Wishbone Brewery – Keighley, Yorkshire, UK

Looking back at the sales patterns for Session IPAs across 2025 it shows that quite a few pubs are reluctant to spend the money on a 3.8% beer versus a 4.5% beer, the amount of hops we need to use to make a damn good 3.8% Session IPA are broadly the same as for a 4.5% beer but Landlords are more willing to pay the money for the stronger ABV when the cost of hops puts the price up. I guess this feels more Bang-for-Buck to drinkers. The results of these patterns of buying are that we have thrown more beer away in 2025 than we have across nearly all of the last 10 years.

We will be tweaking some brews and creating new ones but basing our Sesh IPA’s around the 4.5% ABV mark to see if we can improve the speed of sales.

Beer Quality is of the upmost importance and we want pubs and drinkers to have the best possible experiences.

Cheers

Expect to see a 4.5% version of Social Banter in the near-ish future, all the same hops but more malt.

We are getting back into the groove this week with 3 brews, Tiller Pin brewing tomorrow then we’re onto a Gluten Free stock build with Decade 4% and Pixie Juice 5%.

The Gluten Free beers will be available sometime in the last week of January once the lab test results are with us.

Answers on a postcard!

It was Tiller Pin 4.2% of course.

We started a small brew off with fresh yeast, next week we’ll crop the yeast and brew 2-3 times.

Don’t forget it’s out brewery bar day on Saturday 31st January 12 til 7pm.

Cheers

Firstly, thanks a billion to all our lovely Trade Customers and Drinkers who have kindly supported us in 2025, your goodwill is what keeps us going.

Merry Christmas and wishing you all a prosperous New Year from us here at Wishbone, Adrian, Emma, Paul & Rob.

2025 certainly hasn’t been easy and the outlook for 2026 doesn’t feel particularly rosey with increases in Business rates, though that said we have some better looking Malt prices which will help a little to balance things out.
A few breif stats for those that want to know:

• Total Sales 2025 were about £10’000 down on 2024
• Total Volume produced 2025 was 104071 Litres down from 113954 litres in 2024
• Number of Brews in 2025 were 97 down from 102 in 2024
• Malt used in 2025 was 20122 kg down from 22600 kg in 2024
• Hops used in 2025 was 550 kg down from 649 kg in 2024
• Money in personal bank account, LOL, Savings, LOL!
• We brewed approx 20 New beers in 2025, stopped monitoring and tidying Untappd for my own personal sanity
• We raised money for Ukraine and supported Charities where we could with either cheaper beer or donated beer in 2025
• About 6 more Bounceback Loan Payments to make, being £843.95 better off each month after that will be a bit of a relief

If you take anything from this it is that people don’t have enough money and living costs too much.
Though the other thing to note is that the Beer Duty changes a couple of years back gave the bigger brewers a wage rise so we feel this is now leveraged against smaller brewers as we no longer have any chance of competing on a level playingfeild on price, I mean, we could never compete before those changes but now in a cost of living crisis it made it even worse and the beer range on.

On the plus side there are loads of bars out there that could choose to buy direct versus via wholesaler or big brewer and support smaller and local breweries with a cask or two once or twice a month and it would really help out the small guys. One or Two casks or kegs a month isn’t much to ask and it would bring loads of variety and taste to what can sometimes look all too same-same, especially in Cities.

We see some of our brewery friends have taken on or opened Pubs or Taprooms, this, even more so sounds like the direction of travel we must go. We are trying, the latest updates are on our instagram https://www.instagram.com/wishbonetap/ we are at least ripping more old structure out of the building and clearing out the rubble etc, hopefully we’ll get a drain connection made for a downstairs toilet and clear the rubble out of the cellar in January, I’m still contacting the Trades for quotes in the hope of someone not ghosting me or backing out! We need a new staircase putting in and the old one taking out and the old location in the floor making good then an area at the front needs boxing in and insulating as its always been very open to the elements around the roller shutter door. then after that the current plan is to try do some of the internal construction ourselves as and when time and money allows.

Its been a while, but Palomino Pizza are now back on the road with the Horse Box along with their base up at Tarn House Holiday Park, Skipton. I’ll update here when we have a menu from them.

We will have the usual 6x Handpulled and 4x Keg beers on the bar and we’re open 12 til 7pm.

All the usual stuff applies, we have sloped and level access but our toilet facilities may not be suitable for those less able. We are family and dog friendly, please be sure to keep both under control, ask us if those dogs need water and we’ll bring you a bowl over. We stock some lovely wines from Martinez Wines, Coke, Lemonade and some juice boxes. Cheers

We are open from 12.00 to 8pm tomorrow for our Christmas bar, entertainment from Haworth Ukulele Group mid afternoon and food from Kangs Punjabi Box.

We’ve quite a beer selection plus softdrinks and Wine from Martinez Wines.

Hope to see you all here for some Festive ‘Cheers’

This week we are doing a bit of brewery TLC, we’ve given the Hot Liquor Tank (HLT) and Copper / transfer pipework and Heat Exchanger an Acid clean, its something we do about every 6 month to remove scale from the HLT heating elements and keep the tanks in tip top condition. Its also time to replace our 5 micron water filter and the Carbon filter that feed our Cold Liquor Tank.

Beers coming out of tank this week are Blonde 3.6% and Tiller Pin 4.2%, both available to order now.

We will have 8-Pint Pouches available to take-away on Saturday 20th Dec between 12 and 8pm while stocks last, at the time of writing this we have the following avasilable:

Black bauble Stout 4.5%
Guji Session IPA 4%
Knock Back Bitter 4%
Orange Cats IPA 5%
Tiller Pin Session Pale 4.2%

And we hope to see you all on Saturday for our Christmas Bar Day

After this week our last 2 delivery days before Christmas are Monday 22nd (Yorkshire) & Tuesday 23rd (Lancashire), if you are very local to Keighley or we have contected you directly we could deliver Sunday 28th or Monday 29th for beer emmergencies email info@wishbonebrewery.co.uk but in general we want our holiday downtime and a blooming big rest!

Cheers

Going into cask today is Everyday Carry 3.9% a session pale ale with Mosaic, Cascade and Hallertau Blanc, it’s tasting might fine too.

We’ll be putting Tiller Pin 4.2% into cask at the end of the week and also brewing it along with Blonde 3.6% on Weds-Thurs, these are our last brews of 2025.

Don’t forget it’s our Christmas Bar Day on Saturday 20th with extra beers and food from Kangs Punjabi Box.

Get in touch if you need beer this or next week, then our last two delivery days will be 22nd & 23rd.

Brewed yesterday was more Tiller Pin, you can never have enough can you! We’ll brew it again next week too!

And today we are brewing Everyday Carry Session Pale 3.9% which uses Mosaic, Cascade and Hallertau Blanc hops. This will be going into cask on Monday or Tuesday and ‘should’ be available to order from then 😉

Order in all the usual ways, cheers

8 Pint Pouches are now available, the following beers will be available and here are the ratial prices.

• Tiller Pin Session Pale 4.2% – £29
• Guji Session IPA 4% – £31
• Knock Back Bitter 4% – £29
• Black Bauble Stout 4.5% – £31
• Orange Cats IPA 5% – £33 (Available from Monday 8th)

If you fancy some beer for Christmas email info@wishbonebrewery.co.uk or shoot us a Whatsapp or TXT MSG – Trade Customers can contact us in the usual ways for Trade Prices.

Collections from us are Monday to Thursday 8.30 to 4.30, Friday 8.30 to 3.30 or at our Christmas Bar Day on Saturday 20th 12.00 to 8.00