Polish beer in England.

Purchasing Polish products in the United Kingdom once meant patronizing one of a few specialty shops. Now, all major British supermarket chains stock Polish brands. The Polish emigrants who have flocked to the UK since Poland’s 2004 ascension to the European Union bring a hunger for tastes from home. Nowhere is this more evident than in the changing market for Polish beer. Polish lager, too, is emigrating, indicating that the presence of Poles in the UK may have a lasting impact not only on the makeup of the labor force, but also on British retail practices.

The considerable number of Polish immigrants in the UK— currently estimated to exceed one million—has contributed to the general increase in demand for Polish goods. “Local politicians are beginning to customize their campaigns to reach out to the Polish community, so it’s only natural that business people have sensed the Polish pound too,” said Tomek Siergiejuk, a Polish citizen who works at a financial firm in London.

Exports of Polish beer have grown exponentially on the heels of the new wave of emigration. Beer company Kompania Piwowarska, whose products account for 40.4 percent of Poland’s domestic beer market, saw exports in excess of 20 million liters at the end of the 2007 fiscal year, a dramatic increase from the seven million liters exported a year earlier. Sales for the first half of the 2008 fiscal year, which began in April 2007, have already met 2007’s record-setting figure.

The company, a SA BMiller subsidiary, sends over 50 percent of its exports to the UK. Since the introduction of Tyskie, its leading brand, to the British market, sales have grown more than 400 percent, exceeding those of long-established foreign beers such as Budweiser and Hoegaarden.

The accelerating rise in popularity of Polish products cannot be attributed to any concentrated advertising effort. “Kompania Piwowarska does not conduct marketing communication aimed at consumers from the UK or other foreign countries,” Klaudyna Polanowska, the company’s Specialist for Public Relations Affairs, told the Globalist.

The company’s export success stems largely from the popularity of Polish beers back home. “Kompania Piwowarska’s brands are the most readily chosen beers in Poland. Our compatriots have also popularized our brands outside of Poland’s borders, even in countries where they had, up to now, been unknown,” Polanowska said. “Kompania Piwowarska has broad export plans for Great Britain and other key markets based on the principle that we want our products to be everywhere our countrymen are.”

Poles are not the only ones who reach for brands such as Lech and Tyskie, however. “I prefer the taste of Polish ales to that of Scottish ones because they’re more full-bodied, and they’re cheaper than other foreign beers to buy by the case,” Kirkaldy said. SA BMiller has seen its sales in the UK rise steadily as British consumers display an increasing tendency towards more exotic premium beers. The company’s sales rose 42 percent from March to September 2007, while sales of more established beers fell.

Kompania Piwowarska’s brands were initially distributed to stores, bars, and restaurants run and patronized by Poles, but Tyskie and Lech can now be purchased at pubs managed by major chains. Supermarket giant Tesco originally stocked Tyskie in areas with large Polish populations, but has since expanded its offerings to nearly 400 stores in response to ever-increasing demand.

“Polish beer has definitely arrived in a big way, and if sales continue at their present rate, then in a few years Tyskie could become the new Stella Artois or Beck’s,” said Helen Moores, Tesco’s Chief Buyer of World and Specialty Beers. “Now Polish beer has won the ultimate accolade—we know from customers right across the country that it is winning over the discerning British beer drinker.”

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