A keg count that never adds up
You bought a batch of stainless shells, a few hundred of them, and a year later you cannot fill the next brew without borrowing or renting. The cold store has empties from three other breweries in it. Somewhere out there are your kegs: in a pub cellar, in a wholesaler's yard, behind a festival marquee, or at a scrap merchant.
Your drayman knows roughly which pubs are slow to hand them back. The office knows roughly how many were delivered last month. Nobody can say, on any given day, which pub is holding which keg or how long it has been there.
Why shells drift away
The loss is rarely theft by a customer you know. It is a record problem. A delivery note says six kegs of pale went to the Red Lion, but it does not say which six, and the collection is counted by eye on a busy morning. When numbers do not match, there is no way to prove it either way, so it gets let go.
- Deliveries record quantity, not the keg's own number.
- Collections are counted in the yard and written on the back of a sheet.
- Kegs sold on through a wholesaler leave your sight entirely.
- Other breweries' empties come back mixed in with yours.
- Nobody owns the job of chasing an account that is sitting on shells.
What the missing kegs cost you
Every lost keg is a capital item you have to replace, and every keg sitting in a cellar for months is one you cannot fill. Brew days slip because there are not enough clean shells. Staff time goes on phone calls asking a landlord to check the cellar. Some breweries end up renting kegs to cover a gap that is really a tracking gap.
There is also the awkward question of deposits or charges. Whether you charge for unreturned kegs is your commercial decision, but without a record per account you cannot even have the conversation.
The keg tracking we put in
- Each keg gets a durable barcode or QR label tied to its existing serial number. RFID is an option if you already use it.
- The drayman scans kegs out on the phone as they come off the van, against the customer on the delivery.
- Collections are scanned back in at the pub or at the yard gate, so the return is recorded against the same account.
- Filling scans link the keg to a batch, which also gives you traceability for free.
- A dashboard shows every account holding kegs, how many and for how long, with a list of shells past your chosen return period.
- A weekly chase list goes to whoever deals with the account, or a polite automatic email goes to the pub if you want that.
- Foreign kegs scanned at the yard are logged so you can arrange swaps with the breweries they belong to.
| Moment | What gets recorded | Who does it |
|---|---|---|
| Filling | Keg number, beer, batch | Cellar or packaging team |
| Loading the dray | Keg number, customer, delivery | Drayman |
| Collection | Keg number, account, date | Drayman or yard |
| Cleaning | Keg number, clean date, condition | Keg washer |
| Write-off | Keg number, reason | Office, with approval |
If you run Breww or a similar brewery management system, we connect to its orders and customers so kegs are scanned against deliveries you already created, not typed again.
What the yard looks like afterwards
Before a brew you can see how many clean shells you have and how many are due back this week. The drayman's collection list is printed from real holdings, not memory. When a landlord says they have no empties, you can tell them which numbers were delivered and when. Kegs that are truly lost get written off on purpose, with a reason, instead of fading out of the count.
Does this sound like your brewery?
- You have bought more kegs than you think you should need.
- Delivery notes say how many, never which ones.
- Your drayman knows the slow returners but nothing is written down.
- You have rented shells to cover a busy month.
- You cannot say which accounts are holding kegs right now.