UK Brewers Looking to Attract More Women Drinkers

In an effort to boost lagging beer sales in the UK, brewers are looking to attract the largely untapped market of women. According to market researcher Taylor Nelson Sofres PLC, only 13% of UK women regularly buy beer, compared with 25% in the US. A Wall Street Journal article cites the ban on smoking in pubs and a weakened economy to blame for the decline in beer sales and visits to the pub.

Coors, the UK arm of Molson Coors Brewing Company, even came up with a unit called Eve to focus on marketing techniques aimed at women. Eve’s mission is to create “a world where women love beer as much as they love shoes.” In regard to the beer industry neglecting the female population, Coors chief executive, Mark Hunter, says “We’ve done something fundamentally wrong here.”

Eve found that women in the UK like to drink vodka and wine and that women view beer as “fattening.” Other research has found that women don’t like the smell and aftertaste of beer. To combat these perceptions, Coors has begun to offer Blue Moon, a beer often served with orange slices, for the first time in London pubs. And the drinks company Diageo PLC has launched Guinness Red, a beer that is sweeter and without the strong aroma the traditional Guinness has.

But can British women boost beer sales in the UK? There are skeptics. Of course, women get drunk faster than men and with less alcohol. An alcohol consultant at research company Nielsen Company notes, “They don’t consume the volume — and that is crucial — that men do.”

Read More: UK Brewers Try to Tap Women’s Market (Wall Street Journal)

technorati tags: UK, women, drinking, alcohol

UK Report Estimates Public Cost of Single Drug Addict Over $1.5M

A government report coming out of the United Kingdom estimates that a single drug addict costs taxpayers more than £800,000 (about $1.569 million) over his or her lifetime. Interestingly enough, a female drug addict was estimated to cost £859,000 (about $1.692 million), while a male user cost slightly less at £827,000 ($1.629).

The admittedly conservative numbers, as reported by auditors PricewaterhouseCoopers, were calculated by looking at factors such as the cost of crime and healthcare under Great Britain’s National Health Service. The report also suggested that this cost could be reduced by more than £730,000 (about $1.4 million) if drug addicts were successfully given treatment by the age of 21. According to the BBC report, there are thought to be about 350,000 problem drug users in Britain.

So, how does the United States compare? According to a study from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), total economic cost of drug abuse was $97.7 million back in 1992. This estimate includes substance abuse treatment and prevention costs as well as other healthcare costs, costs associated with reduced job productivity or lost earnings, and other costs to society such as crime and social welfare.

Bottom line is that drug and alcohol addiction is costly to society. With access to proper treatment and more prevention efforts, these costs would go down tremendously.

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From the BBC: Addicts cost taxpayers £800,000
From NIDA: Costs to Society from Drug Abuse

Technorati Tags: drugs, addiction, drug abuse, cost to society, UK, US