Price of Pale Malt

[mixbrewery]

Paid a visit to my local brewery (Tring) to get a new 25kg sack of crushed pale.
Second mortgage setup ready to pay for it as they said it was a new delivery and the prices had gone up.

I was very surprised when they only charged me £20.
Has anyone else taken delivery since the price increases?
What seems to be the going rate now?

[steve_flack]

I will next week but my understanding is that they are still using last years so it will still be £15 for the pale. I've also asked for some lager malt and Munich malt which they'll get fresh from Muntons when they go down next week. We'll see what the damage is for those then.

Additionally Tuckers maltings are still charging £21 a sack for pale (+£5 p&p)...at least for now. The price rise is imminent though.

[MightyMouth]

Why is it that the on-line stores are all over £34 for 25kg? Anyone know of anywhere in the Midlands selling pale for £20 or less?

Edit: I have just had a look online for Tuckers Maltings and found thier online shop.

[nobby]

Why is it that the on-line stores are all over £34 for 25kg? Anyone know of anywhere in the Midlands selling pale for £20 or less?

Edit: I have just had a look online for Tuckers Maltings and found thier online shop.

I think that includes shipping

[mysterio]

Nah, shipping will be another £4-5 on top of that. The price rise is due to global food price rises, and perhaps decreased yield because of the poor weather.

[deadlydes]

my malt was £12.50 per sack before the price increase now its £17.50.

this is from a local micro

[Aleman]

Hamstead Homebrew (0121 358 6800) I got 2 sacks for 59 quid.

I've heard that the bulk price has risen to anything between 680 and 900 per tonne

[charlie]

my malt was £12.50 per sack before the price increase now its £17.50.

this is from a local micro

What Des said.

[Peter Pike]

We purchased our last lot of Maris Otter crushed malt from Tuckers on 2nd January 2008 and paid £160.00 for 10 x 25 kg sacks. This was a collected price from the Maltings at Newton Abbot.

[Peter Pike]

Yes, we are a small micro-brewery based in Somerset.

[RabMaxwell]

Just bought 4 sacks of marris £100 from local micro he buys from Charles Farms malt up & his postage up to £100 was paying £12 before all these increases.What happend to the winter harvest was that crap too or are they just going to ripe us off till the end of time.

[steve_flack]

Just bought 4 sacks of marris £100 from local micro he buys from Charles Farms malt up & his postage up to £100 was paying £12 before all these increases.What happend to the winter harvest was that crap too or are they just going to ripe us off till the end of time.

Probably the latter. Basically, it has to be worth the farmer's while to grow malting barley. If he can get a better price for something else (wheat for example) then the price of barley has to go up so he'll grow it. Since wheat is very expensive right now so is everything else.

Like hops, malting barley was at historically low prices until recently. Eventually the hop price will settle to hopefully a more sustainable level where the grower is making a living and there's enough to go around. Barley will only come down when everything else does - perhaps never.

[mysterio]

If you want to blame anyone blame the policy makers who subsidise farmers to grow crops destined for cars rather than starving people (and brewers)... Thankfully our government U-turned on this absurd policy recently.

[johnh]

Basically, it has to be worth the farmer's while to grow malting barley. If he can get a better price for something else (wheat for example) then the price of barley has to go up so he'll grow it. Since wheat is very expensive right now so is everything else.

I heard an economist defending this situation on the telly the other day. He said that the price of food has to go up to incentivise farmers to grow enough to feed the poor. Now that makes sense...not.

[steve_flack]

I'm sure the poor are so glad farmers are incentivised.

Maybe we need the return of the CAP and food mountains?