Category Archives: General

Want to join our team?

Posted on March 6, 2012 | 1 Comment

So it’s gotten to the point where we need to bring another pair of hands on board – huzzah! While hiring someone always brings with it a huge amount of responsibility, it is also the best way to see things with fresh eyes, inject new ideas into strategies, and generally get more stuff done, so needless to say we are rather excited. We’re using the JobBridge scheme to help us expand our team, as funds are tight at the moment and it would be very difficult for us to take someone on otherwise, but we’re hopeful that if we can find the right person, that this will be the start of something beautiful i.e. a permanent addition to our little team :)

Here is the role we’re hiring for. If you think you might be interested, please take a look at the JobBridge website to make sure you are eligible for the scheme, and send your CV with a covering email to hr@metalmanbrewing.com to tell us about yourself!

Operations Assistant
The role of operations assistant involves carrying out day-to-day activities within the brewery under the general supervision of the operations manager. This includes weekly maintenance of machinery and equipment keeping appropriate logs for same, troubleshooting mechanical issues on the brewery floor, assisting with brewing and packaging activities, and assistance with stock management.

Skills
- No industry experience necessary
- A third level education in a science/engineering discipline is preferred, but not essential
- A genuine interest in beer and the brewing industry is a must
- Good interpersonal skills, and the ability to work both independently and as part of a team
- High comfort level working in a fast-paced and diverse environment
- Working in the brewery can be strenuous and tiring – the right candidate will be able to move about easily in a manufacturing environment
- Full driving licence

Contact
Please send CVs with a covering email to hr@metalmanbrewing.com
Successful applicants will be contacted to arrange an interview at the brewery.
Start date : immediate.

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Seriously, are they *ever* going to start brewing in Waterford?

Posted on January 4, 2012 | Comments Off

And well you might ask! This process has been much longer than we had either hoped, or even dreaded, but we are making progress and are hopeful that Waterford Brewday Number One is not far off.

We’ve been hard at work over the last couple of months pulling all the threads together that are necessary to start brewing at the Waterford brewery. As I type, the electrician is plugging away downstairs (pardon the pun) now that we have located that elusive third phase into the building, and our sexy new distribution board will be live any day now. The plumber will be back later this week to commission the gas burner for the kettle, and we’re hoping to knock out most of the refrigeration work next week.

Parallel to this we’re making savagely long lists of things we think we’ll need to buy, trying to figure out where we’re going to get it all from, and wondering how we’re going to be able to afford it all. Hurrah! We are, of course, continuing to brew at White Gypsy in the meantime, and deliver beer to our customers, although we are pretty much at capacity now and won’t be able to take on any new customers until we have moved production to Waterford – a good incentive to move things along as quickly as possible.

I am ever hopeful that the next blogpost will be about our inaugural brewday!

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Drawing the line

Posted on November 2, 2011 | 12 Comments

So it would appear I have fallen out with my first supplier. (No doubt it won’t be the last.)

Several months ago, I contracted a small company to carry out some work for me. We got off to a shaky start due to some ambiguity regarding the scope of the work involved, but we sorted that out and proceeded on a basis that, while I wouldn’t say I was relaxed and happy about it, we had both agreed on. However, I ran into difficulty almost straight away when I asked for the dates that the work was being carried out on. The reasons that this info was important were twofold : firstly, I need to have visibility into the calendar of work so that in the event of a problem in a related area, I have the data I need to begin troubleshooting from ; secondly, I have a very finite amount of money and I need to carry out due diligence on where my money is being spent. Value for money is extremely important to small businesses, as well as everyone else :-)

Unfortunately, this information (which I felt was very straightforward) was not forthcoming. I was continuously reassured that the work was being done, but it took over three months for the dates to be produced. During this time, I requested the info on various occasions, and it was always going to be emailed to me that evening, but it never arrived. Each time I was told that the work was being done, and I felt that there was an implication that I had no right or reason to be questioning it – despite the fact that I was often passing on feedback to the company from other interested parties who were telling me that they didn’t think the work was being carried out. This lack of clarity was compounded by one of the company’s team members (a third-party contractor) telling someone one day in August that this was the first time they had carried out this work, since as far as they were concerned, I had been doing it myself up to now. Now I had been paying for this work to be carried out since May., so naturally I was a little upset when this nugget of information got back to me. When I queried this with the company in question, I felt like I was simply fobbed off : “he probably meant that it was the first time that he had done it, not the first time it’s actually been done”. I reiterated that this was not what the individual had said, but the feeling I was getting is that it didn’t matter, I would get nothing back on this matter.

