UK: Brewing up success in just nine months

In just nine months Lee Mitchell and Francis Phillips, the two men behind the Hammerpot Brewery, have gone from testing their first brew to creating an award-winning bitter, the Littlehampton Today posted May 25.

Old friends set up their micro-brewery just outside Arundel in August last year, only six months after they first dreamed up the idea.

On May 12, the Society of Independent Brewers awarded Hammerpot's Woodcote bitter with a bronze award in the premium bitter category at its Southern Regional competition in Ealing.

Each week Lee and Francis produce around 1400 pints of beer from their premises on the Vinery industrial estate in Poling.

The brewery now supplies its five different beers and ales to more than 50 pubs in Sussex, Surrey, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight as well as through three wholesalers.

Having met at the University of Sussex 15 years ago, the pair hatched the brewery plan while driving down to a scuba diving holiday in Weymouth in February last year and returned to pitch it to their respective wives.

Six months later they brewed their first batch of Meteor ale and since then the business has gone from strength to strength.

Lee, who lives in Rustington, has a background in cosmetics manufacturing and has worked for COSi, The Body Shop and Estée Lauder in the development and manufacture of new products - perfect training for a master-brewer in the making.

Francis, who lives near Caterham, has worked in computing in the NHS and has an MBA, an advanced university degree in business studies.

The brewery's first beers, Meteor and Red Hunter, were named after aircraft that flew from Tangmere and set air speed records over the seafront at Littlehampton and Rustington
The latest additions to their stable, Woodcote and Madgwick Gold, have been named after corners at Goodwood motor circuit.

"We focus on quality," said Lee. "We are never going to compete with the big breweries so we try to find some variety and keep producing good beers that people enjoy."

Last week the bottling equipment arrived at the brewery and plans are afoot to sell them in shops locally and further afield.

"The bottles will only be available online and through our wholesaler in Manchester at first," said Francis. "We supply pubs as far away as Portsmouth in the west, Newhaven in the east and Dorking in the north."

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