Dashmote launches POS Material Detection: who owns the bar in London, from photos
POS Material Detection shows whose POS material (POSM) is on the taps, glasses, fridge and terrace in venue photos: all of London, with a London Soho close-up.
Key findings
- About three in four London bars and pubs show branded drinks material, against about a quarter of restaurants.
- Guinness (Diageo) leads London's bars and pubs; set Guinness aside and Heineken is narrowly ahead of Asahi, 14% vs 13%.
- Coca-Cola leads London's restaurants and carries about four in five pieces of their branded fridge material; it leads the restaurants of about three in four boroughs, though borough samples are small.
Drinks companies pay to be seen in bars, and they do it with POS material (POSM): the branded taps, fridges, parasols and glasses in a venue. Until now, knowing whose POSM stands where meant sending someone in.
Brands have asked us for this for years. Checking POSM used to be a job for the sales rep: walk in, look around, write it down. Now much of it can be done before the visit, and where it cannot, the rep takes one quick photo.
Dennis Tan, CEO & Co-Founder, Dashmote
Today we are launching POS Material Detection. Until now, Dashmote could show where a drinks brand is available: on the menu and on the delivery apps. Now we also show where it is visible, in the branded material inside the venue. It reads venue photos, finds the branded objects and tells you which brand, and which company, owns each one.
Our first study covers all of London, from the West End to the outer boroughs. About three in four London bars and pubs show branded drinks material in their photos; about a quarter of restaurants do. In bars and pubs, Guinness (Diageo) leads. In restaurants, Coca-Cola leads, and about three in four restaurants show no branded drinks material in their photos. That gap is the opportunity.
How it works: from a photo to an owner
Illustration: a pub with branded material from three placeholder brands, A, B and C.
- Collect the photos. Public photos of each venue are gathered, and every finding keeps its photo and its date. The photos your reps take on store visits are read the same way; this study uses public photos only.
- Read every photo. Each piece of branded material becomes a line of data: what it is, which brand, which company. A font reading Peroni Nastro Azzurro becomes "beer font, Peroni, Asahi".
- Profile every venue. Per outlet, you see which brands are visible and on what: the taps, the glasses, the fridge, the terrace.
- Roll it up by area. Per neighbourhood, borough or region, you see who leads, the runner-up, and whether the lead is clear or narrow.
Bars and pubs carry the branding; restaurants mostly do not
About three in four London bars and pubs show branded drinks material (74%), against about a quarter of restaurants (23%). Diageo's brands are in about 55% of bars and pubs, Heineken's in 36%, Asahi's in 26%, AB InBev's in 22% and Molson Coors' in 21%. In restaurants no beer company shows in more than about 3.0%; Coca-Cola is the name you see most, in about 11%. These shares count what the photos show, so they understate presence where a venue has few photos: among bars and pubs with 40 or more recent photos, 85% show branded drinks material, and among restaurants, 33%.
Share of venues whose public photos show each company's branded drinks material, weighted to all of London. Bottles and cans on show are not counted.
Share of all branded drinks material seen, by the company that owns the brand, weighted to all of London: unlike the share of venues above, each venue type adds up to 100%. A brand counts once per type of object per venue.
Who leads the bar: Guinness (Diageo)
In about a quarter of London's bars and pubs (25%), Diageo's brands, almost all of them Guinness, carry the most branded drinks material; the runner-up, Heineken, leads in about one in ten (9.5%). The same picture holds in Inner London and, less sharply, in Outer London. These leader figures count venues with at least 20 recent photos, which is about three in four bars and pubs and about three in five restaurants.
The lead is Guinness. Diageo's brands show in about 55% of bars and pubs; set Guinness aside and the rest of Diageo's range shows in about 7.6%. Without Guinness, Heineken is narrowly ahead of Asahi: 14% vs 13%, a gap within sampling noise.
Share of bars and pubs with at least 20 recent photos where the company or brand has the most branded drinks items, weighted to all of London. Narrowly ahead: the gap to the runner-up is within sampling noise.
Guinness: the brand you see most
Guinness is in about half of London's bars and pubs (53%); the next brand, Peroni, is in about 15%. Guinness is also the single most-displayed brand in about 30% of bars and pubs; no other brand is top in more than about 2.4%, and in about one in five no single brand stands out. Behind it come Heineken's brands (Birra Moretti, Amstel, Cruzcampo and Beavertown) and Asahi's (Peroni, London Pride and Asahi).
Share of bars and pubs whose public photos show the brand on branded drinks material, weighted to all of London.
