The Spectacular and Utterly True History of Tui - yeah right !

The Spectacular and Utterly True History of Tui
James Griffin
Published by Upstart Press, August 2015, $39.99 RRP

In 2015 Tui is 126 years young and because Tui never does anything by the book they decided to put out a book to celebrate that illustrious but often overlooked milestone.  Sure they could have taken the easy route and celebrated, in 2014, the more usual 125th birthday, but that is not the Tui way. Tui, 126 years strong, and still not doing things entirely the way other people do them.

This is not your usual book about a company or brand either. Let’s face it, they are dreary affairs about profits and corporate restructuring and blah blah blah . . . But not this book, because this is a book about Tui, a company founded by a rat-bag, a failed cheesemaker with an eye for the ladies; who started a company that didn’t play by the rules back then and to this day lives by the philosophy that it is more noble to ask for forgiveness in the event of things cocking up, than it is to beg for permission to launch into whatever it is that might potentially cock-up.

It is about the company and the beer, and is brought to you by the words ‘yeah’ and ‘right’. This book celebrates the quintessential nature of what it is to be Kiwi, as well as suggesting innovative home plumbing DIY projects and promoting the art of catching a cricket ball in one hand. The Spectacular and Utterly True History of Tui will make you laugh, possibly make you think, undoubtedly make you thirsty, and potentially make you wonder how these clowns got away with it for all these years.

James Griffin is a writer primarily known for his work in television, through series such as Outrageous Fortune and The Almighty Johnsons. He’s also co-written a couple of films that were quite popular – Sione’s Wedding and Sione’s 2: Unfinished Business. In the book world he pretended to be Ali Williams for a couple of books that a fair number of people seemed to quite like. For the last 12 years he has written about life, the universe, beer and everything else through his weekly column in Canvas magazine.  James grew up in Tui country, in the One True Bay also known as Hawke’s Bay. His long association with Tui the beverage began in the early 1980s when, during a summer job working behind the bar of the now-demolished Stortford Lodge Hotel, he would hear, many many times a day, the request for “two Tui, cuz”.