No CrossRef data available.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 January 2025
During the last three decades of the twentieth century, John Labatt Ltd., one of Canada’s oldest and most successful breweries, attempted to gain a share of the British beer market. This article examines the push and pull factors of why foreign brewers like Labatt decided to enter the competitive British marketplace and analyzes the strategies of the winners and losers of the “lager war.” The article pays attention to the branding efforts of marketing managers and how some used product–place associations to imbue their brands with authenticity. While positive country images often lead to a favorable assessment of the products from that country, it is also true that unfavorable perceptions often foster negative assessments of their products. By examining the entrepreneurship and structural barriers of the beer industry in the United Kingdom toward the end of the twentieth century, the article adds to our understanding of the dynamics of business failure.
1 Sidney Oland, “Speech to the Shareholders,” (7 Sept. 1989), Box A01-039-348, Labatt Collection.
2 Martin Stack, Myles Gartland, and Tim Keene, “Path Dependency, Behavioral Lock-in and Beer Markets,” in Brewing, Beer and Pubs: A Global Perspective, ed. Ignazio Cabras, David Higgins, and David Preece (New York, NY, 2016), 59–60.
3 Philip Scranton and Patrick Fridenson, Reimagining Business History (Baltimore, MD, 2013), 108-113.
4 Scranton and Fridenson, Reimagining Business History, 108–113.
5 Scranton and Fridenson, Reimagining Business History, 108.
6 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. “Table 7. Survival of Private Sector Establishments by Opening Year.” https://www.bls.gov/bdm/us_age_naics_00_table7.txt
7 Patrick Fridenson, “Business Failure and the Agenda of Business History,” Enterprise & Society 5 (December 2004): 572.
8 Fridenson, “Business Failure and the Agenda of Business History,” 567, 572.
9 J. Gimeno, T. B. Folta, A. C. Cooper, and C. Y. Woo, “Survival of the Fittest? Entrepreneurial Human Capital and the Persistence of Underperforming Firms,” Administrative Science Quarterly 42 (1997): 750–83; D. Ucbasaran, P. Westhead, M. Wright, and M. Flores, “The Nature of Entrepreneurial Experience, Business Failure and Comparative Optimism,” Journal of Business Venturing 25 (2010): 541–555.
10 Kamel Mellahi and Adrian Wilkinson, “Managing and Coping with Organizational Failure: Introduction to the Special Issue,” Group and Organizational Management 35 (2010): 531–541.
11 M. Bliss, A Canadian Millionaire: The Life and Business Times of Sir Joseph Flavelle, Bart, 1858–1939 (Toronto, Canada, 1978; Rod McQueen, The Eatons: The Rise and Fall of Canada’s Royal Family (Toronto, Canada, 1998); Donna McDonald, Lord Strathcona: A Biography of Donald Alexander Smith (Toronto, Canada, 1996); Greg Marchildon, Profits & Politics: Beaverbrook and the Gilded Age of Finance (Toronto, Canada, 1996).
12 C. R. Osthaus. Freedmen, Philanthropy, and Fraud: A History of the Freedman’s Savings Bank (Urbana, IL, 1976); W. Schell, “American Investment in Tropical Mexico: Rubber Plantations, Fraud, and Dollar Diplomacy, 1897–1913,” Business History Review 64 (1990): 217–254; D. J. Cooper, T. Dacin, and D. Palmer, “Fraud in Accounting, Organizations and Society: Extending the Boundaries of Research,” Accounting, Organizations and Society 38 (2013): 440–457; P. L. Govekar, “An Historical Perspective on the Sarbanes-Oxley Act,” Journal of Management History 14 (2008): 284–293; E. J. Balleisen, Fraud. An American History from Barnum to Madoff (Princeton, NJ, 2017); M. Hollow, “The 1920 Farrow’s Bank Failure: A Case of Managerial Hubris?” Journal of Management History 20 (2014):164–178; M. S. Salter, Innovation Corrupted: The Origins and Legacy of Enron’s Collapse (Cambridge, MA, 2008); Ucbasaran, Westhead, Wright, and Flores, “The Nature of Entrepreneurial Experience,” 541–555; M. Bliss, Northern Enterprise, Five Centuries of Canadian Business (Toronto, Canada, 1987), 304.
