By James Atkinson
The Bluetongue beer brand will be discontinued with the announcement by Carlton & United Breweries that it will close its Warnervale, New South Wales brewery later this year.
CUB said in a statement that while Warnervale played a vital role in its Pacific Beverages joint venture with Coca-Cola Amatil, things have changed significantly since the site was built.
“Warnervale is now part of the much larger and established national CUB network and this has resulted in excess brewing capacity, particularly as the overall beer market remains challenging.”
“The unique capabilities associated with Warnervale will be re-installed into the broader CUB network over the next 12 months, commencing potentially as early as May.”
CUB said the Bluetongue brand will be phased out and discontinued over the coming months, despite CEO Ari Mervis having previously told TheShout that there would be no more high profile deletions from CUB’s range.
“There’s a tail of brands that we are deleting but the consumer won’t miss them,” he said in the full interview in July last year.
“They’re very small brands, hence the reason to be able to delete them.”
CUB yesterday said Bluetongue was important to Pacific Beverages but had been in decline over recent years.
“CUB has a well-established set of core beer brands and was not in a position to continue to invest in the brand,” the brewer said.
A total of 64 Warnervale employees will lose their jobs as a result of the closure.
“The decision means CUB will continue to invest in the Yatala Brewery [in Queensland], with multi-million dollar upgrades at that site to support the brewing of the SABMiller international premium brands at the site,” CUB said.
CUB spokespersons could not be contacted for further comment.
I wish I could say I was sad to see it go, but really it was just yet another bland pale lager in a market full of bland pale lagers. There was nothing ‘premium’ about it. It’s a shame for the employees, but nobody’s going to miss the beer.
I wish the founders had’ve had the foresight to make it a true craft micro-brewery, instead of selling out to the big boys. Hope they got rich!
this was not a brewery but a marketing experiment.Just goes to show you can sell dish water to the masses if the label is half good
I have to agree with Jay, this beer was just ‘meh’ when I had it a few years back. It also became impossible to find in Melbourne (not that I really wanted it).
Question. Since CUB no longer want the Bluetongue brand will they give it to someone who does? And what of the stock that they will struggle to sell now they are axing it?