Brewery Focus: Cameron Brown - Turning Point Brew Co.

With everything that has been going on recently, many breweries have had to adapt to the changing climate. Over the past 2 months we've seen breweries switch closer and closer towards online formats and running events such as virtual tastings and even online brewery tours. Many of these changes will no doubt have been hard to make, with some challenges along the way. This is why we have decided to do a series from a brewery’s perspective on what has been going on.The first person that we will be chatting to is Cameron Brown, Co-founder of Turning Point Brew Co. We had the pleasure of participating in their New Frontiers virtual tasting session last month, which was EPIC!

How much have things changed since before lockdown?

“We've adapted pretty quickly to the retail thing, which has been good. Everything we do now is in cans and we’ve managed to turn most of our existing stock into mini casks, doing pretty much exclusively retail, plus a little bit of trade to bottle shops. Volume wise, we’re nowhere near where we were before when the pubs were open but I think we’ve found a different place with this which is quite interesting and I’ve enjoyed it! I guess our interaction with customers is now people in their houses drinking beer rather than in pubs. The human contact, although it is still digital, has been really enjoyable especially for some of the online events we've done. One benefit I think has been that people get their beer as fresh as it can be, for instance, I'll put Disco King up for sale this afternoon [Friday], which will be canned on Monday, then will it leave the brewery Monday or Tuesday and people be drinking it on Wednesday, which is really cool!”

What's been your biggest challenge?

“The biggest challenge from a logistical point of view was back in March when that Boris guy was coming on the telly; sometimes we didn't know what he's going to say next. We didn't know whether or not we’d be able to sell our beer or if we’d even be able to do online retail. It was really difficult with our beer potentially going to waste, spending the precious resources that we had in the bank on ingredients, cans, designs and all the rest of it,  not quite knowing if it would ever see the light of day. It was quite difficult to negotiate and what we did was quite risky, we just thought let's carry on as though things are definitely going to be ok and it was, which was good because we didn't run out of beer.”

What have you learnt?

“That the internet is a far more valuable resource than we appreciated. Our website is our entire infrastructure for buying beer, social media is the gateway to everything and that you can definitely have a good time on a Zoom chat and it not feel weird or awkward. I can't thank the internet enough for everything that it has done!”

Can you share any of your future plans for after lockdown?

“Next week is the start of getting the team together at the brewery and working out how we’re going to make use of all the space. We've got a really big yard out the front that we want to turn into a beer garden. It looks like a car park at the moment... although it is a car park but we're just trying to figure out what the approach should be. If we focus our efforts entirely on the taproom and not rely on national trade to pick up, I think that that’s a good way to be because we have more control over our own destiny. So we're gonna spend quite a lot of time and probably too much money on making outside the taproom look nice so we can still have people come and visit with a table service pub experience, where people only come inside to use the toilet.”

What will be the first pub that you hit up after lockdown and what will you be drinking?

“I will be getting on the first train to York and I'm going to go to The Maltings, the best pub in the world. I'm going to drink 15 pints of Rooster’s Yankee, I'll be having chilli chips and then I'm going to have a Lamb's Navy Rum, Macallan Whisky and then I'm going to get kicked out.”Well said Cam, we’ll be with you on that one! :)