Whitewater Brewing triples production for export campaign

Whitewater Brewing Company, Northern Ireland's largest micro brewery, has completed a major investment programme to more than triple brewing capacity and meet growing demand, particularly from the US, for its artisan ales, beers, lagers and traditional Irish stout.

The brewery, based at Kilkeel, County Down, in the foothills of the Mourne Mountains, is now brewing over 6,000 litres a day of ales, beers and lagers for both keg and bottle lines and including the recently launched 3.7 ABV Copperhead product.

In addition, the company has also strengthened its operations by quadrupling storage capacity and through a substantial upgrading of its cooling system. New storage tanks enable the company to hold up to 50,000 litres.

Bernard Sloan, Whitewater Brewing's managing director, says: "This very substantial investment has been made to enable us to expand our sales in key markets such as Great Britain, the Republic of Ireland, Scandinavia, other parts of Europe and especially the US.

"Over the past two years, we've had many inquiries from the trade and retailers wishing to stock our award winning ales and beers. Success in major competitions such as the International Beer Awards and the UK Great Taste Awards have helped to raise the market profile of many of our products especially Copperhead, a new and much lighter beer that we launched last year.

"Copperhead, for instance, gained a silver medal in this year's International Beer Challenge in London and our Belfast Ale and Clotworthy Dobbin have been successful in the Great Taste Awards.

"While we have supplied some customers in Italy and France, including several Irish themed bars, we decided to hold back on exports until the completion of our expansion programme. We are now positioned to harness the opportunities that have been identified to establish Whitewater ales and beers by launching a marketing campaign in Europe and the US."

Established in 1996 Whitewater brews quality handcrafted beers made from the finest ingredients, with no additives. Whitewater Brewing currently produces an extensive range of cask beers, a lager in keg and bottled products including nine ales, two beers, two lagers and a traditional Irish stout.