13 James Cortada, IBM: The Rise and Fall and Reinvention of a Global Icon (Cambridge, MA, 2019).
14 Stephen Fay, The Collapse of Barings (Ann Arbor, MI, 1996).
15 Barry Boothman, “High Finance/Low Strategy: Corporate Collapse in the Canadian Pulp and Paper Industry, 1919–1932,” Business History Review 74 (Winter 2000): 611–656; G. Robb, White-Collar Crime in Modern England: Financial Fraud and Business Morality, 1845–1929 (Cambridge, MA, 1992); M. Hollow, Rogue Banking. A History of Financial Fraud in Interwar Britain (Basingstoke, UK, 2015).
16 David S. Landes, Joel Mokyr, and William J. Baumol, eds., The Invention of Enterprise: Entrepreneurship from Ancient Mesopotamia to Modern Times (Princeton, NJ, 2010); David Landes, The Unbound Prometheus: Technological Change and Industrial Development in Western Europe from 1750 to the Present (New York, NY, 2003); David Landes, “French Entrepreneurship and Industrial Growth in the Nineteenth Century,” Journal of Economic History 9 (1949): 45–61.
17 S. R. H Jones, “The New Zealand Brewing Industry, 1840–1995,” in The Dynamics of the International Brewing Industry Since 1800, ed. R. G. Wilson and T. R. Gourvish (London, UK, 1998): 247–265; David T. Merrett, “Stability and Change in the Australian Brewing Industry, 1930–94,” in Dynamics of the International Brewing Industry, 229–248; Tony Millns, “The British Brewing Industry, 1945–95” in Dynamics of the International Brewing Industry, 142–159; T. R. Gourvish, “Economics of Brewing, Theory and Practice: Concentration and Technological Change in the USA, UK and West Germany since 1945,” Business and Economic History 23 (Fall 1994): 253–261; Matthew J. Bellamy, “The Rise of the Big Three: The Emergence of a Canadian Brewing Oligopoly, 1945–1962” in Pleasure and Panic: New Essays on the History of Alcohol and Drugs, eds. Dan Malleck and Cheryl Warsh (Vancouver, Canada, 2022), 270–294.
18 Richard W. Unger, Beer in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance (Philadelphia, PA, 2004), 57–67, 73, 76–79, 86–88, 98, 107, 113, 120, 192, 200, 234–235, 292.
19 Boje and Johansen, “The Danish Brewing Industry,” in Dynamics of the International Brewing Industry, 59–75; Unger, “Dutch Brewing in the Nineteenth Century,” in Dynamics of the International Brewing Industry, 13–31; Teresa Da Silva Lopes, Global Brands: The Evolution of Multinationals in the Alcoholic Beverages, (Cambridge, MA., 2007), 242–243.
20 T. R. Gourvish and R. G. Wilson, The British Brewing Industry 1830–1980 (Cambridge, UK, 1994), 169–178.
21 Between 1945 and 1970, Canadian corporations such as Inco, Brascan, Noranda, Cominco, Alcan, MacMillan Bloedel, and Massey-Ferguson made substantial investments abroad. See Duncan Campbell, Global Mission: The Story of Alcan (Toronto, Canada, 1985); Donald MacKay, Empire of Wood: The MacMillan Bloedel Story (Vancouver, Canada, 1982), 245–275; Edward Neufeld, A Global Corporation: A History of the International Development of Massey-Ferguson Limited (Toronto, Canada, 1969), 290–302.
22 James Watson, Golden Arches East: McDonald’s in East Asia (Stanford, CA, 2006), 15.
23 George Ritzer, The McDonaldization of Society: An Investigation into the Changing Character of Contemporary Social Life (Los Angeles, CA, 1993).
24 Alfred Chandler, Scale and Scope: The Dynamics of Industrial Capitalism (Cambridge, MA, 1990), 117, 122, 171–5, 213–17, 446–52.
