GUINNESS are donating hundreds of thousands of kegs to be used to fertilise Christmas trees after much of their stock went unused during lockdown.
Like most businesses, Guinness were forced to scale back their massive worldwide production of the black stuff once the globe was plunged into a pub-less nightmare earlier in the year due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Most beers have a use-by date, and once pubs and restaurants around the country closed, much of that will have quickly gone to waste.
But no one should ever waste a Guinness, right?
It seems the folks in Dublin agree.
Guinness's flagship brewery at St. James's Gate, which usually produces around 720 million litres a year (that's 39 pints a second by the way), decided not to throw their stock away, but put it to another use instead.
They've donated their booze to be used as fertiliser for Christmas and willow trees, while some of it is being used to create bio-gas.
Aidan Crowe, Director of Operations at St. James's Gate, said: "You'd probably make me cry if I started to add it all up [the wasted beer], but it's hundreds of thousands of kegs, and we've still got some products to decant and we've still got some markets that haven't finished returning their beer to us.
"So a lot of beer and a lot of kegs."
Guinness stocks were reduced to their lowest levels since the 1916 Easter Rising back in March, but with lockdown slowly easing and pubs due to reopen next month, operations are beginning to ramp up again.
"We've got to be prepared for different eventualities. If it's slower than we expect we've got to be ready for that," Crowe added.
"If it's significantly busier than we expect, we've got to be ready for that too. And we are ready. We will be ready."
See More: Christmas Tree, Fertiliser, Guinness
