One Year On
Yesterday marked the anniversary of the announcement that I was taking over the running of Beer Guide London from Jezza so it seems as good a time as any to look at how it has been going.
I was apprehensive about taking over, it was a big responsibility maintaining Jezza’s legacy. I knew how much time he had put in to it over the years and I wasn’t sure I would be able to devote the same level of commitment.
My initial plan was to visit all Guide entries at least once within the first year, I didn’t expect to achieve it in 6½ months, and feel aggrieved that it wasn’t exactly 6 months due to a private event at one of the last venues! Having managed to cover everything the aim now is to try and keep it to around a year at most between visits, although this will vary slightly as I don’t just want to repeat the cycle of visits started last March.
The biggest plus out of doing this is the, mostly, positive feedback from all of the Guide users. On Saturdays when I was lacking motivation I would see a couple of tweets asking where I was going that day and it gave me the necessary kick up the ass that I needed, To aid my planning, early on, I created a Google map of the entries so that I could more easily visualise logical itineraries, and as a casual throwaway I shared the link. I never expected that a year on it would have been viewed more than 180,000 times!
It’s always a good feeling to visit somewhere new and decide that it is of a sufficient standard that it can be added to the Guide and so far I have enjoyed that feeling on 27 occasions. However, the opposite feeling comes about when you realise that an existing entry no longer merits its place. It was with great trepidation that I announced the removal of The White Horse, Parson’s Green, a long standing entry and London beer legend, but the overwhelmingly supportive comments that the announcement received were enough to convince me that maybe I do sort of know what I am doing!
On a number of occasions I have been asked, whilst sitting making my notes, if I am Beer Guide London by people who had been watching my days visits and anticipating if I would end up in the bar they were. Equally I have met people who use the Guide regularly, most notably when on a night out in Manchester when I met a City fan who used the Guide on all of his London trips. Moments like this put a smile on your face.
At the end of the day the Guide is subjective, not everybody will like every entry, but I try to maintain a consistent level and standard. Jezza and I worked well together because we had a very similar view on what was “guideworthy” and hopefully it shows that the progression from Jezza, to the two of us, to me, has been seamless and transparent to the end user. And, should our paths cross, I am happy to discuss and defend the inclusion of every bar in the Guide.
Nobody knows what the future holds, and in some ways it is looking a bit bleaker on the London Beer Scene with numerous brewery closures, but there are still great new bars being opened by passionate people, and by people adding additional branches to their little empires. This is what drives me on, and I will keep heading out every weekend to seek them out and let the wider world know of their existence.
Cheers!