Breweries in Wales

Question

This piglix contains articles or sub-piglix about Breweries in Wales

Answer 1

Border Breweries (Wrexham)

Border Breweries

Border Breweries (Wrexham) Ltd was a brewery firm formerly based in Wrexham, Wales, which at its peak was a significant element of the Welsh brewing industry.

In its various incarnations the company operated over a 150-year period, between 1834 and 1984.

Border Breweries had its roots in a small operation at the Nag's Head public house in Wrexham, which was run by the Rowlands family between 1834 and 1874. It was subsequently acquired by Henry Aspinall - who named it the Wrexham Brewery and expanded it substantially - before being taken over by Arthur Soames, who entrusted his 21-year-old son Frederick with management. Within ten years, Frederick Soames had built up the business into a major producer.

Following the financial impact of the Great Depression, Border was formed by the 1931 merger of the Soames Wrexham Brewery, then in liquidation, the nearby Island Green Brewery (dating from 1856), and the Oswestry firm of Dorsett Owen. Operations were then concentrated at the Soames Brewery site. Along with the Wrexham Lager Brewery, the new firm dominated the brewing industry in the town, which was itself the centre of the industry in North Wales thanks to its supply of suitable spring water.

Border distributed a variety of products during its existence, including Border Mild (a dark mild ale), Exhibition Ale and its generally well-regarded Border Bitter (marketed with slogans such as "Wine of Wales", "Thirst Come Thirst Served", and "Prince of Ales"; the writer and humourist Miles Kington, whose father was the brewery's director, commented that Border had "managed to produce damned good beer but had never come up with a good slogan"). The bitter was described by journalist Richard Boston, writing in 1976, as "reddish in colour, pleasant in flavour, but rather thin". Border Bitter had an Original Gravity of 1034, and used Fuggles, Goldings and Whitbread Goldings Variety (WGV) hops, while Border Mild had an OG of 1030. Border also bottled its own minerals. These products were sold in the firm's tied houses located throughout North and Mid Wales, Shropshire, and parts of The Potteries.

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Answer 2

Bragdy Nant

Bragdy Nant

Bragdy Nant  pronunciation  is an ale brewery near the town of Llanrwst, North Wales. The brewery produces cask and bottle-conditioned ales, and is one of four North Wales breweries jointly operating the Albion Ale House in the town of Conwy. The name Bragdy Nant is Welsh for River or Stream Brewery.

Bragdy Nant's dark ale Mwnci Nel was awarded silver in CAMRA's 2010 Champion Beer of Wales competition. The brewery has also produced an ale for the nearby Plas y Brenin mountaineering centre in Capel Curig.

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Answer 3

Brains Brewery

SA Brain & Company Ltd

Brains (S. A. Brain & Company Ltd) is a regional brewery founded in 1882 in Cardiff, Wales, by Samuel Arthur Brain. The company controls more than 250 pubs in South Wales (particularly in Cardiff), Mid Wales and the West Country. The company took over Crown Buckley brewery in Llanelli in 1997, and Hancock's Brewery in 1999. Brains moved to the former Hancock's brewery just south of Cardiff Central railway station in 2000. The Old Brewery, in Cardiff city centre, has been developed into a modern bar and restaurant complex.

The company produces a range of beers under the Brain's, Buckley's and Hancock's names.

Brains use shirt sponsorship for the Welsh rugby union team and the Crusaders as part of their marketing strategy.

In 1882 the Thomas brothers sold the Old Brewery in Cardiff in order to pay debts. Samuel Arthur Brain and his uncle Joseph Benjamin Brain founded their business by buying the brewery from the Thomas brothers. Part of the building dated from 1713 and it had been a brewery since at least 1822.

Brains expanded the Old Brewery was expanded in 1914 by having a new brewery built in St Mary Street.

In 1997 Brains took over Crown Buckley in Llanelli. It closed Crown Buckley's brewery and transferred production to Cardiff. In 1999 Brains bought the former Hancock's Brewery just south of Cardiff Central railway station. In 2000 it moved production there, and in 2003 the Old Brewery was redeveloped as a bar and restaurant complex.

In September 2011 the company diversified into coffee shops, buying the Cardiff-based coffee house chain, Coffee#1.

The current owner is Chris Brain.

Brains SA, the company's flagship brand, is a light-coloured malty best bitter which was colloquially known as "Skull Attack". Its formulation has undergone several revisions since the beer was launched in the early 20th century; the most recent revision was launched in early 2006 and increases the quantity of hops in the brew.

