days of HUGE tanks of Tenants or similar but the keg / cask problem is something that is being unsatisfactory delt with by brewerys, dray, logistics, stockhandlers etc.

Plastic casks are starting to make an appearance and mighty fine they are too until one explodes on your cellar floor (after you have signed for it... :evil: :evil: ).

Anyway rant over.

 

[kev]

Heineken or Carlsberg or a branch of S&N (Waverly TBS?), as they are no long connected to a brewery their concern of returning the kegs is limited to the draymens willingness (and space) to up lift them.

Sorry to pick you up on this but S&N doesn't exist anymore as Heineken bought it over. WTBS was sold off recently (by Heineken) but still has connections to breweries.

K

 

[Darcey]

Sorry to pick you up on this but S&N doesn't exist anymore as Heineken bought it over. WTBS was sold off recently (by Heineken) but still has connections to breweries.

Sorry I was 2 years out of date..

 

[shocker]

**

id like to say that the problem with missing kegs is the breweries them and wholesalers rather than gypos and brewers. id say 5% of barrels we we get to the pub never get collected again, over 20 a year easy. we had a mountain of em outside the pub carlsberg,strong bow, j smiths, Heineken, more black sheep firkins than you can shake a stick at and a load others, if i lent someone my cornie to drink my beer at their party i wouldn't be as dull as to forget i did it.

**

...and aint that the truth ! In my old job fitting out nightclubs and bars we were ALWAYS confronted with kegs that had built up over various managerships and needed to be got out of the way .This is going back over 10 years but we could never to my recollection get anyone to take any responsibility or even interest in taking them away .And by god we tried . Its not like you could weigh them in even ,unless you have a special site nearby and even then the accusations would fly . So ,they stayed stacked somewhere ,in the way ,waiting to be someone elses problem .

This was all in the past so I am glad that Kegwatch are trying to round up these missing barrels .However ,the focus should not be on the individual for "stealing" them but on the bloody breweries for taking no interest in getting them back and passing the buck .I am all for supporting the industry but it seems to me that there is a case of smoke and mirrors going on to shift the blame .

Keg Watch ,I am all in favour of it ,so long as it doesnt go chasing prosecutions of individuals and concentrates on getting the barrels home .

 

[Scorrie]

Bear in mind the people who deliver and pick up the kegs aren't neccesseraly(sp?) the brewery, they can be contracted hauliers (who have absolutely no interest in what belongs to whom).....

 

[shocker]

Granted ,yes ,but in the cases I was talking about we never actually asked the draymen to take them away .Several of us had worked driving lorries and knew what the score was and thus couldnt blame them for not wanting to take them on . It was distributors ,wholesalers and then breweries we contacted .Repeatedly .For years .

So if Kegwatch want to take this on without making criminals of the innocent more power to their elbow . If ,however ,it proves that they go after the easy targets who are not the real problem ,well ,I would be less supportive . :hmm:

Not that you said the comment was aimed at me Scorrie ,just making a general point .

 

[Scorrie]

Slack admin all round, it would appear.

Yup, I guess it's like most things - it depends how Kegwatch 'play the game'.
I can understand them vigorously chasing up people selling kegs on Fleabay etc to get the point home, but where do you draw the line on who to chase to prosecution or reimbursement level?

Not an easy one, I'd say.

Er....Just nipping out to the shed to quickly 'move on' some kegs....... :whistle:

 

[Darcey]

I spoke to someone 'from' keg watch the other week. They said

'We just love kegs and casks, and we dont want to see them cut up or melted down'

I think thats a nice way of putting it...

 

[critch]

hmmmm kegwatch......

ive been down to their local depo and picked up casks clearly marked not to be picked up except by brewer with siba stickers, that have been taken directly by dodgy draymen for the bounty kegwatch give out from pubs cellars(they werent left outside but kept securely in a locked cellar)

now i have to pay 7.50 a time for the privalege of having my property returned. i know of breweries who refuse to pay this legalised extortion and get away with it, and others who are in lengthy court battles

undoubtedly kegwatch do get back barrels some scroaty publican cant be bothered keeping(believe me its not worth your while traveling 40 miles each way to drop off and then pick up 1 firkin, if you just want to order off us to keep your pet tickers happy DONT bother i dont need your trade that much.....),or some filthy pikeys pi(c)ked up and"borrowed" but the vast majority have been half inched by big brewery draymen, hell ive caught dhl tradeteam blokes doing it and not being a little bloke, taken the fekkers straight back and just DARED the gits to do something about it.......on the whole though you do get em back. if i found some scroat selling my casks on ebay they'd be getting a visit from me and my mate claude hammer.....

 

[shocker]

So its just more Stealth Tax ******** then ?. Just like speed cameras and all the rest . You cannot get a metal yard to take the damn things anyway , even if they are cut up into tiny bits ....even if you offer to pay THEM to take them

EDITED By V1

 

[Hirsty]

If there is a build up of casks outside your pub give the brewery a call. If they can't pick it up they'll probably arrange for another (closer brewer) to take it back to their brewery for collection at a later date. Casks are expensive and definitely not making the brewery any money lying around, empty in a pub cellar or yard (one of the reasons that one ways are becoming popular).

 

[Stone Cold]

i dont think the pub being to far from the brewery to make it not worth wile picking up a valid excuse.
if its to far away why take the order? a barrel of beer cost around 70-100 quid, and the value of the cask itself can cost the same sort of money depending on how many they get at once. so why shoot yourself in the foot? this could turn into my ''you should only drik local rant'' i dont mind as much anymore about casks being left here at pub for years at a time, i just use them with my own beer.
the new brecon brewing co have plastic casks brand new from polymore solutiouns they are called green cask and are great casks, bit more expensive than the old plastic casks by ??cryophere is it?? but they are great. now we had the first batch from him deliverd in his shiny new van in a shiny new orange cask. he droped it off and never took interest again, so its now my shiny new cask as far as im concerned.

 

[Morgan]

Stolen kegs are big business

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-16560677

Maybe keep an eye on the police auctions in a few months!!!

 

[shocker]

Funny thing , I was at the council tip the other day and the police were there smashing up electrical items that they had siezed to put them beyond use . They werent illegal items , just things that could be used for illegal purposes . I would have thought it better for everyone if the things were sold to be used for their normal purpose .

What I am getting at is this : after seeing that I started to wonder if there ARE police auctions anymore and if so what items would be sent there ? Pretty much anything can be used in the commission of a crime , after all .

 

[Scorrie]

i dont think the pub being to far from the brewery to make it not worth wile picking up a valid excuse.
if its to far away why take the order? a barrel of beer cost around 70-100 quid, and the value of the cask itself can cost the same sort of money depending on how many they get at once. so why shoot yourself in the foot? this could turn into my ''you should only drik local rant'' i dont mind as much anymore about casks being left here at pub for years at a time, i just use them with my own beer.
the new brecon brewing co have plastic casks brand new from polymore solutiouns they are called green cask and are great casks, bit more expensive than the old plastic casks by ??cryophere is it?? but they are great. now we had the first batch from him deliverd in his shiny new van in a shiny new orange cask. he droped it off and never took interest again, so its now my shiny new cask as far as im concerned.

http://www.globalpolymersolutions.co.uk/

 

[Hirsty]

I reckon it wouldn't make a very good gas fired kettle though.

 

[Darcey]

If you ask for a quote they are only slightly cheaper than the metal casks. I think I'd rather have a metal one.

 

[Stone Cold]

but a metal one can be weighed in for scrap, plastic cannot, worth paying more id say