Billinghay pub's latest beer - Osama Bin Lager goes viral and crashes website
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00:00Okay, so we're here at the Coats and Horses pub in Billinghay, and over the last few five
00:07to ten years we've had quite a boom in craft beers and lagers, but this one seems to have
00:13really caused a stir and gone viral. And here we've got Catherine Mitchell, who's co-owner
00:21of the Coats and Horses here. Do you want to talk me through what's been going on over
00:24the last few days?
00:25Yes, yeah, so it looks like Sunday evening somebody had posted a tweet on Twitter with
00:32a badge of the Osama Bin Lager, and it woke up Monday morning to about 1,800 notifications
00:41and it had just gone absolutely viral. Within 24 hours it made its way onto Facebook and
00:47Instagram, and it's been picked up and we've been told today it's just been shown in Thailand,
00:53it's made news in India, so yeah, it's just gone a bit crazy.
00:58And you've had got a lot of national press and international press interest, haven't
01:01you?
01:02Yes, yeah, New York Post yesterday, so they've put some things on Twitter as well. Yeah,
01:07it's gone everywhere.
01:08And how has people taken it? Because obviously it could be taken a bit contentiously, I suppose.
01:12Yeah, I think so. I mean, it's certainly not meant as offensive, it's play on words, all
01:17of our Dictator line of the ales, simple play on words, tongue-in-cheek.
01:24So what other ones have we got here?
01:27Okay, so we have Putin's Porter, at the end, that's a seasonal brew, obviously a darker
01:33ale. We have King Yong Ale, which was our first ale, part of the start of the Dictator
01:39line. An Amber Session, Session B is absolutely flying off the shelves. And then Winston Church
01:45Pale, which is a pale ale. And then obviously we have the Assam Bin Lager, and we've also
01:52got our two ciders and the lighter beer, Buzz. It gets people talking when they come to the
02:00pumps and it makes people laugh. Certainly no offence intended, but if it gets people
02:06talking, then that's great.
02:09So do you have a favourite?
02:12I can't drink at the moment, being pregnant, but certainly once I can try, I'll be certainly
02:17trying the Buried In Cider, the fruity cider.
02:21And how about the locals then, the people, the customers that come, what's their favourites
02:25then?
02:26The King Yong Ale, that's by far the favourite, we've had that in lots of other pubs. It's
02:32just a really easy drinking session ale. And the Assam Bin Lager, it goes down really,
02:38really well.
02:39And this is all linked to your own little brewery business as well, isn't it?
02:43Yeah, yeah, so it's part of Mitchell Brewing Co, so we own the Country Horses and then
02:46we've got the brewery as well. But things have just gone absolutely crazy, so all of
02:52our stock sold out, we've launched the pre-orders for the bottled Assam Bin Lager, it's there
02:59on pre-sale at the moment, and hoping to get those out in the next few weeks, certainly
03:04by the end of June. But it's, yeah, it's crazy.
03:07I heard that interest had rocketed, hadn't it?
03:11Yeah, absolutely. A few days ago our website kept crashing, Touchwood, that's back up and
03:15running and we've been getting orders through, but yeah, we just couldn't keep up with demand.
03:20So how long do you think it's going to take to get through the backlog of orders?
03:24I don't know, it depends how long the interest keeps going. We're working really hard with
03:29our suppliers, we've had to contract out to get more made, so as soon as they start arriving
03:35they'll be shipping out to customers as fast as we possibly can.
03:38And you supply to quite a lot of other pubs as well, don't you?
03:40Yes, yeah, yeah, and again the interest in that has just skyrocketed, had lots of requests
03:45for new installs all over the country, so we'll be working hard to get those filled as well.
03:50So we can find Mitchell Breweries beers all over the UK at the moment, can't we?
03:56Yes, yes, yeah, and we've been announcing some collaborations as well with other breweries,
04:03so there'll be ones to look out for as well.
04:06Great, thank you.