After a hugely successful 2017 event, The Cheltenham and Gloucester Beer Week returns for 2018 with more venues than ever before.

Unlike conventional beer festivals that are held in one location, the Cheltenham and Gloucester Beer Week is held at dozens of pubs and breweries with the ever-popular ‘Beer Trails’ back for the 2018 event. Leigh Norwood, Chairman of the event, says the Cheltenham and Gloucester Beer Week is a wonderful opportunity to promote the great pubs and breweries in this part of Gloucestershire. He said: “I came up with the concept of the beer week a couple of years ago. We ran the Cheltenham Beer Week in 2016 that was a real success. Last year we expanded the event to include Gloucester.

“My main inspiration for launching the event came from the great pubs and breweries here in Cheltenham. We’ve always had a good pub scene here in Cheltenham – in the last decade or so several of the town’s pubs have won local and national awards for their top-quality beers. Cheltenham isn’t the biggest town, but it does have a large number of fantastic breweries and pubs, so the idea behind creating the event was to celebrate all those great establishments.

“Traditional beer festivals tend to be held at one location that draws lots of people to one place whereas our event is spread out over a ten-day period, over venues in Cheltenham and Gloucester.”

One of the main features of the ten-day event are the ‘beer trails’ that were introduced last year. With dozens of pubs and breweries signed up for the 2018 event, this year’s trails will surpass the ones held last year. Leigh explained: “The beer trails were introduced to try and encourage people to see pubs and breweries that they might not have visited before. We’ve got a record number of venues that have signed up to our beer trials this year which is great news.

“Last year we had people tell us that they’d been to pubs that they didn’t even know existed before they appeared on our beer trail map. The pubs saw an increase in trade and many returning customers in the weeks after the event which is great to hear.”

Leigh runs the award-winning ‘Favourite Beers’ shop on Cheltenham’s Hewlett Road and says attitudes towards the alcohol industry have changed significantly in recent times. He continued: “I run many ‘meet the brewer’ sessions and tasting workshops in my shop. People love discovering more information on what they’re drinking. In the last few years I’ve noticed a lot of people are turning away from the mainstream brands and wanting to try out beers from smaller, independent breweries. I wouldn’t say it’s unique to the alcohol industry either, an increasing number of people are spending more time learning about what they eat and the origins of the produce they use.

“The fact that we’ve got so many fantastic breweries here in Cheltenham and Gloucester is to be celebrated, that’s what the Cheltenham and Gloucester Beer Week is all about – promoting the great products that are available on our doorstep.”

The Cheltenham and Gloucester Beer Week runs from 13th-24th September.