Internal accounting practices at Whitbread & Company c.1890-1925

This paper examines internal accounting practices at Whitbread & Company from c. 1890 to 1925. At this time, there was an increasing interest in cost accounting, but there is little detailed extant research on general internal accounting practices of firms. The brewing sector, we suggest, is a potentially fruitful realm to further our knowledge of this time. Drawing on the Whitbread brewery archival records, we chart the internal accounting practices of the company. Our findings reveal a stable set of accounting practices, focused mainly on bookkeeping, although the firm’s auditor produced some reports which may have been useful for management decision-making. We argue these practices were highly institutionalised, and seemingly resistant to external forces present in the company’s environment

Improving the public house in Britain, 1920-40: Sir Sydney Nevile and 'social work'

The ‘improved public house’ movement in the inter-war years was a central part of the shift towards retailing by the brewing industry. An important part of the reform movement was the alliance between certain brewers, notably Whitbread, and ‘social workers’, particularly those associated with the University settlement movement in London. Using the papers of Sydney Nevile, the importance of a particular social milieu is outlined, calling into question attempts to align the movement to improve public houses with transatlantic Progressivism. Rather, this alliance drew upon longstanding English traditions of public service and religious affiliation amongst a fraction of the gentry

Drift or shift? Continuity, change, and international variation in knowledge production in OR/MS

With the aim of contributing to the debate around OR/MS as a discipline, this study provides a historical comparative investigation of publicly available knowledge production in the field. The empirical investigation is based on a content analysis of 300 randomly selected articles from six major journals in the field. We have found: (1) since the late 1950s to the present day there has been no significant change in the types of published research in OR/MS in North America; (2) from the late 1950s to the present day, there have been significant differences in types of published research in OR/MS internationally. The imputed imbalance between theory and applications in published work had already occurred in the early stages of the development of OR/MS in North America and has since remained very much the same. Furthermore, research in the United Kingdom has been distinctly different from that dominant in North America and elsewhere. There are also indications that outside North America and the United Kingdom there is an emerging turn towards applications-oriented research. Over the last two or three decades there has been a significant increase overall in the share of articles published by academic authors

From Monasteries to Multinationals (and Back): A Historical Review of the Beer Economy

This article reviews beer production, consumption and the industrial organization of breweries throughout history. Monasteries were the centers of the beer economy in the early Middle Ages. Innovation and increased demand later induced the growth of commercial breweries. Globalization and scientific discoveries transfirmed the beer industry and increased competition from the 16th through the 19th century. The 20th century was characterized by dramatic (domestic and international) consolidation, major shifts in consumption patterns, and the re-emergence of small breweries

A highly successful model? The rail franchising business in Britain

A crucial feature of rail privatisation in Britain was franchising. Passenger services were franchised in competitive bidding processes to train operators which were meant to function with declining subsidy. The paper adopts the framework of social cost-benefit analysis to examine rail privatisation's impact on three key groups; consumers, producers and the government. It establishes that privatisation did not achieve all the supposed benefits. Further, franchising only appears to be profitable through the use of calculative accounting practices, where by franchised train operators are portrayed as discrete business entities, whereas they are supported by very substantial, ongoing direct and indirect government subsidies

A highly successful model? The rail franchising business in Britain

A crucial feature of rail privatisation in Britain was franchising. Passenger services were franchised in competitive bidding processes to train operators which were meant to function with declining subsidy. The paper adopts the framework of social cost-benefit analysis to examine rail privatisation's impact on three key groups; consumers, producers and the government. It establishes that privatisation did not achieve all the supposed benefits. Further, franchising only appears to be profitable through the use of calculative accounting practices, where by franchised train operators are portrayed as discrete business entities, whereas they are supported by very substantial, ongoing direct and indirect government subsidies