Author Archives: Brewing Services

Congratulations to Ayr Brewery!

It’s no surprise to us that our longtime client, Ayr Brewery has been chosen to supply beer for the Six Nations Championships Virtual Rugby events. We’ve been involved in the recipes for many of their Champion Beers of Scotland and this latest accolade is well deserved. Further details courtesy of the Ayr Advertiser: A local […]

Looking to 2021 and Beyond

2020 has proved to be an eventful and difficult year to say the least (carefully avoiding the much overused ‘U’ word). I’d like to say 2021 will be better, but probably not for six months at least as we continue to grapple with the effects of Covid lockdowns, plus the effects of Brexit on beer […]

The Digital Beer Awards 2020

The first ever ‘digital’ Beer awards There may be no beer festivals to attend but brewers have still found a way to get their beers judged. Organised by the Society of Independent Brewers (SIBA) and open to all independent breweries in the UK, the Digital Beer Awards 2020 were a landmark competition, entered by over […]

Brewers: It’s your name on the package

  Over the past four months we’ve seen a quadrupling of the sales of small pack beer. More brewers than ever before have rushed to offer beer in both bottle and can, to be consumed at home. Packaging slots became like gold dust, and anyone with a means of filling bottles or cans were approached […]

Things are going to have to change

  Brewers are starting to adjust to this new sales situation, if they haven’t already and they need to adjust quickly if they don’t want to be left behind. It won’t be easy for at least the next twelve months (with or without a second wave and an even more draconian lockdown) so hard decisions […]

What a difference Six Months Makes…

At Brewing Services, we are looking forward to 2020, and what the next decade brings – but what a difference six months makes: When I wrote the piece below for the Brewing Services website, Covid 19 was no more than a single sneeze in a far-off land, but how the effects of that first sneeze […]

SIBA National Beer Competition 2020

We’re always really happy to see our breweries doing well in beer competitions. We always like to think we simply brew beers for people to enjoy but getting a little recognition along the way always helps. So, we’d like to congratulate the following breweries for doing well in this year’s competition:     Overall Champion […]

Looking forward to a new decade

At Brewing Services we are looking forward to 2020, and what the next decade brings. 2019 proved to be a bumper year for us with many of our breweries picking up awards for their beers at Regional SIBA and CAMRA competitions. The winning beers were across all beer genres from pale ales and classic bitters […]

Brewing Services’ Training Course Celebrates 30 Years!

Our brewing course covers the basic theory of the brewing process and examines constitutes good brewing practice on a small scale and has been labelled ‘the course designed by brewers for brewers’. Over the past 30 years we have explained the intricacies of the brewing process to hundreds of brewers and would be brewers, all […]

2019 SIBA Scottish Region Competition Results

Well done to our friends north of the border! Last week saw 26 of the best brewers in Scotland gather for the annual Society of Independent Brewers Scottish Region 2019 beer competition. We are pleased to see yet again many of the breweries we have worked with over the years come away with yet another […]

Congratulations to clients Hawkshead and Brimstage

Congratulations to Hawkshead, Kendal and Brimstage, Wirral and a few other of our past breweries for winning awards in the 2019 SIBA North West regional finals   Overall Champion for Bottle and Can Beers Gold Hawkshead Brewery  Route 590 IPA 5.6%     Hawkshead also won a rack of other awards for: Bottle/Can British Dark Beers (4.5 […]

Congratulations to Slater’s Ales and Peak Ales!

Well done to Slater’s Ales (Stafford), and Peak Ales (Bakewell), for winning a clutch of medals each in the canned beer and bottle at the recent:   SIBA Midlands Independent Beer Awards 2019     Bottle & Can Session IPA (up to 4.3%) Gold  Slater’s Ales 1 Hop 4.0%   Bottle & Can Speciality Light Beers  Silver […]

Nightmare Porter wins Great Taste Award: Three Star

Well done to Hambleton Brewery of Ripon, North Yorkshire with Nightmare Porter, a classic dark ale. We are always pleased to see breweries and the beers we have had a hand in making doing well on the international scene. https://www.linkedin.com/posts/nick-stafford-19962629_a-cause-for-us-to-celebrate-our-nightmare-activity-6564844232228642816-n0Mk

What’s in a name?

https://www.morningadvertiser.co.uk/Article/2019/04/24/What-s-in-a-name-Understanding-the-re-categorisation-of-bitter?utm_source=newsletter_daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=26-Apr-2019&c=IrE7%2FRVfEO83Z%2FvGi2xIo60duNAmwjBE&p2= Does it really matter what we call our beers? Once we had a bar full of ‘Bitters’ or ‘Best Bitters’ -even when a brewery didn’t have a second best Bitter! Now however we are faced with a a bar full of pseudo IPAs simply because brewers don’t want to be seen to be old […]

Congratulations!

