Purity drinks to northern expansion plan
Warwickshire-based microbrewery Purity Brewing is expanding. The company, which supplies to chains such as Mitchells & Butlers, has received planning permission for a new 5,000 sq ft brew house. Managing director Paul Halsey told Insider the development was the beginning of a growth process, and the company would soon be expanding into Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield and York.
Halsey said the company needed to move into bigger premises because there was “more demand than we could brew for”. The new brew house is set to almost triple Purity’s current brewing capacity to 5.9 million pints per year.
The expansion will make further use of empty barns at the farm in Great Alne, Warwickshire, where the company is located.
Halsey said: “The ambition is to be the biggest brewer for Midlands pubs, hotels and restaurants. We’ve had a very successful year in that net profit has grown by 50 per cent, and we’re now supplying to more than 500 outlets. We just need to keep building on it.”
He said one way the company would grow would be to expand out of the Midlands and the South East, where the brewery currently supplies, and expand into the North of England.
“We’re looking at moving into Manchester, Sheffield, York and Leeds – we’d like to have a depot up there. We’re also doing well in the South East, and want to expand out presence further.”
Halsey added the company had earmarked next September for the northern expansion.
He also said that the company had not been affected by the current troubles in the pub trade. Last week, Enterprise Inns sold off nine of its properties, while Mitchells & Butlers announced that its properties would be subject to a major cull over the next few years, through which 333 pubs would be axed.
“The pubs and taverns that Mitchells & Butlers are selling are the low-end premises; we deal with the top end of the market. There is a real demand there, as we’re different from traditional brewers. Hotels and top end pubs are still very interested in our products.”
The company said the first brew from the new premises should be ready in the summer of 2011.
