Wikipedia:WikiProject Beer/Beer brand article suggestions

Description/Guidelines
A beer brand is the name of a beer produced by one or more breweries or brewing companies. The beer may have a long history and may have changed breweries over the years - such as Pabst Blue Ribbon. The beer may be brewed in many locations around the world, such as Budweiser. The beer may be brewed in many locations around the world, and may be slightly different in many of those locations, such as Guinness.

It is important when deciding to write about a beer brand that the editor first checks to see that the beer is not already included on Wikipedia, either with its own article, or as part of a larger article. Most beer brands are discussed on the brewery page.

Secondly the editor must decide if the beer brand is notable enough to generate enough interest for its own article, or if it should appear as part of the main article for the brewery or brand owner. Generally convention and consensus has been that the majority of beers do not deserve their own articles. See Historic statements below.

If the editor does not know the name of the brewery making the beer brand, then a www.google.com search or looking on a comprehensive beer database site such as RateBeer.com should be done. If there is an article on the brewery on Wikipedia, then the beer should be added to that article. If there is no article on the brewery, then a decision has to be made on creating an article for the brewery. See Notability (breweries).

It is not recommended that a beer article be created without first having a brewery or brand owner article.

If the editor decides that a beer brand is notable enough to have its own article, and there is sufficient material to create more than a stub, then the following guidelines may be useful:


 * 1) A picture of the beer brand logo, bottle, pump clip or advert should appear on the top right of the page.
 * 2) A wikilink should be created in the first sentence to the parent brewery.
 * 3) The region in which the beer is brewed should be mentioned in the introductory paragraph.
 * 4) The beer style should be mentioned in the introductory paragraph.
 * 5) The beer strength (abv) should be mentioned in the introductory paragraph.
 * 6) The article should be given an appropriate regional (or multi regional) brewery category: Category:Beer and breweries by region

Historic statements

 * Also I believe a beer can be judged notable (and hence worthy of an article) if more than one or two sentences can be written. --3mta3 14:20, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * Also, it would probably be best if we collapsed "brands of beer" into "breweries". They're generally the same thing... – ClockworkSoul 00:28, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I agree on both counts --Sean κ. ⇔ 03:08, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * I was going to try to rationalise the brands of beer vs breweries thing, and move all the ones that were basically breweries into that category, then see whats left. Justinc 09:09, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I am rewriting the beer articles to make tem about the brewery that makes the beer - I think when I finish brands of beer wont have much left in it. Usually it only involves changing a few words, and many articles were confused about whether they were a single or multiple beers anyway. Justinc 10:36, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I think that this is an excellent idea. – ClockworkSoul 13:19, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC) Which beers are notable enough to have their own page? Off the top of my head, Budweiser in the US seems to be more well known than its brewer, Anheuser-Busch. But other than that, I can't really think of a beer that's very notable, outside the context of its brewer.


 * I think that it is now the case that Category:Brands of beer now only has really well known beers in it that deserve their own article. I think they are a nice collection of important beers, some that I had heard of before, some that I hadnt. Except Chang (beer) which I wasnt quite sure what to do with. Justinc 23:11, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * Miller Brewing

