I found myself looking at an Enter Here page. It was
illustrated by a promising slogan, “Fresh From the Country – the Black
Country”, and a picture of a handpump with a rotating display of their flagship
bitter and mild. But that was not all. There was a dropdown menu. And a
question: “Are you of legal drinking age for the UK? Please tell us what year
you were born in.” The menu asked visitors to select a year, making it
implicitly clear that failure to tick one of the choices would preclude entry
to the site.
Intrigued, I scrolled down to the bottom of the page,
finding some consistent small print. “You must be of legal drinking age to
enter and use this site.” Really? “To find out more about responsible consumption,
visit Marstons PLC.” Beneath the small print was a link to the website for the
charity drinkaware.co.uk.
What sinister invitations could be lurking the other side of
the barrier, I wondered, deciding to click on my year of birth and take the
plunge? Well, the outlet’s opening hours were there as I had hoped, thankfully
including Saturday mornings. A description of each of their beers too. A walk
through the process of brewing. The history of the brewery. And an explanation
of their brewery tours with the catchline “enjoy 3 half pints on us”, although
the tours were seasonal. But nothing more sinister than that. Not even the
chance to order a supply of beer online, let alone an invitation to the next
secret lock-in at one of their tied houses (joke).
So what’s with the demand for age confirmation? Such a pointless
gesture anyway. An underage schoolboy interested in researching local industrial
history, or how water, barley, hops, and yeast can be transformed into beer, is
hardly going to think twice before clicking on an inaccurate age option. And
that’s the kind of prohibited person who might be looking at the site, not
someone in search of illicit online refreshment when it’s quicker and easier to
go straight to the off licence or supermarket.
Not knowing if some draconian EU based legislation might
have been sneaked through on the quiet, I thought of four other favourite ales
and checked out their breweries’ sites. Neither Timothy Taylor, nor Theakstons,
nor Hook Norton nor Purple Moose asked their website visitors to confirm their
age. The latter two were heinously (!) offering beer for sale via online shops.
Both Theakstons and Purple Moose had the drinkaware website link. A brief look
at the JD Wetherspoon site also sailed through without an age confirmation
enquiry.
One impression stood out. Whoever decided to make visitors
to the Banks’ website go through that irritating final step could only have
been following that equally irritating policy doctrine, namely the need to be
seen to be doing something, empty and futile gesture as it was. Will it result
in one single drop of beer not finding its way down an underage drinker’s
throat? Hardly. Would they have put it up because of a legal threat? Equally
hardly (but watch out for the nanny state’s mission creep, now that they have
seen off tobacco displays). Might they have been responding to some busybody’s
nagging? Maybe, even if common sense would have dictated a reply involving long
walks and short planks.
At least the visit to the outlet was worthwhile. Eight top
range bottled pints for £10, from a wide variety including the Wychwood and
Ringwood ranges alongside Banks, Marstons and Jennings, was an offer that beat
the supermarkets hands down. Well done, Banks’ Brewery. But please, take that
silly age confirmation requirement off your website.
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