25 Eline Poelmans and Johan F. M. Swinnen, The Economics of Beer (Oxford, UK, 2011), 1–17; Matthew J. Bellamy, Brewed in the North: A History of Labatt’s (Montreal, Canada, 2019), 320–383; David H. Jernigan, “The Global Alcohol Industry: An Overview,” Addiction Review 104 (October 2008): 6–12.
26 Boje and Johansen, “The Danish Brewing Industry,” 70–72.
27 Boje and Johansen, “The Danish Brewing Industry,” 70–72.
28 Katie Sluyterman and Bram Bouwens, “From Colonial Empires to Developing Countries and on to Emerging Economies: The International Expansion of the Dutch Brewery Heineken, 1930–2010,” Management & Organizational History 10 (2015): 103–118.
29 Andreas Zangger, “Chops and Trademarks: Asian Trading Ports and Textile Branding, 1840–1920,” Enterprise & Society 15 (2015): 759–790.
30 Lopes, Global Brands, 23–42.
31 Saverio Gioffre, “Growth Opportunities That Exist for Canada’s Brewing Industry: A Market Study” (MA thesis, Ryerson Polytechnical Institute, 1984), 5–7.
32 Gioffre, “Growth Opportunities,” 6.
33 Rod Mickleburg, “Student Drinking, Drug Abuse on Rise, arf Says,” Globe and Mail, 20 November 1991, A7.
34 Ed Gregory, Wendy Hurst, and Thomas Gussman, Alcoholic Beverage Taxation and Control Policies, Alcoholic Beverage Taxation and Control Policies: An International Survey (Toronto, Canada, 1997), 50.
35 David Merrett and Greg Whitwell, “The Empire Strikes Back: Marketing Australian Beer and Wine in the United Kingdom,” in Adding Value: Brands and Marketing in Food and Drink, eds. Geoffrey Jones and Nicholas Morgan (London, UK, 1994), 166.
36 Gregory, Hurst, and Gussman, Alcoholic Beverage Taxation and Control Policies, 466.
37 Gregory, Hurst, and Gussman, Alcoholic Beverage Taxation and Control Policies, 6, 8.
38 John Spicer, Chris Thurman, John Walters, and Simon Ward, Intervention in the Modern UK Brewing Industry (London, UK, 2012), 31–39.
39 Emily Bell, “You Can’t Top a Premium Lager,” The Observer, 27 September 1992, 32.
40 Merrett and Whitwell. “The Empire Strikes Back,” 167.
41 “United Kingdom Beer Market Potential for Labatt Participation,” 28 Nov. 28 1979, Box A10-039-236, Labatt Collection.
42 Monopolies and Mergers Commission, The Supply of Beer, 185.
43 Merrett and Whitwell. “The Empire Strikes Back,” 167.
44 Geoffrey Gibbs, “Lager Peps Up Whitbread,” The Guardian, 21 Nov. 1985, 27.
45 Gibbs, “Lager Peps Up Whitbread,” 27.
46 Geoffrey Gibb, “Aussie Assault on the Poms Picks Up,” The Guardian, 17 Feb. 1988, 11.
47 “John Labatt Limited, Corporate Strategy Review,” 27 Sept. 27, 1989, Box A10-039-088, Labatt Collection.
48 “United Kingdom Beer Market Potential for Labatt Participation,” 28 Nov. 1979, Box A10-039-236, Labatt Collection.
49 Ignazio Cabras and Charles Bamforth, “From Reviving Tradition to Fostering Innovation and Changing Marketing: The Evolution of Micro-Brewing in the UK and US, 1980–2012,” Business History 58 (2016): 625–646.
50 Thomas Thurnell-Read, “The Embourgeoisement of Beer: Changing Practices of ‘Real Ale’ Consumption,” Journal of Consumer Culture 18 (2018): 539–557.
51 Sid Oland, “Eldridge Pope Public Presentation,” A08-053-304, Labatt Collection.
52 “Labatt’s News Release,” 29 Jan. 1988.
53 Labatt Brewing (UK) Limited, “Presentation to Mr. Roy McMurtry Canadian High Commissioner to the UK, Box A10-039-236, Labatt Collection.