For some reason this has the most comprehensive set of articles on its brands eg Miller Lite. None of them say very much - inclined to merge them into main article really and turn into redirects. ANy objections? Justinc 14:43, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I'd say go for it. --Sean κ. ⇔ 14:57, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC) Have done all except Miller Lite so far. Also similar work on other breweries (eg Fuller's). It makes the main articles much better.Justinc 18:17, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC) I disagree; I'm personally of the opinion that those two beers are rather notable, and should have their own articles. If the brand Budweiser has an article, so should Miller Genuine Draft. But I grant you that the brand articles should have more information on them. How about this; I'll start writing an article on my userspace on each Miller brand, and then recreate the articles on each brand once I have enough to justify the brands having their own page. I'll also work on expanding the Miller Brewing article. I live 10 miles away from it, so it shouldn't be too hard. --BaronLarf 18:34, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC) I left Miller Lite as it was the only one that had any external links to it. Miller Genuine Draft is marginal in my view but certainly has been around for a while; certainly the others were completely unimportant. I think it makes a better Miller Brewing article to have the information about the beers in it (would be good if you could write a few sentences for each of the others). But if you write proper articles I am fine with it too, I am not trying to get rid of all individual beer articles at all, just ones which look like they will remain stubs forever. Breweries make new beers all the time, and most arent notable. At least Budweiser has a whole page article. Go on, write some good stuff... Justinc 18:59, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Oh and could you write something on Miller Beer, which is mentioned as ill-fated and in the list of commercial failures, it should get a mention in the article. Justinc 19:02, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The thing with most beers, as we've noted already, is that they're generally equated directly with the brewery. I would say that no beer deserves its own page, unless there's something really interesting to say about it. Budweiser is an exception, I feel, because its brewer has a much different presence. We have a chain of Busch Gardens, and Busch stadium, but the the only mention of Busch in the Budweiser commercials is the tag line "Anheuser-Busch St. Louis Missouri". I don't even think their logo is on the bottle. --Sean κ. ⇔ 19:10, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Partly the Budweiser thing is that it was bought by Busch, not set up by them, and it is in fact the name of a (long dead) brewery (like eg McEwan's Brewery), which is why it has its own identity. This is very common in the beer world, where the names of brewers and breweries live on, in an attempt to give some historical continuity. Justinc 19:25, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * Separate brewery and beer pages?

I'm slowly making some beer edits and my proposal over on Talk:Kwak probably needs more exposure. There doesn't seem to be much here with enough specific detail.

For the Kwak page, it's currently one page on the particular beer, with no separate page for the brewery. I'm thinking that there should in fact be an article on the brewery itself, with the beer page being a redirect to the brewery page. As it's a fairly small brewery with only two or three beers, the brewery itself only takes a paragraph, and the beers would come up fairly quickly in the article.

Therefore, the question is whether notable beers from small breweries should be described on the brewery page, or whether the beers themselves should occupy their own pages. This already occurs for mostTrappist beers, so perhaps it's a useful guidenline?

I'm pondering all of this as I'd like to eventually see all of the beer related pages done with a similar structure so that we can have some consistency. User:Riflemann

I hope I'm not too late on this, but I'd like to add my two cents in. I guess it would all depend on the beer in question. Many of the ones above, such as the Trappist beers have a lot of infomation for both the beers and the companies on seperate pages. Others, such as microbrewers, have little information about the company and little about the beer as well. I would say that for situations like that the beer should be included in the main brewery article and then spun off later. Radagast83 20:58, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

I hop to and fro on this one. But on the whole it appears that at this stage it would make more sense to have beers on the brewery page. Names of individual beers redirecting to the brewery. This keeps the information in the most relevant place. And the history and development of an individual beer might be wrapped up in the history and development of the brewery (and vice versa). Also, there have been some people writing about a beer on the brewery page and someone else writing about the beer on a beer page and the information not matching up and being shared. Keep the beer on the brewery page and people share and build together. If information on an individual beer builds significantly there would be no problem at that stage of the beer having its own page linked from the brewery page. From my limited experience of Wiki it seems that the more hits a page has, and the more information on that page, the more likely people are to get involved and work on it. Isolated simple paragraphs on individual beers should be brought in from the cold and be comforted by the warmth of the company of other beers and the parent brewery. Cheers! SilkTork 15:30, 8 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Following varying discussions on other beer pages, several brief discussions on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Beer/Archive, current ongoing procedure and an explanation of intention during the process on Categories for deletion/Log/2006 April 4 (which was related to the entire re-catorisation of all the beer articles), the consensus has been to move individual beer articles into the main article of the parent brewery or brand holder.


