Diageo is preparing to open the doors of its latest Open Gate Brewery concept for Guinness, adding London to sites in Baltimore, Chicago and the brand’s home town, Dublin.
Situated in the centre of the UK capital, in the district of Covent Garden, the latest on-premise-focused “brand home” will open to the public on Thursday (11 December). The 54,000-square-foot site comprises two restaurants, a bar area and courtyard, along with two retail spaces and a microbrewery with an annual capacity of around 4,000 hectolitres.
The brand owner has spent in the region of GBP73m (US$97.3m) on Open Gate Brewery London.
If grouped with the Guinness Storehouse, at the St James’ Gate brewery in Dublin, as a market in their own right, the existing Open Gate Breweries would constitute a top-five market for Guinness, according to Diageo.
Speaking to Global Drinks Intel at a press briefing at the site today, Diageo’s global director for beer, liqueur & vodka, Gráinne Wafer, highlighted that none of the Open Gate Breweries actually produce Guinness, with all four operating in markets that are supplied directly from St James’ Gate in the Irish capital.
When challenged on the environmental credentials of the export strategy, Wafer defended the approach. “From a carbon perspective,” she said, “it’s more effective to ship beer in bulk than it is to move kegs over land. The sustainability impact of shipping Guinness from St James’ Gate to North America, for example, is lower than producing Guinness in North America and then transporting product on land.”
The Dublin brewery supplies Guinness to European markets, the UK and US, as well as to Asia Pacific and the Middle East.
Diageo is in the process of constructing a new brewery in Littleconnell in Ireland’s Co. Kildare that will take on the production of lager and ale currently manufactured at St James’ Gate. The move will “more than double” the annual brewing capacity for Guinness at the latter to 4.5m hectolitres, a company spokesperson told Global Drinks Intel. Both breweries will contribute positively to the group’s carbon-neutrality targets.
The Littleconnell site is expected to come on-stream early next year.
