Worthington Brewery

British brewery founded in 1761

Worthington Brewery, also known as Worthington & Co. and Worthington's, is a British brewer founded by William Worthington in Burton upon Trent in 1761. It is the third oldest continuously brewed British beer brand, after Shepherde Neame and Whitbread. The best known Worthington beers are its Creamflow nitrokeg bitter and White Shield India Pale Ale. When William Worthington died in 1800, his brewery was one of the largest outside London. Horace Tabberer Brown, a chemist employed by Worthington, pioneered brewing science in the separation and cultivation of pure yeast strains from 1866, and the brewery was the first in the world to systematically use a laboratory in the brewing process from 1872. Worthington & Co merged with its major Burton rival Bass in 1927. Until the 1960s the Worthington brand, in bottled form, ranked alongside Bass and Guinness as one of only three beers with nationwide distribution. However, bottled beer sales declined as keg beer grew in popularity throughout the 1960s, and the Worthington brewery closed in 1965. The beers continued to be brewed elsewhere, and the Worthington brand has remained prominent up to the present day. The Worthington brand was purchased from Bass by the American brewing company Coors in 2002, which following a merger became Molson Coors in 2005. Creamflow is the third highest selling ale in the United Kingdom, as well as the highest selling ale in Wales, and is brewed in Burton. Worthington's White Shield IPA has continued to be brewed since 1829, and has been the recipient of a number of awards. In 2010, Molson Coors opened the William Worthington microbrewery, which brews historical and seasonal beers. The Worthington brand has had an association with rugby union sponsorship since the latter half of the twentieth century. The brand also sponsored the Football League Cup from 1998 until 2003.

William Worthington (1723–1800) was born at Orton on the Hill in Leicestershire, the fourth child of William Worthington (1687–1742), yeoman farmer, and his wife, Elizabeth. In 1744, he moved to Burton upon Trent in Staffordshire where he worked as a cooper at Joseph Smith's brewery. Largely as a result of this trade, by the time of Worthington's death in 1800, Worthington & Co. ranked among the largest of the provincial breweries. On the death of Worthington in 1825 he was succeeded by his son, also named William (1799–1871). Combined with a decrease on malt duty in 1823, this led to an oversupply of beer in Burton. The railway network joined Burton in August 1839, which made it much more economical to distribute beer throughout the country. Worthington dissolved the Robinson partnership in 1864, in order for his sons to acquire the business. In 1866 the Prince of Wales awarded the company the Royal Warrant. Worthington pioneered brewing science from 1866 by employing a chemist, Horace Tabberer Brown, who led the world in separation and cultivation of pure yeast strains. The company had previously resisted employing a laboratory, for fear that the public would perceive the scientific apparatus as a means of doctoring the beer. In order to differentiate themselves from other brewers, Worthington labelled their beers with alphabetical letters: their Burton Ales were called G, F and D, their light dinner ale was labelled M. Worthington E was an India Pale Ale, a competitor to Bass Pale Ale. By 1880, Worthington's IPA was challenging Bass's sales in the home market. Worthington was the third largest Burton brewer by 1888, behind Bass and Allsopp, with an annual output of 220,000 barrels per annum. From 1886, Worthington began to acquire public houses, which provided a captive market for their product. When William Henry Worthington (1826–1894) died he left no direct heirs and was the fourth and final generation of the family to manage Worthington & Co. Horace Brown left the company in 1894 following a dispute with co manager William Manners. By 1900, 73 per cent of the company's equity was in the hands of William Posnette Manners, who had joined the company in 1862 as a junior clerk, and under his astute leadership Worthington acquired a reputation for the quality of its bottled pale ales. The company acquired the Burton Brewery Company in 1915. Product rationalisation began after the Second World War and although Worthington occasionally overtook Bass in sales, the decision was taken to prioritise Bass products. Arthur Manners took the chairmanship of Bass in 1947, and was instrumental in driving the company forward. Brewing industry mergers from the late 1950s onwards damaged Worthington sales, as tied house ownership became increasingly concentrated with brewers intent on promoting their own products. At the same time, bottled beer sales suffered as drinkers in search of consistency opted for the new keg beers instead. In 1965, the original Worthington brewery was closed, although production of the Worthington beers continued, consisting of White Shield, Green Shield (a filtered version of White Shield) and the draught product, E. Worthington E became the main keg bitter offered by Bass from 1967, and it had become a leading bitter brand by the 1970s, boosted by the company's network of 11,000 public houses. Worthington E was replaced as Bass' leading keg bitter by Stones Bitter from 1981. Worthington regained its position as the leading ale brand for Bass from 1997, predominantly through the Creamflow variant. In 2000, Bass was bought by the Belgian brewer Interbrew. The Competition Commission ordered Interbrew to divest itself of a number of its recently acquired brands, and Worthington was bought by the American brewer Coors, who later became Molson Coors in 2005. In 2004 Coors announced that they would no longer advertise Worthington on a large scale.

Worthington's Creamflow (3.6% ABV) ale is the twelfth highest selling beer in the United Kingdom, with an estimated 640,000 hectolitres sold in 2012. It is the third highest selling ale brand in the United Kingdom after John Smith's and Tetley's. It is the highest selling ale in Wales, where it has a 20 per cent volume share, and has been first since at least 1999. Most of the sales consist of the nitrogenated and pasteurised Creamflow, which was launched in 1995 and is available in kegs and cans. Modest amounts of a four per cent ABV keg bitter known as Worthington's Ale continue to be brewed for the Teesside market.

Worthington's White Shield (5.6% ABV) is an India Pale Ale available principally in bottle conditioned form, but also in casks. It has won the CAMRA Champion Bottled Beer of Britain Gold award three times, more than any other beer. In 1829, Worthington launched East India Pale Ale, their first IPA. It was exported to British expatriates across the Empire, mostly officers and civil servants, as the soldiers tended to drink the cheaper porter. In the 1870s it gained the White Shield logo, and by the end of the nineteenth century took on this name with drinkers. By the 1960s White Shield had become a cult drink brewed in small quantities for a dedicated following; production in 1965 was just 15,000 barrels as drinkers switched to filtered and pasteurised bottled and keg beers. It found renewed popularity in the early 1970s as the demand for real ale grew, but lost this position as cask ale became easier to find. Bass moved production from Burton to their Hope & Anchor brewery in Sheffield in 1981. The Hope & Anchor brewery closed in 1992, and production was moved to Cape Hill in Birmingham, before being contracted to King and Barnes of Sussex in 1998. The King and Barnes brewery closed in 2000, and production moved to the Bass owned White Shield microbrewery in Burton upon Trent. In 2010, production was moved to the newly constructed William Worthington's Brewery, a microbrewery based at the National Brewery Centre in Burton. In 2012, increasing demand saw White Shield production moved to the main Coors brewery in Burton. In 2013, Roger Protz described White Shield as the highest selling bottle conditioned beer in Britain.

1920s print advertisements linked the brand with Englishness alongside classic images of the Lake District and other national areas of beauty. Throughout the 1970s Worthington E was marketed as "The taste that satisfies " Advertising in the mid 1990s focused on Creamflow, with a series of television advertisements featuring comedian Harry Enfield.

The brewery's blood red heart shield and dagger logo was introduced in 1863. The name was changed to Worthington's in 2002 and shield became more obviously heart shaped. The shield was restored in 2011, and the brand's design was modified to resemble its 1920s appearance.

Worthington's is involved in sponsorship of rugby union and rugby league. From 1998 until 2003 it sponsored the Football League Cup to the cost of £23 million. Since 2011, the brand has sponsored the St. Simon Stakes at Newbury Racecourse.