We were pleased to see so many of our breweries past and present do so well in this year’s Society of Independent Brewers National Beer competition, not only in cask categories but also in bottle, keg and can. Gloucester Brewery lifted the overall champion in the cask category with their stout, but the various winners […]

Brewing Services assists Utopian Brewing with new Devon-based brewery

Utopian Brewing Limited have contracted with Honiton based supplier, Vigo Limited, to supply and install their new 35 Hectolitre brewery. The chosen configuration is based on a 3 vessel brew house, with a unique design by Brewing Services Ltd based around a single Mash Tun/Lauter Tun and two Coppers to provide both flexibility and allow multiple brews […]

Cold Town House Pub brings brewing back to Edinburgh’s Grassmarket

It’s always nice to see a project which we’ve been working on for over two years finally coming to fruition, and hopefully we will be brewing and selling beer within a few weeks. A former church has been transformed into a new pub and brewery in Edinburgh’s Grassmarket – reviving a brewing tradition on the street […]

BeerXUK: 13-14th March, 2019. Liverpool

Brewing Services Ltd assist Utopian Brewing to build their new Devon based brewery Utopian Brewing Limited have contracted with Honiton based supplier, Vigo Limited, to supply and install their new 35 Hectolitre brewery. The chosen configuration is based on a 3 vessel brew house, with a unique design by Brewing Services Ltd based around a single Mash […]

All you need is the right venue

http:// https://www.morningadvertiser.co.uk/Article/2019/02/05/Why-pubs-should-brew-their-own-beer Is it time that we had a few more ‘venues’ brewing their own beer, and why just stick at pubs? At the turn of the last century there were over 12,000 small establishments brewing their own beer, these were not wholesale brewers but pubs, street corner beer kitchens, country houses or university colleges. […]

Desert Island Beers

Desert Island Beers – David Smith, Brewing Consultant Welcome to the latest episode of Desert Island Beers which this week features David Smith of Brewing Services Ltd. David has been involved with brewing for over 40 years and since starting his consultancy in 1988 has assisted over 200 breweries with technical support & Quality Assurance […]

News from Utopian Brewery

UTOPIAN BREWING SELECT HONITON-BASED COMPANY TO BUILD THEIR NEW DEVON BREWERY   See https://grow-media.co.uk/exeter-news/utopian-brewing-vigo-devon-brewery/ https://www.brewersjournal.info/utopian-brewing-calls-on-vigo-to-build-devon-brewery/   Utopian Brewing Limited are pleased to announce that they have signed contracts with Honiton based Vigo Limited for the supply and installation of their new 35 Hectolitre brewery. The chosen configuration is based on a 3 vessel brew house, with a unique […]

Crime Novels and IPA?

For centuries the beer has been an accompaniment to life rather than something separate, and lately somewhat edified. So it’s good to see that whilst indulging in a little light reading you can do so over a beer. Crime novels paired with IPA perhaps, or occult paired with dark Porter or Stout or Romantic novels […]

Craft Beer and Choices

https://www.morningadvertiser.co.uk/Article/2018/12/11/Cask-heroes-why-licensees-need-to-keep-stocking-cask If everything we read about craft brewing is about greater choice, then that must also include how we want our preferred tipple to be served for our enjoyment. Cask beer, despite some decline in the volumes drunk,  is still very much favoured by a high proportion of the beer drinking public, and any brewer […]

The Fundamentals of Mini Brewing and a Party Invitation

The Fundamentals of Mini-Brewing, November 2018 The completion of yet another successful Fundamentals of Mini-Brewing course and a photo of the very happy smiling attendees says it all. This is four-day intensive brewing course was designed by brewers to help other brewers improve their understanding of the brewing process and hone their basic skills as […]