Bulmers drops draught pear cider

Scottish & Newcastle has announced the withdrawal of its draught version of Bulmers Pear. The news comes less than a year after the launch of this format into the UK on-trade.

Darryl Hinksman, head of on-trade consumer marketing for S&N, said: "S&N UK believes packaged Pear Cider offers more opportunity for growth and has focused its investment on this format rather than rolling out draught Bulmers Pear.”

There are currently no plans to axe the draught version of Bulmers Original, which has not encountered the same problems.

The addition of a draught format was originally intended as a means of building on the performance of the “over-ice” cider category. However, rival brand Magners held back from making the same move with its own pear cider on the grounds that the draught format would not appeal to the product’s core 18-24 year old, female consumer base.

Despite this setback, S&N is still pressing ahead with its biggest ever Bulmers press and poster campaign, launched at the end of August. Running across key UK cities, men’s magazines and sports publications, the strapline promotes “Squeezing the Best out of the British Summer”.

Gabriel Savage, 08.09.09