Last week saw the early trickle of the latest quarterly results come through in our industry. While the soft drinks big-hitters will come thick and fast over the next three days, the previous week was dominated by beer.

Both SABMiller and Heineken posted updates that have justified their decisions to invest in developing markets. As we emerge from the global economic downturn, the difference between emerging and mature markets appears even more pronounced. In beer, all of the growth would appear to be in Africa and Asia, along with parts of Latin America.

The US and Europe, meanwhile, are where brewers continues to slug it out. Heineken actually posted its first quarterly volume sales rise in Western Europe since the second quarter of 2007, but this had more to do with its particularly tough first quarter of 2010 than any lasting resurgence in demand.

In much of Europe and North America, cost savings remain the order of the day, but how long can brewers rely on this?

The end of April traditionally sees our thoughts turn to the London International Wine Fair, which is only three weeks away.

As last year, just-drinks will be hosting an industry briefing at the exhibition, looking at the current playing field here in the UK. If you have an opinion on this, then we'd like to hear from you. Click here to complete our survey (which should only take five minutes) but, be quick – the survey closes on Thursday.

Also, as usual, we shall be running our LIWF daily diary pieces in the run-up to the opening day, Tuesday 17 May. So, if you'd like your company's activities at ExCel covered in just-drinks starting next week, then email all details to news@just-drinks.com.

Until next time...

Olly Wehring
Managing Editor
Web: http://www.just-drinks.com
Email: editor@just-drinks.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/just_drinks