Welcome to Northern Brewing, a five- barrel micro-brewery producing traditional craft beers at Blakemere Brewery, nr Northwich, Cheshire. We badge our beers either Northern (for our soul beers) or Blakemere (other ranges & specials)

Many of our beers have won awards:

"Hit & Run" (4.5%) Blond beer with raspberry. 2009 Siba North Bronze Award - Speciality Beers. 2008 Macclesfied Beer Festival - Winner, Fruit Beers & 2nd Overall.

"Deep Dark Secret" (5.2%) Liquorice porter. 2008/9 Champion beer of Cheshire.

"All-niter" (3.8%)Refreshing session bitter. 3rd at Norwich Beer Festival (2005)

"Soul Rider" (4.0%) Pale, dry, some citrus. Middlewich Beer of the Festival (2005)

"Dancer" (4.2%) Gold & Hoppy. Northwich beer of the Festival (2004)

HISTORY

Having established Northern Brewing in August 2003, its founder Col (thats Colin not Colonel) Stubbs spent the next few months acquiring the brew plant and associated equipment, premises and a delivery vehicle. All duly found, the brew plant was installed in an industrial unit in Runcorn, Cheshire, which was to be Northern’s home for the next two years. The first ever brew, a Northern “45”, appeared in late-December 2003. Col had spent much of 2003 acquiring knowledge in both the technical and commercial aspects of the micro-brewing business at the now defunct Beecham's Brewery, which was then part of St. Helens College.

Early in 2004, Col was joined by Mike Hill who was keen to join the fledgling enterprise, and the following year it became apparent that the unit at Runcorn was too small to supply the fast-growing demand for our beers and a move to larger premises was badly needed. The guys took the opportunity to save on commuting time, cost and hassle, and that November  moved the whole kit and caboodle to Blakemere Craft Centre, Sandiway, Northwich… twice the space and a full ten minutes drive from their homes… bliss!

The sales side of the business is now essentially out-sourced to  “Beer Monster Cask Beer Sales”, operated by Dean McDonald (aka Deano) … and a grand job he does too, visit…www.beer-monster.com for current availability, special deals, forthcoming brews & guests, and if you sign up for "ALemail", our weekly flyer, all that info will go straight to your inbox!

Over the years, various additions to the plant and equipment have been made – namely, extra casks, fermenters and conditioning tanks. A purpose-built cold store, which houses the conditioning tanks, is now an integral feature of the Blakemere Brewery, as is a small bar area to accommodate brewery tours.
Small-scale in-house bottling of the beers began in the Spring of ’07, with "Deep Dark Secret" and "Vale Royal Heritage Ale" now permanently available in bottles and all the beers available in 5-litre “mini-casks”, with a built-in vent and tap, these are brilliant for parties, BBQs etc and also ideal for promotional purposes.      In addition to our core range, we produce monthly and seasonal specials, with "event" beers to mark special occasions, such as the World Cup, St George's Day etc.

We now deliver direct throughout the north-west on a weekly basis, with monthly deliveries to Staffordshire and Fylde and occasionally further afield. We always have a range of other Breweries' beers available, to offer our customers more variety in their cask range, often goodies rarely found on north-west bars.