PowwowPint!

My folks have lived in a village in the rolling Oxfordshire countryside for about ten years now and, despite constant assertions to the contrary, have both become indispensable members of the local community. Dropping in on them has become quite a challenge; if she’s not dashing out to do the church flowers before Girl Guides, he’s off winding the clock in the tower or surveying a new village path.  Early in September, however, they pulled together an entirely new contribution to village life: the first ever East Hendred Beer Festival!

We ordered in nine barrels of prime ale from breweries up and down the country and over a hundred pounds’ worth of sausages from the local butcher. We booked the village hall and a bouncy castle. We borrowed a stillage (strong racking) and a barbecue. We even signed up the local wine shop to do a tasting for those with a lighter enthusiasm for beer. It took nearly six months of steady preparation to pull off and, in the end, it went swimmingly. The best part was, the more we organised, the more enthusiasm we got from the local community. People volunteered their time and local businesses agreed to buy programme space to sponsor barrels to help keep the costs down. The event was just gaining momentum when, back in July, I mentioned it to Powwownow technical director and notorious beer enthusiast Mick Kemp. He immediately demanded to get involved and, after working hard to persuade the other two directors for literally a couple of minutes, secured a generous donation to pay for branded glasses. That was the watershed; once I’d placed the order for a couple of hundred of our very own over-size glasses there was no going back – this thing was going ahead come swine flu or bad weather!

On the weekend of September 12th, go ahead it did – and how! We opened for four hours on the Friday night, just to test the water, and sold so much beer that we had a bit of a panic and had to order in another couple of barrels at short notice. One of the guys from the local “Best Mates” brewery was there at closing time.

“You’re in luck,” he said before draining his glass. “Entirely by chance, I’ve got a couple drawn off bright for you so they won’t even have to settle. Very lucky, that.” He gave me a broad wink. “See you in the morning!”

And what a glorious morning it was. After such a substandard August we had been rather concerned that we might be hosting a rather miserable afternoon indoors but we were treated to one of the brightest days of the year and with a huge turnout all day long we were soon racing through the beers. Until we opened the doors, of course, we hadn’t had the faintest idea whether we’d ordered far too much beer or far too little.

The most gratifying sight for me was the arrival of almost half the employees of Powwownow and sundry partners – that was when I could be sure we’d sell out! Indeed, at twenty past six, our first barrel shed its last drop and was followed by a steady progression through the rest. They weren’t just drinking, though; my recollection is hazy at best but I have photo evidence of Stewart helping out on the barbecue. At 7pm we estimated to have sold our 500th pint and by the time the band came on at 8 we had another two barrels with EMPTY scrawled across their cards.

There was dancing and merriment (and minor injury when Mark and I got a little over-enthusiastic) and as the last sausage came off the barbecue and disappeared into certain ravenous reveller the flush of success washed over us like beer over the tongue of a thirsty traveller. We closed the doors with barely half a barrel left over and over £2,000 in pure profit for the hall – a tidy sum.

So thanks to everybody that turned out and thanks in particular to Andy Pearce, our esteemed marketing director, who signed off the fantastic glasses. If you want to see one, we’ve got about 50 extras floating around the office as I write.

See you next year!