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Answer 4

Breconshire Brewery

Breconshire Brewery

Breconshire Brewery is a brewery in Brecon in Powys, Wales. Since its establishment in 2002, the brewery has received numerous awards at Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) festivals and others. The brewery owns three pubs in Powys: two in Brecon and one in Llangynidr.

In January 2014 the Brewery closed.

Breconshire Brewery was established when beer distributing company C.H. Marlow decided to expand into beer production. Marlow established the brewery in a part of their warehouse in Brecon. The brewery's copper, mash tun, lauter tun and fermenters came thirdhand from Pembrokeshire Brewery.

Breconshire's beers are made with Optic barley and use varieties of hops from Wales and England. The brewery recommends that, unlike other cask ales, Breconshire beers be tapped and vented at the same time; failure to do so leads to incomplete sedimentation.

Ysbryd y Ddraig ("Spirit of the Dragon") begins with a standard Breconshire beer as a base, with Golden Valley and Ramblers Ruin known to have been used before; the beer is then aged for several months in whiskey casks. The beer is also sold as a Discworld tie-in beer under the name Bearhugger's Old Restorative.

Fan Dance takes its name from the exercise conducted by the British army on Pen y Fan and contains a blend of Progress and "dwarf" hops.

In January 2014 the brewery closed, with the loss of 3 jobs.

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Answer 5

Bryncelyn Brewery

Bryncelyn Brewery is a brew pub in 'Wern Fawr Inn', a pub located near Ystalyfera, Neath Port Talbot in Wales. Brewing was begun in July 1999, and the brewers are Will Hopton and Robert Scott.

The brewery produces three quarters of a UK brewer's barrel of beer at a time. The ales have been consistent and frequent winners of awards at beer festivals since the brewery's inception.

The first beer produced was Buddy's Delight; this was done in nine-gallon (one-firkin) batches. The brewery then expanded to 27-gallon batches and began producing five beer types in 2000; by 2002, this had further expanded to one barrel and as of 2006^[update] twelve recipes are brewed, with brewing taking place up to four times a week.

Bryncelyn's three regular beers are Oh Boy, a bitter; Buddy Marvellous, a strong mild ale; and Holly Hop, a golden ale. A further nine beers are produced on an occasional or seasonal basis. The Good Beer Guide describes Oh Boy as:

An enticing hop and fruit aroma, a golden color and a taste full of hops and fruit. Good bitterness and underlying malt add to the flavor, with a long, hoppily-bitter finish.

Bryncelyn's beers are usually available only at the Wern Fawr Inn, but can be purchased for take-away in polypins and frequently appear at beer festivals in Wales.

The names of Bryncelyn's beers all feature the motif of references to the singer & guitarist Buddy Holly; the name "Bryncelyn" itself means "Holly Hill" in Welsh. Pump clips and associated artwork for the brewery also feature Holly's image or references Holly in some way:

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Answer 6

Cwmbran Brewery

Cwmbran Brewery

Cwmbran (/kʊmˈbrɑːn, ˌkuːmˈbrɑːn/; Welsh: Cwmbrân [kʊmˈbrɑːn], also in use as an alternative spelling in English) is a new town in Wales. Lying within the historic boundaries of Monmouthshire, it forms part of the county borough of Torfaen. Cwmbran was established in 1949 to provide new employment opportunities in the south eastern portion of the South Wales Coalfield. Cwmbran means Crow Valley. Cwmbran is twinned with Bruchsal in Germany and Carbonne in France.

Comprising the villages of Old Cwmbran, Pontnewydd, Upper Cwmbran, Croesyceiliog, Llantarnam and Llanyrafon, its population had grown to 48,535 by 2011. This makes it the sixth largest urban area in Wales.

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Answer 7

Evan Evans (brewery)

Evan Evans is a brewery in Llandeilo, Carmarthenshire, Wales.

The brewery was founded in 1767 by Henry Child, a farmer, merchant, maltster and agent to Sir Alex Stepney. Henry Child's daughter Maria married the Reverend James Buckley in 1798. Today, Simon Buckley and his son James, seventh and eighth generation of the family, continue the family brewing tradition in Llandeilo.

In 2014 the company launched the Porter Street Brewing Company, a brewer of cask ale in London.

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Answer 8

Hurns Brewing Company

The Hurns Brewing Company Limited is a drinks and brewery company based in Swansea, Wales. Hurns own several pubs in Wales. It acquired the Tomos Watkin range of beers in 2002.

The Hurns Brewing Company was originally established as the Hurns Mineral Water Company by Arthur A. Hurn, in the late 1800s. Hurns premises were in Northampton Lane in Swansea and they initially produced bottled soda water, ginger beer, lemonade and cordials.