54 Sid Oland, “Eldridge Pope Public Presentation,” Box A08-053-304, Labatt Collection.
55 Matthew J. Bellamy, Brewed in the North: A History of Labatt’s (Montreal, Canada, 2019), 263.
56 Millns, “The British Brewing Industry,” 154.
57 Labatt Brewing (UK) Limited, “Presentation to Mr. Roy McMurtry Canadian High Commissioner to the UK, Box A10-039-236, Labatt Collection.
58 Merrett and Whitwell. “The Empire Strikes Back,”167–173.
59 “United Kingdom Beer Market Potential for Labatt Participation,” 28 Nov. 1979, Box A10-039-236, Labatt Collection.
60 “United Kingdom Beer Market Potential for Labatt Participation.”
61 Marina Strauss, “Labatt Eyes Breweries of Troubled Bond Corp,” Globe and Mail,12 Jan. 1990, B1.
62 Anonymous, “Guinness to Acquire Spanish Brewer, ”Globe and Mail, 22 Nov. 1990, B24.
63 Paul Brent, Lager Heads: Labatt, Molson and the People Who Created Canada’s Beer Wars (Toronto, Canada, 2004), 154.
64 Brent, Lager Heads, 153.
65 Sid Oland to Andrew Thomas, 16 Jan. 1987, Box A08-053-304, Labatt Collection.
66 Merrett and Whitwell, “The Empire Strikes Back,” 169.
67 Spicer, Thurman, Walters, and Ward, Intervention in the Modern UK Brewing Industry, 128.
68 Spicer, Thurman, Walters, and Ward, Intervention in the Modern UK Brewing Industry, 128.
69 Sam Floy, “Competition and Oligopoly in the UK Beer Market: How Do Small Brewers Survive?” Brewery History (2014): 41.
70 Sid Oland to Andrew Thomas, 16 January 1987, Box A08-053-304, Labatt Collection.
71 Spicer, Thurman, Walters, and Ward, Intervention in the Modern UK Brewing Industry, 185.
72 Stephen Ward, “Labatt Battles for a Beachhead in Britain,” Globe and Mail, 17 Nov. 1992, B4.
73 Agreement, 3 Dec. 1987, Box A10-039-169, Labatt Collection.
74 Labatt’s of UK and Europe, Report, 4 Mar. 1995, Box A10-039-297, Labatt Collection.
75 Labatt’s of UK and Europe, Report.
76 Monopolies and Mergers Commission, The Supply of Beer, 239–240.
77 Roger Cowe, “Carlsberg -- Probably the Most International Lager,” The Guardian, 13 June 1988:12.
78 Spicer, Thurman, Walters, and Ward, Intervention in the Modern UK Brewing Industry, 31–39. Why Guinness’s Harp Lager was not widely stocked in the UK while its stout was is an interesting question. Part of the answer is that Guinness stout had been sold in the UK for decades before Harp Lager was introduced, allowing the company to slowly build a loyal customer base for the brand. Since the early nineteenth century, the company had emphasized the quality and uniqueness of its stout, appealing to a niche segment that appreciated the beer’s rich flavor and smooth texture. Guinness could not make this product differentiation with Harp Lager. Furthermore, effective marketing highlighted stout’s Irish heritage, with the iconic harp logo and the slogan “Guinness is Good For You.” Finally, Guinness’s international success bolstered its reputation back in Britain.
79 Monopolies and Mergers Commission, The Supply of Beer, 259.
80 Ray Oldenburg, The Great Good Place: Cafes, Coffee Shops, Bookstores, Bars, Hair Salons, and Other Hangouts at the Heart of the Community (New York, NY, 2019), 16-18.
81 Julie Bower and Howard Cox, “How Scottish & Newcastle Became the U.K.’s Largest Brewer: A Case of Regulatory Capture?” Business History Review 86 (Spring 2012), 59–61.
82 Daniel Yergin and Joseph Stanislaw, The Commanding Heights: The Battle for the World Economy (New York, NY, 1998), 89.
