United Kingdom: Carlsberg to raise prices as from March

From March, 2, the wholesale prices for Carlsberg’s draught and packaged beers will rise by 2.8%, The Morning Advertiser reported on February, 2.

“Carlsberg UK fully understands the demands that the on-trade is under and has endeavoured to minimise this price rise as far as possible, which has been made necessary by the increases in material and production costs that the business has incurred," said Carlsberg UK sales and distribution director Chris Houlton.

"Over the last 12 months we have worked very hard as a business to deliver price increases that are significantly lower than our competitors."

He added: “Carlsberg UK has recently launched its 'We Deliver More' initiative which aims to provide support for the on-trade across a number of areas, but in particular driving cost efficiencies across their business.

"We strongly believe that by keeping price increases to a minimum, and supporting the on-trade through our We Deliver More initiative, we will deliver a programme of activity that supports each business in these very challenging times.”

Carlsberg's price rises follow on from InBev adding 7p a pint, Scottish & Newcastle 5.74% and 5.4% from Guinness.

The Danish brewer introduced two price rises prices last year amounting to a total of 4.3%.

04 February, 2009