the end is near! i can't believe what i've read today in the news!! check this out:
Germans drinking less beer
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By Burt Herman
July 30, 2001 | BERLIN (AP) --
Germans are losing their taste for their national drink, with cloudy skies over the country's beer gardens and a growing concern about beer bellies leading to fewer drinkers.
Beer consumption dropped 4.3 percent in the first half of the year to 1.4 billion gallons -- 63.4 million gallons less than in the same period last year, according to statistics released Monday by the government.
Bad weather was partly to blame, with a belated summer keeping drinkers away from outdoor beer gardens. But also cutting consumption were a more health-conscious public and changing work habits, as fewer people do manual labor where beer drinking is a break-time tradition.
Lothar Ebbertz, head of the brewing association in Bavaria state, Germany's beer capital, blames the weather for this year's beer decline, but also sees a longer-term cause behind the changing tastes.
"Drinking a beer used to be people's idea of a leisure activity," Ebbertz said from the association's Munich headquarters. "Now people go to the fitness studio and then to an Internet cafe and drink Diet Coke.
"Some people think it's wrong to sit in front of the TV and drink two beers," he said.
At Berlin's ultra-hip Cafe am Neuen See, a beer garden that's so cool it doesn't call itself one, Anna Czarnocka isn't sipping a beer, but a "Radler" -- a mixed drink with beer and soda.
Diluted beer drinks are also part of the reason for the drop in overall consumption: Germans downed 29 million gallons of Radler and similar beer drinks in the first half of this year -- a rise of 6.1 percent.
"In the heat it's better, there's less alcohol," the 28-year-old Czarnocka said, adding that she's able to read more pages in the dense text in front of her on economic theory for her business studies. "You can get through a bit more."
German beer drinking has been decreasing for several years.
"Sales have been declining slightly since the mid-90s," statistics office spokesman Christopher Graeb said.
Beer consumption per German fell to about 33 gallons -- or 528 pints -- per person per year in 2000 from 37 gallons -- 592 pints -- a person in 1970, according to the German Brewer's Association.
Rudolf Boehlke, a consultant on the brewing industry for Arthur Andersen, said younger drinkers are shunning beer for different alternative drinks.
German bars usually sell trendy "long drinks," as cocktails are called here, often Brazilian Caipirinha cocktails or Mojitos, and even once-banned absinthe is making a comeback. Wine is also often chosen to accompany meals at Italian or French restaurants.
"Beer is something traditional, the drink of fathers and grandpas, not of the sons," he said.
The statistics don't include malt drinks, alcohol-free beer and beer imported from countries outside the European Union. But while Boehlke said Mexican beers and other imports have also contributed to declining tastes for domestic brews, they are still a small fraction of total consumption.
Although there's no great hope for a renewed thirst for beer, Graeb of the statistics office said the hot summer weather that arrived after June will likely make for a less steep drop in consumption over the whole year.
Under Berlin's sunny skies Monday, cashier Denise Hoffmann at the Cafe am Neuen See got no respite from the parade of beer drinkers lining up to pay for their sweet amber Hefeweizen or yellow-crystalline Pilsner brews.
"They don't seem to be drinking any less to me," she said.
. http://www.salon.com/people/wire/2001/07/30/beer/index.html
"If God has spoken, why is the world not convinced?"
..........Percy Bysshe Shelley, English poet (1792-1822)