At this point, our communications were starting to get a little heated as I got increasingly frustrated. An adhoc piece of work was left languishing for three weeks – when I would look for an update, it was always “that will be done tomorrow”, which I would communicate back to the other interested party in the equation. When no-one would turn up to do the work, I looked like a prize idiot. Especially the second AND THIRD times it happened. And yet, the other company in question felt that it was their reputation that was being damaged by being associated with me – they were currently only contracted to carry out a portion of the work we do, but they wanted me to hand it all over to them because they felt they couldn’t trust what might be being done by other contractors, and didn’t want their names associated with it. Oh the irony.

I felt they weren’t doing a good enough job on what they were responsible for already, and that I couldn’t trust them with the full shebang. I was informed that my attitude was terrible, and that I was pissing a lot of people off. “Well good, because I’m pretty pissed off myself”, was my not-very-witty retort. Hey, I can’t be marvellously poised *all* the time :-) They gave me an ultimatum – all or nothing – and I even surprised myself with how gladly I chose “nothing”.

Even a few weeks later, the situation still frustrates me – especially the implication that my attitude was the problem. Disgraceful of me really, looking for information about the service I was paying for. Honestly, who did I think I was?  In the end of the day, it all came down to trust. The signal I was getting was that I should have just inherently trusted the company in question. Yet I never felt like they once trusted me. I repeatedly felt like they were doing me a favour, rather than feeling like a valued customer. My requests for visibility into the process went unheard, but I was expected to cough up for the invoices that appeared without questioning them. (And there was almost always something that needed clarification/correction.) Wonderful learning experience though, sleepless nights and angry phonecalls aside.

So what have I learned?

1. Trust your instincts. I think I knew at the start that this had potential to be a difficult relationship, and that there might be a personality clash, but I ignored it and forged ahead because I needed to get the work done.
2. Trust your supplier – and if you can’t trust your supplier, then find a new one.  I left this situation drag on for longer than I should, and I’m still trying to figure out why that is. Going looking for new suppliers is certainly a pain in the ass, but so is trying to manage a supplier who doesn’t care about your business.
3. Stick to your guns. There were times when I could have been a bit more forceful and set out my terms and conditions a bit more stringently, but perhaps I was afraid of pissing people off. Since I have allegedly done this already with my terrible attitude, it seems I would have had nothing to lose and I should have let rip a lot sooner! No More Ms. Nice Girl from now on :-)

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Kettles and hoses and tanks, oh my!

Posted on October 12, 2011 | 4 Comments


Once again, I need to start a blog post with a big apology for my lack of updates recently – things have been overwhelmingly busy for the last 4 weeks, and it feels like I have barely had time to catch my breath. To give you a little background (and make me feel better for being so remiss!) I will summarise briefly what’s been going on, and then you can draw your own conclusions as to whether my public silence has been warranted. (Clue : it has.)

In the early stages of September, the unthinkable happened – we *actually* managed to close a lease on premises. After three false starts, we were finally there, and couldn’t quite believe it. So much so that we chose not to shout about it just in case it all slipped through our fingertips. We picked up the keys from the landlord, shuffled some bits and pieces around, and started to plan the imminent arrival of the brewery, along with the buildout work that would need to happen in tandem and afterwards. (Turns out it’s all happening afterwards, couldn’t mobilise anyone to get anything done in advance, other than putting a desk in. Oh well.)

So armed with the keys to my new premises, I did what any sane and rational person would do -  went back to college.  I turned up on Monday the 19th of September to join some others starting out on the rocky road of being ones own boss to attend a course which promises to help me plug some of the gaping holes in my would-be entrepreneurial armoury. When I applied for the SEEPP program initially, it was billed as 1 day per week for the academic year, but when the position was offered to me, the format had changed somewhat, and the commitment was now 2 days per week until Christmas, after which time it reverts to 1 day per week. I was (and still am) very wary of this, but I decided to give it a go, and so far have been (almost!) able to keep up, although it is certainly proving to be quite a drain on brewery-time.  (I’m a student again. How did that happen? I swore at the last graduation ceremony that I wouldn’t be doing this again, and yet here I am within 12 months. Someone really needs to give me a good talking to.)

