Now that we have completed the festival and finished taking down all the equipment, I would like to take this opportunity to thank every one of the members who helped to organise the festival through the dark nights of winter and to those who gave freely of their time during the set up on Tuesday, the festival days themselves and the take down on Sunday.

The festival was originally planned to be open from midday on the Friday to ten o’clock on the Saturday. However, we registered an excellent attendance over the two days of close to nine hundred people. This resulted in every single drop of beer and cider (forty-three nine-gallon casks of beer and twenty different ciders and perry’s) being sold out by 8 o’clock on the Saturday. We could not believe how quickly the beers and ciders started to empty from about three o’clock in the afternoon.

The attendance was higher than we expected as the weather forecast was not that favourable leading up to weekend. However, the weather was good on the Friday, and I am pleased to say that the thunderstorms held off until late afternoon on the Saturday. The Racecourse is an excellent venue, whatever the weather, as there are so many rooms for people to sit down comfortably as well as having the outside areas also available.

The entertainment on the Saturday afternoon was again provided by the local Bretforton group the Lock Down Layabouts and the atmosphere they created was excellent. On everyone’s behalf we wish to offer them all our thanks for the considerably extended set that they willingly played which supported the overall positive feeling created by this year’s festival.

Having just finished some of analysis of the feedback forms the following is worth noting “Congratulations to the volunteers and programme editor / Always a great time / Thank you, we had a great time on Saturday. Great beer and music / Brilliant festival, keep up the good work / Great event / Superb beer, superb cider, superb staff.” It was encouraging to read just how much people appreciated and enjoyed the festival. The festival was officially opened at noon on Friday by the Mayor of Stratford Town Council, Cllr Sam McNaught Barrow, and she gave an informative introductory speech about the branch and the festival itself. Since the start of the festivals in Stratford, we have also worked very closely with the volunteers from Shakespeare Hospice who always have a fundraising stand (raffles and tombola) at the event I am pleased to say that we received an email from them today where they explained that they had to count the money twice as they raised the fantastic sum of just short of two thousand pounds, their highest total ever. Further to this we encourage visitors to donate any unused amounts on the money cards used during the festival and this year they amounted to £407.80 which will be added as a donation to the Hospice.

Lockdown layabouts

Beer / cider of the festival voting results.

Thirty-eight of the forty-three beers achieved at least one vote.
North Cotswolds Aurora Joint 1st
Brass Castle Bad Kitty Joint 1st
Beartown Crème Bearlee – 3rd
Shindigger Black – 4th
Coach House Elderflower – 5th
4T’s Tripwire – 6th

Fifteen of the twenty ciders / perries achieved at least one vote.
Broad oak Rhubarb – 1st
Siblings Semi Sweet – 2nd
Fleece Ark - 3rd
Two votes each Black Dragon / Bee Sting / Gladiator / Malvern Gold

Thank you again for all your fantastic support and effort in making this one of our more successful festivals – it couldn't have been done without you all.

Lloyd Evans, Chair Shakespeare Branch of CAMRA
Festival Sponsorship Co-ordinator
Overall Festival Organiser