Skip to main content
27th March 2024

Northern Monk To Increase Brewing Capacity By 20% With Half-A-Million Pound Investment

Northern Monk Brew Co. are set to increase their brewing capacity by a fifth following a £500,000 investment in new equipment and the main brewery site.

The 20% increase in capacity will be the equivalent to an additional 8,000 hectolitres (HL), or 1.4 million pints, of beer per year.

Last year, Northern Monk, who are based in Leeds, brewed around 7 million pints from their two brewing sites, Sydenham Road in Holbeck, and their original home, The Old Flax Store, just south of Leeds city centre.

Russell Bisset, who Co-founded Northern Monk alongside Head Brewer Brian Dickson, said: “After ten years of brewing, we’re entering a really exciting new era for Northern Monk. The increase in capacity represents a really positive period for us as we continue to attract new customers enjoying our beers, like Faith, in their local, to picking up a few cans from the supermarkets, to our innovative special releases in independent bottle shops, which are enjoyed by beer lovers who have followed our journey since the start.

“Due to this growth, we were pushing the limit of what our current site could handle and so this felt like the right time to make a significant investment in our facilities.

“It’s been a challenging few years for the industry as a whole with Covid, rising bills, political uncertainty and supply challenges acutely felt by the sector. We’re deeply grateful to our consumers and customers for their continued support which has allowed us to continue to grow as a company.”

In the last twelve months, half of the ten best performing new craft beers in supermarkets were brewed by Northern Monk, who recently celebrated their 10th anniversary.

Ends

About Northern Monk 

Northern Monk is an independent brewery focused on creating the best beer experiences in the world. From two people in a parent’s cellar in 2013, to more than a hundred employees, Northern Monk is one of the North’s fastest growing drinks companies.  

Northern Monk started life in a parent’s cellar with a £5,000 gift from a grandparent. Inspired by these origins and an ambition to give back wherever they can, they launched the For the North Foundation in September 2019, now renamed “Faith in Futures Foundation”. The Foundation will see £5,000 grants offered to businesses, charities and projects which aim to provide a genuine benefit to the communities they serve, or reduce environmental impact.  

Northern Monk Patrons Projects is an initiative set up to foster collaboration, creativity, and community, whose objective is to collaborate with artists, athletes, and creatives across the North, by dedicating each Patrons Project to one Patron. Through the cross-pollination of ideas, Northern Monk treat each Patrons Project as a curated, immersive experience, with everything from the recipe and ingredients used, to the can design, carefully chosen to reflect each individual Patron. Each Patrons Project contains 7 beers and sometimes non-beer items such as glassware or merchandise. 

In March 2021, Northern Monk were ranked number 1 in the Ward Hadaway Yorkshire Fastest 50 list, achieving the titles of ‘fastest overall growing business’ and ‘fastest growing small business’. In May 2021 they were ranked 60th in The Sunday Times Best Small Companies to Work For 2021 list. 

Creativity, community and collaboration are at the core of Northern Monk’s business, they focus on working with the people that share their passion, and their values. They regularly collaborate with national and international breweries, businesses and causes to help strengthen the North for positive change.  


Contact: Tim Ward, tim@northernmonk.com

Third-party news items that are posted on the Guild website’s news section come from press releases received by the Guild. These press releases are posted as they have been received and their publication on the Guild website is intended as an informational service provided to our members and website visitors. As such, the publication of a story from a third-party source is neither an endorsement of the content, nor its sender, by the Guild. For enquiries on any news item, please use the contact details that can be found at the bottom of each post.