After my first week at school, I got to debunk to Dublin for a long weekend to run our stand at the All Ireland Craft Beerfest – and what fun that was! Exhausting, but we had a really great time. Simultaneously, we had to set up a tap for the Funconf folk down in Lismore Castle, where they ran what sounds like a fantastic conference which included a DeLorean, a donkey, our beer, and (from what I can see) a valiant effort to get the donkey into said DeLorean. I don’t know how, or if, our beer featured in this stunt. If it did, then I hope the donkey at least got his fair share!

So in epic-week-stylee, I deconstructed our bar at the RDS on Monday, tore back to Waterford to meet our consulting engineer, went to school on Tuesday, and then got up at 6am on Wednesday to go collect the brewery. (Given that I had also scheduled a quick birthday a couple of weeks previously, I think I can safely say I am too old for this kind of carry-on.) Quite a fun day, all in all, and I don’t think we broke anything (that wasn’t already broken at least) but it took 5 of us most of the day to unpack everything out of storage in Templemore, load it onto the articulated lorry with the groovy little forklift that attaches to the back of it(I feel quite grown up, having hired an artic and a forklift for the day – go me!), and then unload it all again at the other end. I’ve got some pics which I will post and blog about at a later date in a proper write-up about the whole thing. No doubt it will be several months down the line, and will start with an apology for its tardiness.
So since the end of September, we’ve had our brewery more-or-less in situ – the hard part done, you say? No chance. Cue the meetings with plumbers, refrigeration engineers, builders, electricians, customs & excise folk, welders, and who knows who else to ask as many questions as I can think of, but still probably not the ones I should be asking. Factor in school, regular beer deliveries, new customers, installations, and the odd hour of sleep here and there – why it’s a miracle I’m even getting to write this in 2011 at all :-)

“Blah blah blah”, I hear you say, “quit yer whinging and tell us when will the brewery be MAKING BEER!” Fair question., I suppose. My answer? We should be brewing in about 4-6 weeks time. The Universe’s answer? Who knows, but it likely involves Jupiter rising in Virgo when Mercury is in retrograde, once the unicorns have started to fly south for the winter.

Stay tuned!

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Posted in General

Going it alone

Posted on August 22, 2011 | Comments Off

Lughnasa 2011 - PosterFriday August 19th saw Deveney’s Lughnasa Beer Festival return to The Pod on Harcourt Street for its second year. We weren’t able to go last year, so this was our inaugural outing for many reasons : first time attending the festival itself, first time out with our newly constructed bar, and first time setting up our bar from scratch on the day of the festival.  Yikes!

The festival itself was awesome – 300 odd beers from all manner of countries catering for every beer palate out there. I’ll leave it to the beer bloggers who turned up to fully describe the array of delights on offer, but we were tucked in amongst heavy hitters like Rogue, Brewdog and Sierra Nevada as well as the other great Irish micros on the scene at the moment – wonderful company indeed, if not a tad intimidating! The crowd was amiable and enthusiastic, the atmosphere was kickin’, and the pies from Pie Minister were just the thing to accompany all the lovely beer. On more than one occasion over the course of the evening, I dreamt of being on the other side of the bar, sampling my way around the venue, but it wasn’t to be – that Windjammer wasn’t going to pour itself, after all, so someone would need to (wo)man the bar!

Before kickoff - Metalman Brewing bar

The Metalman team brace for impact - before the crowds descend at 5pm.

Thankfully we had enough helpers on the Metalman bar to allow each of us time to peruse the offerings over the course of the evening. Lesson learned #1 : Always make sure you don’t need to drive anywhere after a beer festival, as it can seriously hinder your enjoyment of the event, regardless of which side of the bar you are on.

The Metalman Brewing Bar at Lughnasa Beerfest 2011

Our (very) recently constructed bar - a bit rickety once the kegs started emptying, but we made it through. Reinforcing needed though!

