The first ever ‘digital’ Beer awards

There may be no beer festivals to attend but brewers have still found a way to get their beers judged.

Organised by the Society of Independent Brewers (SIBA) and open to all independent breweries in the UK, the Digital Beer Awards 2020 were a landmark competition, entered by over 180 British breweries. The awards saw almost 500 different beers judged by 50 expert tasters across two live video judging days.

The beers were judged first regionally in each category before the regional winners in each category went into the national finals.

In the North we were pleased to see Acorn Brewery get bronze awards for both Yorkshire Pride session bitter and Old Moor Porter whilst Wold Top Brewery won silver at the first attempt with their Landmark Lager and yet another Gold for their multi award-winning Wold Gold premium gold ale.

In the National Finals Brew York received Gold for their Big Eagle Strong IPA (6.4%), having first winning Gold in the Northern regional competition and Bays Brewery from Paignton got Gold in the South West regional competition for their Devon Rock Craft Lager which went on to get a worthy Bronze in the National competition.

In the Midlands, the Chiltern Brewery received Gold for their Bodgers Barley wine, 8.5%. and then went on to get Bronze in the National finals.

We are proud to say we played a part in their successes, this year and in the past.

So, a good showing for both North and South across the many different many beer styles from what is a first in beer competitions, but hopefully we will be able to get back to sampling beers in the old fashioned beer festival setting by this time next year, fingers crossed.