 * Merge

Mega companies like Interbrew (now InBev) picked up famous brands, and production was moved away from the brewery with the related name. For instance, the Marston's Brewery now brews Bass, where the brand is owned by InBev and the producer under licence is Wolverhampton & Dudley Breweries PLC! Noisy | Talk 23:03, 20 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Naming of beer articles.


 * nod* Hence "what it says on the label".

I argue that brand continuity is the most important factor:


 * A particular beer will, in the course of its production, go through accidental and deliberate reformulation, even at the same brewery; this is well-documented.
 * A sufficiently-old brewery will go through both changes in ownership (including inheritance) as a natural part of its existence.

Some cases which come to mind which need resolving, and my feelings on them: Young's Brewery -- the beer brand is "Young's", the beer is made at "The Ram Brewery", the beer is going to be made at "Eagle Brewery". There is no "Young's Brewery" and I think it's nonsensical to title the article after something that doesn't exist. The trademark itself is simply "Young's" and that's what the article should be titled.

Brakspear vs. Brakspear (Refresh UK): The Brakspear brand and beers are continuous, production is at the original location now after a two-year hiatus. I think the two should be one article.

In addition to the Bass example, there's also the Guinness example: seperate articles for a notable brand and notable brewery. --Stlemur 11:38, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

We did consider dealing with beers under the brand owner, but it was felt that some notable beers should have their own article. Guinness is a notable beer. The Guinness brewery is also notable. Though there is some overlapping of information, it was felt - and I agree - that they should have separate articles. One is about the beer. The other is about the brewery. The brewery is dealt with under St. James's Gate Brewery - Guinness Brewery redirects to St. James'. It may be a case that it should be the other way round, but whichever way it goes then it would be appropriate to have the name Brewery attached. The company which owns the brewery and the Guinness brand name also has an article: Diageo. This is all clear, with no confusion. Beer. Brewery. Company. Three different articles covering three different, though related, topics. In many cases the one article will cover all three: beer, brewery and company. If the beer is notable, but the brewery is not, then the article will be about the beer, with the minor details of the brewery mentioned in the article. And the article will carry the name of the beer. If the brewery is notable, then some (or all!) of the beers the brewery makes will be mentioned in the brewery article. The brewery article will carry the name of the brewery and the identification Brewery or Brewing Company. The full accounting or business name of the brewery may be given in the first paragraph. SilkTork 13:43, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

This is useful: Wikipedia:Naming conventions. I think, in general, the idea is that the naming should be as helpful as possible to general readers. My understanding, also, is that if there is a consistent naming policy that would be helpful to everyone concerned - editors and readers. As there is already a fairly consistent trend for articles about breweries to go under the name Brewery or Brewing Company it would appear to make sense to continue with that. The serious question is should the consistency go one stage further and all the brewery articles appear as XXXX Brewery or XXXX Brewing Company - or should we continue as we are with North American brewery articles going under the title XXXX Brewing Company and all other countries going under the title XXXX Brewery. The issue of a brand series, rather than an individual brand name, is interesting. So: Brakspears beers, rather than any individual beer. And that being a separate article to the Brakspear brewery or the company (Refresh UK) which owns the brand series. I think that is a possibility. If we can have an article on a notable individual beer, then we can have an article on a notable brand series. I suppose the difficulty we have is that the term "brewery" (or "brewing company") can cover the company, the building, the brand name and the beers themselves. I suppose we muddle through, play it by ear, and take each case as it comes. I wouldn't object to any suggestion. Especially as I am gently easing down on my involvement in this project. Though I would feel that established practise and general Wiki guidance is considered before making major name changes. SilkTork 14:09, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Brauerei Herrenhäusen
There is an article on this brand of beer on the German Wikipedia site. Here is a preliminary translation. How should an article here be pursued?-- T HE F OUNDERS I NTENT  TALK 17:48, 3 December 2007 (UTC)