Appy times for beer lovers

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BEER LOVERS and real ale connisseurs now have a more high-tech way of seeking out beer festivals, pubs and even places which sell their favourite tipple, thanks to smart phone applications.

The Campaign For Real Ale has created a Good Beer Guide 2012 app for mobile phones, available for £5 from the Apple App Store and the AndroidTM Market.

Users can search for pubs in the Good Beer Guide by postcode or place name or, alternatively, be located by the app, which uses GPS.

There is information and full descriptions for local pubs and tasting notes for the regular beers which are on there.

Brett Laniosh, CAMRA's national director, said the new app had proved very popular.

"It's great to have the paper version of the guide to read generally, but the app works well if you are out and about.

"It enables you to acces Britain's best pubs wherever you are.

For more on the Good Beer Guide 2012 app, visit: m.camra.org.uk.

Another one - the Caskfinder App - which is also available on iPhone and Android, now plays host to the 'World's Biggest Ale Trail' feature.

That enables users it to register the number of pubs they visit, using QR codes. Then, when they reach various milestones - 25, 50 and 100 pubs - they get rewards and prizes. At 100 pubs, the user becomes a Cask Marque ambassador and is given the opportunity to spend the day with an assessor, visiting several pubs to see how Cask Marque ensure a quality pint.

Among the other information available on the app are details of cask beers on sale at each pub and descriptions of more than 1,000 beers from 250 brewers.

There is also the option for users to find other beers similar to the ones they like and to rate beers to help others decide if they would like to try them.

The Caskfinder app also features a 'Beer of the Week', a beer blog and gives a list of beer festivals, complete with maps on how to get there, contact details and admission prices.

Paul Richards, chairman of the Redditch and Bromsgrove branch of the Campaign for Real Ale, has been reviewing this app for The Standard.

He said: "It is excellent when you’re out and about in an area that you don’t usually go out for a pint, and best of all, it’s free.”

For more on the app, visit: www.cask-marque.co.uk.