"HOME BREW" INDUSTRY

Waipa Post, Volume 48, Issue 3479, 14 June 1934, Page 6

"HOME BREW" INDUSTRY

NOT DEAD IN WELLINGTON. OPINIONS DIFFER WIDELY. According to a message from Auckland this week, the home-brew industry there is dying, if not quite dead. But whether the industry is in the same plight in Wellington is an open question. Inquiries made by the "Dominion" at many stores where they sell the ingredients brought varying opinions on its present condition. "Definitely, home brewing is not dead," said the manager of one provision firm which ought to know. "It is in a state of coma at present, bul the winter is no time to judge oi the city's thirst. Nevertheless, we dill sell large quantities of hops ; malt and the rest of the recipe." A" few doors up the street another grocer contributed this: '-Home-brew? —it is fading out entirely. .Except for a few diehards who still buy the ingredients, hardly anyone seems tc bother about the stuff. A lot of people used to make it last summer, but they scon got .tired, or did not make it properly. Anyway, it was only s fad. Some of them thought themselves great brewers, but even they have had enough of it. One woman who used to come in regularly for the 'makings' had a nervous breakdown. Her home-brew cannot have been much good." The manager of a concern which dees a large country business was equally certain, though less emphatic, in the way he put it, that home-brew-ing had had its day. His firm sold only a fraction of the malt and hops that were disposed of formerly. In winter the enthusiasm of home-brew-ers waned in common with that of people Who bought their beer ready made. The coming of warmer days would possibly stimulate the demand for hops and malt, "but the business was only a fad which was giving its Isst Icicle* A provision shop in one of the populous suburbs reported that the sale of home-brewing materials was still active; in fact, during the past two-weeks a-number of'new customers had come to buy the ingredients. Home-brewers in the district served by the shop were still going strong. It could not be said that the business was declining, although it was naturally hot as brisk as in summer.