Which brings me neatly on to our brand “new” bar -  over the past few weeks, we have enlisted the help of some friends to build a contraption that we can use as our festival bar going forward. (For previous festivals, we had either borrowed, or partnered with, other people’s bars, but it’s time to strike out on our own and fly the nest at this stage, I suppose.) Our requirements were that it would be quick and easy to assemble and disassemble, so that one person could manage it on their own, reasonably lightweight for the same reason, but sturdy enough to not fall over if people lean on it while enjoying a beer. We aced the quick’n'easy and lightweight requirements, but sturdiness was somewhat lacking. We worked around this initially by using the weight of our kegs to add a bit of stability, which was perfect – until we started pouring beer, and the kegs started emptying. Who could have foreseen this though? Needless to say, it was adequate on the night, and we learned a few more things about our festival bar requirements – but I do see some more welding in our future! Lesson learned #2 : Lightweight is good, but not falling over is better.

Gráinne and Tim from Metalman before the doors opened to the public at Lughnasa 2011

Finally finished mopping up all that water! Taking a deep breath before the doors open to the public - here we go!

While the bar itself took mere minutes to assemble, the fitting of all the dispense mechanisms by contrast was slow and painful – now here was a real learning curve for us. Through some pretty poor planning on my part, we ended up collecting the final components required on the morning of the festival, meaning we would need to build everything from scratch when we got to the Pod. With a deadline of 5:30pm when the doors open, this meant a very well planned strike was necessary to get everything done in time by an amateur such as myself. Unfortunately nothing went to plan, and it was like a car-crash edition of the Crystal Maze. Who could have foreseen that fittings I had put together lots of times before would simply defeat me on the day? I will know in future to bring a mop with me to such events – at least if I have one, I might not need one, which was *definitely* not the case on Friday as I almost flooded the ShaSaaz room with my cooler and line cleaning bottle. Not as much fun as it sounds, honestly.

But 5:30pm came round and we were ready to serve beer – not in exactly the way we had planned to (perhaps we had been over-ambitious with thoughts of split beer lines and water-cooled pythons for a 5-hour event?) but it poured, and it was good.  Lesson learned #3 – practice makes perfect, but it’s better not to practice under a live deadline.  Annoyingly, we took everything home and re-constructed it in the same way on Sunday afternoon, and it all fitted together perfectly first time, no leaks and no mopping needed. Go figure, grumble grumble.

Overall a fun event, although the manic take-down of all stands at 10:30pm meant it was a somewhat disjointed evening for the exhibitors, particularly those with draft bars. Nonetheless we really enjoyed it, and will be hoping to attend again next year – preferably with bottles instead of taps though!

We took a few pics on the night, they can be seen here.

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Bloomin’ gorgeous!

Posted on June 15, 2011 | Comments Off

The June bank holiday weekend saw us at the Bloom festival in the Phoenix park for 5 days of fun, food and fab beer! (Oh, and I think there were might have been some gardens too.)

The Bloom Inn - Bloom 2011 - featuring Metalman BrewingThe festivities kicked off on a sunny Thursday morning, and the site filled up pretty quickly – by lunchtime, the food village was teeming with hungry punters, many of whom were looking for an Irish craft beer to wash down their lunch with on such a lovely summer’s day. Enter the tenants of the Bloom Inn – eight craft breweries and two whiskey producers with a tempting range of beverages to slake anyone’s thirst.

Metalman Brewing at Bloom 2011After running two beer festivals (Easterfest and Brewers on the Bay) in short succession a few weeks back, I hadn’t given much thought to how different Bloom was going to be – only that the days would be wrapping up at 6pm instead of 1am (a welcome change!), and that there would be attractions for people to look at while they sipped a tasty malted beverage. Different it was though – for the most part, these festival-goers were here for purposes *other* than beer (well ok, maybe *some* of them came exclusively for beer), and our presence on site was a novelty, something new and different to be (warily) investigated. One of the most common phrases from the other side of the bar was “I’ve never heard of any of these before”, typically accompanied by a look of confusion, and a slight twinge of panic.

Metalman Brewing pouring Windjammer beer at Bloom 2011Nonetheless, many of our intrepid festival-goers took the plunge, and tried the beers that were on offer to them, despite there being absolutely no T.V. advertising by the brewer to reassure them that they were making the right choice. And many of them were delighted with their adventure – cups were handed back to be refilled, different beers were sampled to investigate what other delights were on offer there, and lots of questions were asked as to where these beers might be available outside of the Bloom Inn. Music to our brewing ears!

