“Asda is serving beer on tap to customers in a trial that marks a first for a UK supermarket chain.
Eco-conscious drinkers will be able to take home reusable containers of beer poured fresh from the tap instead of picking up cans and bottles from shelves under the pilot scheme.
Visitors to Asda’s Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, superstore can choose from a list of 12 beers and ciders and have a member of staff pour their preferred option into either a one- or two-litre glass container to be taken away and consumed at home.
Customers can keep the containers, bring them back to be refilled or return them, at which point a deposit will be refunded.
If the pilot scheme proves successful Asda said it would consider selling draught beer at other stores across the UK from next year.
The brews on offer will be rotated, with “unusual beers from smaller and local breweries” showcased through the initiative. Craft on Draft, a specialist retailer of craft beers and ciders, will work in partnership with the supermarket to choose and get the beers on the shop floor. Asda said it had brought the business on board with the goal of offering shoppers lesser-known beers that aren’t widely available in other retailers, or in pubs.
The draught beer venture comes in the wake of a series of “refill zone” schemes at Asda, and elsewhere, and amid persistent consumer demand for brands and retailers to eliminate unnecessary packaging.
This summer Asda announced plans to make packaging-free shopping available at more of its stores after the introduction of a trial “refill zone” in a Leeds branch proved popular.
The initiative allows customers to do away with single-use plastic by inviting them to fill their own reusable containers with everyday groceries including cereal, pasta, laundry detergent and pet food. Demand for loose produce was so great that sales of some goods exceeded those of packaged items in some categories, Asda said of the original trial.
Waitrose was the first of the major supermarket chains to test with packaging-free areas in store, in 2019, and has been credited with helping to popularise “refill culture” in the UK.
While glass beer bottles and aluminum cans are widely recycled, environmental experts point out that it still requires energy to produce them in the first place, and their transportation also contributes to greenhouse gas emissions…..”
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