83 “John Labatt Limited, Corporate Strategy Review, 27 Sept., 1989,” Box A10-039-088, Labatt Collection.
84 Spicer, Thurman, Walters, and Ward, Intervention in the Modern UK Brewing Industry, 128–138.
85 Julie Bower, “Vertical and Financial Ownership: Competition Policy and the Evolution of the UK Pub Market,” Business History 58 (2016): 659.
86 Spicer, Thurman, Walters, and Ward, Intervention in the Modern UK Brewing Industry, 152–164.
87 These are (1) A.B. InBev U.K. Ltd. (Stella Artois), (2) Carlsberg UK Brewing Ltd., (3) Heineken U.K. Ltd., and (4) Molson Coors Brewing Company (UK) (owns Carling Black Label, Britain’s best-selling lager).
88 R. J. Clark to S. M. Oland, 26 March 1991, Box A10-039-088, Labatt Collection.
89 Spicer, Thurman, Walters, and Ward, Intervention in the Modern UK Brewing Industry, 137.
90 David Higgins, Steven Toms, and Moshfique Uddin. “Vertical Monopoly Power, Profit and Risk: The British Beer Industry, c.1970–c.2004.” Business History 58 (2016): 667–693.
91 Keon Deconinck and Johan Swinnen, “Tied Houses: Why They Are So Common and Why Breweries Charge Them High Prices for Their Beer,” in Brewing, Beer and Pubs: A Global Perspective, eds. Ignazio Cabras, David Higgins and David Preece (New York, NY, 2016), 232.
92 Shane Butler, Karen Elmeland, Betsy Thom, and James Nicholls, Alcohol, Power and Public Health: A Comparative Study of Alcohol Policy (New York, NY, 2017), 135.
93 Minutes, John Labatt Limited, 10 Dec.1992 Toronto.
94 Minutes, 5 Nov. 1992.
95 Minutes, 10 Dec. 1992.
96 Brent, Lager Heads, 155.
97 Sid Oland, “Year-End Review John Labatt Limited Annual General Meeting,” 10 Sept. 1992, Box A10-039-088, Labatt Collection.
98 Stephen Ward, “Labatt Battles for a Beachhead in Britain,” Globe and Mail, 17 Nov. 1992, B4.
99 Labatt Brewing UK, “Liquid Map and Profiles,” 4 Dec. 1995, Box A10-039-090, Labatt Collection.
100 Lopes, Global Brands, 1–66, 129–279; Merrett and Whitwell, “The Empire Strikes Back,” 162–190; Hans Chr. Johansen, “Marketing and Competition in Danish Brewing,” in Adding Value: Brands and Marketing in Food and Drink, eds. Geoffrey Jones and Nicholas Morgan, (London, UK, 1994), 126–138; Ronald Weir, “Managing Decline: Brands and Marketing in Two Mergers: ‘The Big Amalgamation’ 1925 and Guinness−DCL 1986,” in Adding Value: Brands and Marketing in Food and Drink, eds. Geoffrey Jones and Nicholas Morgan, (London, UK, 1994), 139–162.
101 Geoffrey Gibb, “Aussie Assault on the Poms Picks Up,” The Guardian, 17 Feb. 1988, 11.
102 Labatt Brewing (UK) Limited, “Presentation to Mr. Roy McMurtry, Canadian High Commissioner to the UK,” Box A10-039-236, Labatt Collection.
103 W. J. Bilkey and E. Nes, “Country-of-Origin Effects on Product Evaluations,” Journal of International Business Studies 13 (1982): 89–99; C. M. Han, “Country Image: Halo or Summary Construct?” Journal of Marketing Research 26 (1989): 222–229; M. Larouche, N. Papadopoulos, L. A. Heslop, and M. Mourali, “The Influence of Country Image Structure on Consumer Evaluations of Foreign Products,” International Marketing Review 22 (2005): 96–115.
104 R. A. D. Hill, “‘Le terroir, c’est la vie’: Re-Animating a Concept Among Burgundy’s Wine Producers,” Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space 5 (2022): 447–472.
