If you’ve ever done a double-take at the cost of buying a round of beers for your mates at the pub these days, your complaints have been justified: since January 2020, the average price of a pint of beer has risen by nearly $1 every 18 months, or from $9.96 to $13.76 across the nation.
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price → do → nation
And if you’re in Melbourne, tough luck; you’re typically paying more than the rest of the country for Australia’s favourite beers, according to exclusive data provided by Square.
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you → ’re → Square
Click on the interactive below to see how prices compare for your beer of choice across capital cities.
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prices → click → cities
Some pricing information is missing due to insufficient data in some cities, including Carlton Dry and Carlton Draught in Brisbane, and Carlton Draught and Balter XPA in Adelaide.
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information → miss → Adelaide
City-level pint comparison data for VB, Asahi, Furphy and Heaps Normal was incomplete and has been excluded from the final data set.
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data → exclude → set
A pint of Balter XPA costs more in Melbourne ($15.70) than any other Australian city on average.
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pint → cost → city
The same goes for Guinness ($15.51), Carlton Draught ($13.91), Carlton Dry ($12.86) and Great Northern Super Crisp ($12.95).
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same → go → Guinness
Meanwhile, the opposite is true for those who live in Perth, which is generally the cheapest capital city to buy a pint of those beers.
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which → live → beers
“That to me suggests [those beers are] trying to do some sort of targeted discounting or trying to break in to the Western Australia market,” said beer expert and The Crafty Pint founder James Smith.
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Smith → suggest → market
“WA as a whole, in terms of hospitality and the beer production industry, has generally held firm longer than other states did.
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states → hold → hospitality
The steepest increases came after pandemic lockdowns ended in 2022, after which most pint prices rose by about 10 per cent, said Square executive David Schnabl.
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Schnabl → come → cent
“Most [pubs] held prices for as long as they could, which is why pub beer may have felt like it lagged the grocery aisle in the early inflation years,” he said.
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he → hold → years
“Increases have moderated every year since, but they’ve never reversed.”
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they → moderate → ?
The national average price of premium beers Balter XPA ($14.53) and Guinness ($14.48) have been drifting towards the $15 mark.
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price → drift → mark
“Craft beer was already trading at a premium, but the gap between premium and mainstream has continued to widen.
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gap → trade → premium
The $10 pint is effectively extinct in this dataset,” said Schnabl.
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Schnabl → say → dataset
“Even XXXX Gold, the cheapest pint of any beer we tracked, now averages $11.24 nationally.
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we → track → 11.24
Beer breakdown
Stone & Wood Pacific Ale tends to be the most consistently priced across the country, with less than $1 difference between the cheapest and most expensive city, Sydney ($14.25) and Adelaide ($15.23).
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Stone → tend → city
Residents of Adelaide, where Coopers Brewery originated, are paying more than others to drink a Coopers Pale Ale at $13.81 (with the exception of Perth).
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Brewery → originated → Perth
A pint of Great Northern ($11.73), Australia’s best-selling beer, has risen more than any other major tap beer, at 43 per cent since 2020, when it was $8.21.
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it → sell → 2020
Guinness (which has enjoyed a cultural resurgence thanks to the viral trend of “splitting the G”) is not far behind, increasing 41 per cent from $10.25 to $14.48 a pint.
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which → enjoy → 14.48
What’s the most you’ve paid for a pint in Australia?
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you → ’ → Australia
Let us know in the comments.
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us → let → comments
Publicans in Victoria are grappling with more levies and taxes than those in some other states, including the mental health wellbeing levy and the COVID-19 debt repayment payroll tax, which impact venues where payroll exceeds $10 million.
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payroll → grapple → million
Meanwhile, higher land tax and council rates as well as stricter licensing conditions, which include a mandatory guard-to-patron ratio for late night venues, have also pushed up overheads and squeezed margins.
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which → include → margins
“I certainly hear my mates who’ve got pubs say: ‘They’re f---ing killing us here,’” said Smith.
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Smith → hear → us
But the popularity of Carlton Draught as the state’s most ordered tap beer endures.
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popularity → order → beer
“I reckon there could be an element in Victoria or in Melbourne, people knowing we can charge more because people are going to buy it anyway.
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people → reckon → it
They might walk away from the bar and go, ‘I can’t believe how much it’s cost me for a round’, but they’re never going to look at anything else on tap.”
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they → walk → tap
Perth’s prices also appear cheaper as there’s a more “entrenched pint culture” on the west coast than the east coast, according to Titanium Property food and retail planning expert Taylor Westlake.
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prices → appear → Westlake
About 8 per cent of greater Perth’s population was born in England, where pints are the standard beer size (570ml), compared with greater Sydney’s 2.9 per cent.
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pints → bear → cent
“Pints are charged at a premium in NSW and Queensland, compared to the base price of a schooner (425ml),” said Westlake.
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Westlake → charge → schooner
“In Perth, its more common for a pint to be the base beer price – the fact they are more common could have kept its price down over time.”
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are → it → time
And in South Australia, a “pint” measures at 425ml, which is a schooner everywhere else; and if you order a schooner in Adelaide, you’ll get a Sydney middy (285ml).
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you → measure → middy
Taxed for drinking
Australia has the world’s third-highest alcohol tax rate in the world.
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Australia → tax → world
One of the biggest factors pushing up beer prices is the twice-yearly alcohol excise increase, which is tied to inflation.
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which → push → inflation
Since 2000, beer prices have risen by about 27 per cent after general inflation has been factored in, according to AMP analysis.
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inflation → rise → analysis
“In Australia prices have gone up by 113 per cent over the period, but beer prices have gone up a lot more, meaning that’s a real increase in beer prices,” said AMP economist My Bui.
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Bui → go → prices
Last year, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese made much noise of taking the pressure off beer prices by freezing the excise on draught beer for two years.
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Albanese → make → years
“[It’s] a commonsense measure that is good for beer drinkers, good for brewers and good for pubs,” he said in March last year.
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he → ’ → March
…and 9 more, not listed.
The Aporia
