Newcastle Brown Ale
| Type | Brown ale |
|---|---|
| Manufacturer | Heineken |
| Distributor | Heineken |
| Country of origin | United Kingdom |
| Introduced | 1927 |
| Alcohol by volume | 4.7% |
| Colour | Red-brown |
| Website | newcastlebrown |
Newcastle Brown Ale is a brown ale, originally produced in Newcastle upon Tyne, but now brewed by Heineken at the John Smith's Brewery in Tadcaster, North Yorkshire.
Launched in 1927 by Colonel Jim Porter after three years of development, the 1960 merger of Newcastle Breweries with Scottish Brewers afforded the beer national distribution and sales peaked in the United Kingdom during the early 1970s. The brand underwent a resurgence in the late 1980s and early 1990s with student unions selling the brand. By the late 1990s, the beer was the most widely distributed alcoholic product in the UK. By the 2000s, the majority of sales were in the United States, although it still sells 100 million bottles annually in the UK. In 2005, brewing moved from Newcastle to Dunston, Tyne and Wear, and in 2010 to Tadcaster.
Newcastle Brown Ale is perceived in the UK as a working-man's beer, with a long association with heavy industry, the traditional economic staple of the North East of England. In export markets, it is seen as a trendy, premium import and is predominantly drunk by the young. It was one of the first beers to be distributed in a clear glass bottle and it is most readily associated with this form of dispense in the UK.
Newcastle Brown Ale was originally created by Lieutenant Colonel James ('Jim') Herbert Porter (b. 1892, Burton upon Trent), a third-generation brewer at Newcastle Breweries, in 1927. Porter had served in the North Staffordshire Regiment in the First World War, earning his DSO with Bar before moving to Newcastle. Porter had refined the recipe for Newcastle Brown Ale alongside chemist Archie Jones over a period of three years. When Porter actually completed the beer, he believed it to be a failure, as he had actually been attempting to recreate Bass ale. The original beer had an original gravity of 1060º and was 6.25 ABV, and it sold at a premium price of 9 shillings for a dozen pint bottles.
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