Three Brothers Brewing Company started in Teesside back in 2016, when Kit Dodd and his brother Chris decided to team up with Kit’s brother-in-law, Chris, to make their beery dreams a reality.
The brewery is the result of drawing on the expertise of each team member to help bring the company to life. Kit has a degree in chemical engineering and worked in traditional commerial brewing for six years before starting Three Brothers. Dave worked as a mechanical engineer for a number of years, and constructs a range of purpose-built machinery to enhance the efficiency of the brewery. And Chris worked in catering for twenty years, so understands the importance of presentation, style, and beer and food pairings.
Playing To Their Strengths
Having a brewery based in Teesside may have been an obstacle to other teams as young as theirs. The area is considered a traditional beer space; however, the team used this to their advantage, establishing their brand as great, sessionable cask beers. Alongside this, they produce a great range of bottles. The bottles have proved popular at Christmas markets, as well as local restaurants and for direct sales.
Looking To The Future
Over the years, the Three Brothers team has been slowly increasing the number of alternative beers they brew. They’ve also upgraded equipment to increase capacity, and to have the ability to make bigger American-style, and more complex continental beers that they love.
The biggest challenge has always been distribution outside of the Teesside area, as they find glass bottles don’t travel particularly well. Equally, lots of styles just don’t work or aren’t wanted in bottle format. So with this in mind, Three Brothers made plans at the start of 2020 to launch a range of cans.
David Dodds, Brewing Manager, says “We were in the process of booking places and starting artwork design when Covid came to the UK. At the time when the pubs were shut we were about 80-85% focused on the pub trade and 15% focused on our events business, running and setting up beer festivals around the North East. This all disappeared in March so like most breweries we adapted and managed a home delivery service though lockdown.”
Three Brothers tried to get booking slots for canning runs, but with demand for home beers at an all-time high, it was difficult to book slots months in advance. As they didn’t have the right vessels to produce the volumes required for mobile or off-site canning, it was time to review things.
Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes
The team decided their only real option was to buy a canning line. Coming from process engineering and manufacturing backgrounds, they wanted a fully automated system, but didn’t have the right set up for a big process line.
The compromise is with a Gosling canning system from Wild Goose. It’s a new system designed specifically for smaller breweries to can beer on-site at the same high quality as a big system.
“We are so excited for this arriving in the next month or two, and already have a number of big beers planned for it after our core range and session lager are packaged. We wanted to launch a crowdfunding campaign as a method to increase awareness of this and give people a chance to get some awesome early bird deals”, says David.
The Crowdfunder rewards range from a core can three pack, and your name on their wall of fame, to limited edition t-shirts, handpull installs at home, and much more in between.
David says, “2019/2020 has been a wild ride for Three Brothers, with new equipment, beer lines, and some big brewery milestones, not least the increase of two new future brewers into the family! As Covid continues to hurt the industry, and the future economic impacts, this machine gives us something to really be excited for as we look to the future.”
If you’d like to add to the Crowdfunder to help Three Brothers Brewing Company fund their new canning line, click here before the campaign closes.
To check out more info from Three Brothers Brewing Company, you can follow the team on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, or buy beers online here.