Where the branding sits: the taps, then the glass
The taps carry about 44% of all the branded material seen in London's bars and pubs, glassware 24%: together, about two thirds. On the taps themselves the space is shared: Heineken's brands hold about 19% of the branded tap material, Asahi's 16%, Diageo's 14% and Molson Coors' 11%. Diageo is in the most bars; on the tap row itself, Heineken and Asahi hold more of the branded material.
Restaurants spread their branding differently: glassware 28%, signs and decor 15%, terrace and front 13%, taps 13% and fridges 11%. The fridge matters far more there than in bars and pubs (0.8%), and about four in five pieces of branded fridge material in London's restaurants (81%) carry a Coca-Cola brand, against about 8.7% for PepsiCo.
Share of all branded material seen, by type, weighted to all of London; company shares are of that type's branded material. A brand counts once per type of object per venue.
Restaurants: Coca-Cola leads, and most show no branded material
Coca-Cola leads London's restaurants, in Inner and Outer London. Among restaurants with at least 20 recent photos, it carries the most branded drinks material in about one in ten (9.9%); no other company leads in more than about 2.6%.
But about three in four London restaurants (77%) show no branded drinks material in their photos: no branded taps, fridges, glassware or signs (bottles and cans on show are not counted). Part of that is what the photos miss, but it marks white space for drinks brands, and a ready call list.
Who leads where in London
Guinness (Diageo) leads the bars and pubs of every London sub-region, and Coca-Cola the restaurants. The lead is clear in Central and East London's bars and pubs and in Central, East and West London's restaurants. Elsewhere it is a narrow lead, within sampling noise: in North London's bars and pubs, Guinness 24% vs Heineken 20%; in South London's restaurants, Coca-Cola 9.6% vs Molson Coors 4.2%. Read the regional figures as indicative: the samples are smaller than London's.
Share of venues with at least 20 recent photos where the company has the most branded drinks items, weighted. Every area is coloured by its leader; a lighter shade is a narrow lead, where the gap to the runner-up is within sampling noise. Sub-region and Outer London figures are indicative.
Borough by borough: restaurants, indicative
Coca-Cola leads the restaurants of about three in four London boroughs. Borough samples are small, so these figures are indicative: only in Camden is its lead clearly larger than sampling noise, and elsewhere it is a narrow lead. In the other boroughs another company leads, narrowly, among them Molson Coors in Sutton, Harrow and Croydon and AB InBev in the City of London and Hackney.
Company with the most branded drinks items in restaurants with at least 20 recent photos, by borough, weighted. Indicative: borough samples are small. Every borough is coloured by its leader; full red: Coca-Cola's lead is clear; lighter shades: a narrow lead, where the gap to the runner-up is within sampling noise, or a level result where both print the same share.
Close-up: London Soho
In London Soho, the bar is more contested. In the neighbourhood of London Soho and West Fitzrovia, 70% of bars and pubs show branded drinks material. Diageo's brands show in 56%, close to London's 55%, but Heineken's show in 40% and AB InBev's in 36%, against 36% and 22% across London, and Diageo is only narrowly ahead of Heineken: 18% vs 13% of bars and pubs. Its restaurants show less: about one in six (17%) show branded drinks material, against 23% across London.
Across the 33 busiest neighbourhoods we read in depth, Diageo's brands are the ones seen in the most bars and pubs in all but two.
What drinks brands should do
Find the white space. About three in four London restaurants show no drinks-brand material in their photos: room to be the first brand in, and a ready call list.
Know where the lead is narrow. Borough by borough, Coca-Cola's lead in the restaurants of most boroughs is narrow, and without Guinness, Heineken is only narrowly ahead of Asahi in London's bars and pubs.
See where a rival's kit stands and yours does not, before the visit.
See it for your outlets
Being stocked is not the same as being seen. This shows brands not only where they are on the menu, but where they are actually visible in the venue.
Dennis Tan, CEO & Co-Founder, Dashmote
The manual audit is the dull part of a rep's job. Skip it, and the time in the venue goes to selling. POS Material Detection shows the POSM in every outlet in your territory, alongside cooler detection and the outlet execution audit. Book a demo or get in touch.
About this study: public venue photos of bars, pubs and restaurants (outside the big restaurant chains) in a sample of neighbourhoods across all 33 London boroughs, with 33 of the busiest neighbourhoods read in depth; photographed over the two years to 2026 and weighted to all of London. Photos your reps take on visits are read the same way. A brand counts once per type of object per venue. A company leads a venue when it has the most branded drinks items there, counted on venues with at least 20 recent photos, and an area's leader is the company that leads the most venues there; where its gap to the runner-up is within sampling noise, it is a narrow lead. A photo shows what was visible, not when it was installed; it cannot show what nobody photographed, and visibility is not sales.
