There is a good article in Glasgow's Sunday Herald this week focusing on the state of Scotland's smaller breweries in the aftermath of the acquisition of Arran Brewery from its administrators by an investment firm, Marketing Management Services. In the last ten years a scene that boasted fewer than ten breweries now boasts 52 with a resulting increase in choice and also serves as a neat example of where we find the larger world of craft beer:

Visitors to Scotland, big consumers of locally produced beers, now have between 400 and 500 differently labelled bottles to chose from, compared with around 20 in the late 1990s.

Correct me if I am wrong but hasn't the whole history of industrial brewing, including the whole micro-brewing movement since the 1970s, has been one of cyclical boom and bust, waves of mergers followed by regeneration from the grass roots? Despite these comings and goings, there are always home brewers with bigger dreams as well as beer lovers with the desire for career changes despite the hard work and risks involved. Is this economic phase in Scotland - and the rest of the world it may be merely illustrating - any different?

I am not inclined to think so. Compared to a lot of sectors of the economy it may seem to have a vulnerability but it also appears to be pretty robust. Why? Well, it is not like beer is going out of style. Whatever happens, there is a huge market for beer whether as societies we like to think of it or not. We are not entering a phase of abstinence as far as I can tell. Plus new beers - at least at the edges of craft and innovation - are consistently being sought out by consumers for their novelty as well as value. Brewers restructure and invent to attract and thereby survive. Isn't such change an inherent part of the vitality of the economic sector as well as what makes it interesting to the average beer hound?

Do we diminish the importance of this hardscrabble life of the brewer to we the contented consumer? Is it too cruel or too cheeky to point out that sometimes the forest has to burn to keep itself vital? Sometimes when I think about what is next in beer - and in life, I suppose - I know it won't be what is here now.