All in all, it was a cracking weekend – the weather was mostly beautiful (just a little bit of winter peeking through on Sunday), the food was amazing, the gardens were incredible, and people were relaxed, laid back, and happy. One could almost forget the recession for a few days, and just enjoy the spectacle of ~90,000 people have a good time! Not even a minor collapse of the Bloom Inn could dampen people’s spirits – “is this a lock-in?” one punter quipped, while the Bord Bia folk frantically worked at getting the generator back to work. (Hats off to Bord Bia and all the organisers btw, they did a great job.) By the end of Monday, we were absolutely exhausted, but it was 100% worth it and we’ll definitely be back next year.

Some photos from the weekend can be seen here.

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Beer tasting at Revolution

Posted on May 30, 2011 | 1 Comment

The first beer-tasting session at Revolution happened on Friday May 27th, and while the turnout was smaller than expected, we nonetheless had an interesting time tasting some different beers. (Regrettably, I forgot my camera, so no pics, sorry!)

We followed a blind-tasting format of 5 beers – each participant was given a scorecard for each beer to rate it based on appearance, aroma, flavour, finish and overall appreciation. The beers were poured and presented to each participant, and we got stuck in – certainly some interesting results, and I won’t go into the details of what people thought of each brew (that is up to each individual to blog about if they wish), but I think it’s safe to say that there were surprises in store for all involved.

Once we had sampled all 5 beers, each participant was given a sheet with details of the beers we had just tasted, along with tasting notes from the brewers, and a couple of reviews from one of the popular beer-rating websites. Then came the task of matching those beers to the evening’s scorecards, which certainly raised some eyebrows among our intrepid tasters!

Personally, I love blind-tasting beers – it removes any preconceptions (positive or negative, subconscious or not) I have regarding what I already know about the beer or the brewery. It seems easier for me to analyse the beer if I know nothing about it beforehand, I tend to be more clinical in my assessment of the beer, and inevitably discover something that I didn’t notice about a beer before. So it was with some envy that I sat amongst my tasting compatriots who were blissfully unaware of the name on the bottle of each beer before raising it for a sniff and a sip – maybe next time I will need to make @metalman_tim do the organising!

For those of you interested, the beers we tasted, in order, were :

  1. Shepherd Neame’s Whitstable Bay
  2. Carlow Brewing Company’s Curim
  3. Metalman Pale Ale
  4. Sam Adam’s Boston Lager
  5. Shepherd Neame’s Bishop’s Finger

Picking out five beers from the bar’s menu that were adequately diverse, yet had enough elements in common to make the final matching of beername to beer a bit of a challenge, is fun, but it’s also trickier than it sounds :-)

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Posted in beer, Events, General, Metalman Brewing, pale ale, waterford

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Ask a simple question…

Posted on May 17, 2011 | Comments Off

This week, we will brew our second (and last) batch of Windjammer for 2011, which should be enough to see us through the Tall Ships festival in Waterford (the inspiration for the beer) and some of the upcoming festivals in the summer. We’ve been really pleased with the reception to Windjammer – especially since it was a bit of a gamble, what with us being new kids on the block and all, concocting this seasonal brew with a combination of exotic hops which we hadn’t used before. But it appears to be paying off, and the feedback we’re getting is that people love it – so much so that we are definitely planning to bring it back again next year as our spring/summer seasonal.

That said, a big challenge we’re facing is getting it out on our native turf – Waterford is only just getting used to the idea of our Pale Ale, and convincing bars to let us put *one* tap can be a formidable enough job, let alone two. While we have some excellent publicans onboard already who are keen to try something different, and support a local business, there are plenty who don’t feel there is any need to change what they are currently stocking. “There’s no demand for your beer in our pub”, we have been told by more than one establishment. And yet, we know for a fact, that people who like to drink our beer go to the pubs in question. It’s a curious thing – is it that we as a drinking populace have gotten too conditioned to just asking for what we know to be available in a given pub, rather than asking for what we really want to drink? Do we not want to rock the boat, or cause trouble, by asking for a beer that they might not have? We wouldn’t think twice about it in a shop – if we can’t see what we’re looking for, we ask someone who works there if they stock it. And if they don’t, we either select a suitable alternative if there is one, or we leave and try somewhere else. And the latter option can send a very powerful message – it’s very possible that the next time you are looking for the same product in that shop, they will have started stocking it. (Depending on the nature of the shop of course – this is assuming that you haven’t gone looking for an iPod in the butcher’s, or lingerie in the Spar. Although you never know.)

So could it be that simple?