Arthur Hurn's son, Idris, died in 1966 and Idris's son (who had been running the business) unexpectedly died a month later. The company went into decline for the next ten years, until Idris's grand daughter Connie and her brother were old enough to take over in 1976. The company changed direction to concentrate on distribution and wholesale.

In 2010, as CEO of Hurns, Connie Parry was awarded the Welsh business woman of the year award at the Welsh Women Mean Business Awards ceremony.

The Hurns Brewing Company acquired the Tomos Watkin brewery in 2002. The present incarnation of Tomos Watkin was started in 1995 by Simon Buckley. Tomos Watkin first operated from a small brewery in Llandeilo, Carmarthenshire and later opened a larger brewery in Swansea. Tomos Watkin brew several beverages from their brewery in the Swansea Enterprise Park.

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Answer 9

Otley Brewing Company

Otley Brewing Company, Ltd.

The Otley Brewing Company Limited, colloquially Otley Brewery, is a brewery located in Pontypridd, Wales. Established in 2005, it has won several awards, including the Champion Beer of Wales in 2006. The head brewer is Charlie Otley. In October 2016, the brewery was put up for sale by its owners.

The Otley family owns and operates three pubs in the Pontypridd area; a natural synergy was perceived in establishing a brewing operation. Some trials on the homebrewing scale, when the recipe for O-riginal was developed, led to limited production at Moor Beer Company in Somerset; a full-scale five barrel brewplant was purchased from Moor and production on an industrial estate in Pontypridd began in August 2005.

Beer is currently available in casks regularly at the Otley-owned pubs in Pontypridd and Trefforest and as guest ales in other pubs in the Rhondda valley and Cardiff areas. They also produce bottled versions of Dark O, O1, O2 and O-Garden. 20 litre (36 pints) polypins and 10 litre (18 pints) minipins are also available for most of their beers.

Otley beers generally have floral/citrus hop flavours, making heavy use of American hop varieties, particularly Amarillo hops; and display a dry finish on drinking. Otley's beers often do not fit closely into the beer style scheme generally applied to British beer.

O1 is the most common beer available, a golden ale at 4.0% ABV. While classed as a pale ale by the brewery, CAMRA's categorization scheme treats it as a golden ale.

By the same token, Otley O8, as of 2006^[update] the current Champion Beer of Wales, is classified as a barleywine under CAMRA beer style definitions, and as such stood unopposed in its category at the Champion Beer of Wales tasting; but the beer is formulated as a strong golden ale.

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Answer 10

Tiny Rebel

Tiny Rebel Brewing Co.

Tiny Rebel Brewing Co. is a microbrewery located at the Wern Industrial Estate in Rogerstone, in the city of Newport, Wales.

Tiny Rebel beers are available in cask, keg, bottle and can. The company is probably most famous for its Cwtch (rhyming with 'butch', "cuddle" in Welsh), having won the top award in British brewing with it.

Core ranges of each package are available year round, with specials and seasonals released intermittently. In 2016 alone, Tiny Rebel released 30 new beers.

The company's beers are sold throughout the UK, with selected products available in Welsh branches of supermarkets Co-op and M&S Food. Around 15% of the company's beer is exported, with Australia, Japan, Norway and Sweden being the largest overseas markets.

Tiny Rebel was founded in Newport in 2012 by brothers-in-law Bradley Cummings and Gareth Williams. Williams had learned to homebrew with his grandfather, and introduced his brother-in-law to the hobby. After brewing in Cumming's father's garage for a number of years, the pair decided to make their hobby their profession. They rented an industrial unit in the Maesglas area of the city. The neighbouring unit was very quickly needed, and the brewery expanded into it just a year after opening.

In 2013, exports to Sweden of the company's pale ale FUBAR were blocked by the Swedish government on the grounds that the beer's label was contrary to Swedish government guidelines on war imagery.

The company opened their first bar in the Cardiff, in late 2013, just after winning the top three places at the Champion Beer of Wales competition. Urban Tap House was the first dedicated craft beer bar in the city, and a branch opened in the company's hometown of Newport in 2015. The Urban Tap House brand was retired in 2016, with the bars being renamed simply 'Tiny Rebel'.

In mid 2016, the company announced significant expansion, unveiling plans for a bespoke 36,000sq/ft brewing facility in the Rogerstone area of Newport. Brewing moved to the new site in January 2017, increasing total capacity five-fold.

In the first year they were eligible to enter, Tiny Rebel took home a clean sweep of Gold, Silver and Bronze at the Great Welsh Beer and Cider Festival 2013. The following year, they also became the first brewery to defend their Champion Beer of Wales title at the GWBCF.

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