105 F. Graby, “Countries as Corporate Entities in International Markets,” in Product-Country-Images. Impact and Role in International Marketing, eds. N. Papadopoulos and L. Heslop (New York, NY, 1993), 257–283.
106 Merrett and Whitwell, “The Empire Strikes Back,” 170.
107 S. Bartholomeusz, “CUB Launches Foster’s Lager in UK,” The Age, 20 July 1984, 21.
108 Memorandum, 23 Oct. 1987, Box A10-039-236, Labatt Collection.
109 Bilkey and Nes, “Country-of-Origin Effects on Product Evaluations, ”89–99; Han, “Country Image, 222–229; O. Wästberg, “The Symbiosis of Sweden and IKEA,” PD Magazine (Summer 2009); M. Kang and S.- U Yang, “Comparing Effects of Country Reputation and the Overall Corporate Reputations of a Country on International Consumers’ Product Attitudes and Purchase Intentions,” Corporate Reputation Review 13 (2010): 52–62.
110 Labatt Brewing (UK) Limited, “Presentation to Mr. Roy McMurtry.”
111 Abbott Mead Vickers/SMS Ltd. “Malcolm the Mountie”: Summary of Findings from Qualitative Research, October 1987, Labatt Collection.
112 Labatt Brewing (UK) Limited, “Presentation to Mr. Roy McMurtry.”
113 Labatt Brewing (UK) Limited, “Presentation to Mr. Roy McMurtry.”
114 Bellamy, Brewed in the North, 275–286, 349–351.
115 Labatt Brewing (UK) Limited, “Presentation to Mr. Roy McMurtry.”
116 Abbott Mead Vickers/SMS Ltd., “Malcolm the Mountie.”
117 Keith Walden, Visions of Order: The Canadian Mounties in Symbol and Myth (Toronto, Canada, 1982), 211.
118 “Malcolm the Mountie: A Profile,” Box A10-039-236, Labatt Collection.
119 Monopolies and Mergers Commission, The Supply of Beer, 239–240.
120 Tom Brennan, “Memorandum. The Malcolm Campaign—Quantitative Tests,” 21 Oct. 1987, Box A08-053-304, Labatt Collection.
121 Brennan, “Memorandum. The Malcolm Campaign.”
122 Marilyn McLeod to Sid Oland, 16 Sept. 1988, A10-039-088, Labatt Collection.
123 Keith Walden, Visions of Order, 211.
124 J. R. Bentham to John Morgan, 14 Apr. 1988, Box A08-053-304, Labatt Collection.
125 Memorandum: UK Brand Image Grid,” 27 Oct. 1987, Box A08-053-304, Labatt Collection.
126 “Malcolm on the Trail of British Drinkers,” Globe and Mail, 30 April 1988: B1.
127 Melissa Aronczyk, Branding the Nation: The Global Business of National Identity (Oxford, UK, 2013), 107–126.
128 “SKOL International Limited—General Correspondence,” 25 July 1964, Box AFC 101-25, Labatt Collection.
129 Stack, Gartland, and Keene, “Path Dependency,” 68–70.
130 Matthew J. Bellamy, “The Making of Labatt ‘Blue’: The Quest for a National Lager Brand, 1959–1971,” Business History 62 (2020): 123–150.
131 Lisa Peñaloza, “The Commodification of the American West,” Marketers’ Production of Cultural Meanings at the Trade Show.” Journal of Marketing 64, (October, 2000), 82–109; Kent Grayson and Martinec Rand. “Consumer Perceptions of Iconicity and Indexicality and Their Influence on Assessments of Authentic Market Offerings.” Journal of Consumer Research 31 (September 2004): 296–312; Michael Beverland, Adam Lindgreen, and Michiel W. Vink, “Projecting Authenticity through Advertising: Consumer Judgments of Advertisers’ Claims.” Journal of Advertising 37 (Spring 2008): 5–15.
132 David Landes, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations: Why Some Are So Rich and Some So Poor (New York, NY, 1998); David Landes, Dynasties: Fortunes and Misfortunes of the World’s Great Family Businesses (New York, NY, 2006); Landes, Mokyr, and Baumol, eds., The Invention of Enterprise.