Could getting a better selection of beer in your local be as easy as asking for it? Well, yes. It will be in vain at first, but keep asking, and the message will ultimately sink in, especially if a publican sees people leaving their bar to go somewhere else for a product that he/she could easily be stocking as well. Be bold, be adventurous, and risk the wrath of (or probably just a dirty look from) your local landlord! If you order it, it will come!

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Posted in beer, brew, brewery, General, Metalman Brewing, waterford

A weekend in Salthill

Posted on May 3, 2011 | 1 Comment

Brewers on the Bay returned to The Oslo in Salthill for the second installation of their celebration of Irish craft beer. Having missed out on attending last May, I was really excited to trundle up to Galway to experience it first hand this year, rather than hearing all about how great it was through @metalman_tim. So we set off in the Metalman mobile with beer, a borrowed bar, and a miscellany of barware – some of which we even knew what to do with!
Set-up on Saturday morning was manic, as we continue to learn the things about keg dispense that never cross your path as an I.T. monkey or a mere beer drinker (who knew there was more to this stuff than flipping the tap open?) and with a cool 20 minutes to spare, we were ready to serve at 3pm on the nose. Plenty of time to fuel up on chicken and chips from The Oslo before the masses descended.

Lots of studying of menus going on

There were 11 bars in all, with 12 breweries represented, including Breweyed from Banagher in Co. Offaly, making their festival debut with a pale ale and lager. The kick off of the festivities coincided with the Leinster rugby game, which was shown on the big screen in the beer hall, and attracted a mixed crowd who were not necessarily there to sample the delights of Irish craft beer on offer. Many pints of cider and macro lager pervaded the room, some of them were even left on *my* bar, harumph! The staff at the Oslo were stellar though, and quickly swept all this detritus away out of sight :-)

Before long, those not interested in plunging into the waters of non-macro beer filtered away, and many eager faces appeared, brandishing their menus and looking for something to galvanise their tastebuds into action – and we didn’t disappoint. Our Windjammer on keg proved a great hit, and sold almost as much as our Pale Ale, to the point where we are wondering if “seasonal beer” is going to be appropriate for this beauty after all – maybe we need to think about making it available for more than a couple of months in a year?

Sunday saw more of the same – a soccer match in the afternoon on the big screen drew its own crowd, but by Sunday evening it was Irish craft beer all the way in the beer hall of The Oslo. We managed to get a few photos of the proceedings, take a look at the slideshow here. For only its second year running, this was a great festival, and will surely only go from strength to strength based on what we saw this weekend. I’m already looking forward to next year, and have decided what my aims will be – at least three beers available, a much faster set-up, and no falling down the stairs when packing up to leave!

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See you on the other side

Posted on April 26, 2011 | Comments Off

The Metalman Bar at Franciscan Well Easterfest

This weekend, just like many other Easter weekends over the last 10 years, we were at the Franciscan Well Easter Beer Festival. However, things were a little different this year – we were on the other side of the bar, serving up the beers to customers, rather than greedily working our way through the menu ourselves. (Not that there wasn’t some of that as well, of course.) The weekend was delightful, and there are some photos posted here.

And it’s fair to say that the view is certainly different from the other side. It’s incredibly rewarding to watch someone take a sip of your beer, and see their eyes widen and their face light up. Even more delightful is when they come back for more, and bring their friends with them. And I still get a bit giddy when someone likes what we’re doing so much that they not only want to drink the beer, buy they are also prepared to separate themselves from some cash to buy a t-shirt – I mean, how cool is that?

But let’s not get carried away. There are also people who take a sip of your beer, and make a face as if you’ve just tried to poison them. Some of them try to be a bit more polite, but you can tell by the little wrinkle of their nose and shake of their head that it’s just not for them. And that’s ok, because it would be pretty boring if everyone liked the same beers anyway – that’s what we’re trying to get away from, right? Nonetheless, it doesn’t mean that you don’t feel a twinge of disappointment when someone passes over your beer in favour of another that is a little lighter, or darker, or fizzier, or foreign, or spends more on TV advertising.

But it seems to me that this is going to be one of the great things about working beer festivals – that connection with the people who do, and do not, drink your beer, because you can’t get access to that by wholesaling to pubs. Rocking up to a festival gives you instant access to customer feedback, and first-hand experience of those facial expressions – will this one be a wrinkled nose, or widened eyes? Looking forward to doing it all again this weekend in Galway – roll on Brewers on the Bay this weekend!

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