2025, 2024 was Sooo last year!

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Hello there I’m ok, how are you? šŸ˜‰

It’s that time of year again where we look at all last year’s costs and try to balance our operating costs to the price of beer. I’ll bullet point things below, all for fairness & transparency:

We will be saving money on the following!

  • Malt – Malted barley, Wheat & Oats etc all came down in price, up-to Ā£101 per Ton better, I immediately started costing up recipes to see where we could save you some money.
  • Hops – We updated all hop costs to current supply contracts or Spot-buy prices, supply and prices seem more stable these last few years so rather than using the worst-possible hop prices because supply could have come from one of four different suppliers. This, with malt means we are even more accurate on beer prices.
  • Diesel – Delivery Costs, we hedged our bets through the last couple of years while fuel prices were quite volatile, we spent a little less than expected on fuel in 2024 and prices look to be more stable now so I’m happy to use real-world spend on Fuel costs.
  • Cleaning Chemicals – We shopped around when we found that the old supplier was vastly ripping us off, found a cheaper price.
  • Insurance – The old Insurance broker was being a bit slack and never giving us fair time to shop around at the renewal dates, swapped to a local broker and saved money on all insurance, brewery, buildings & Van.

That’s the good stuff done! Now for all the cost increases.

  • Water and Trade Effluent – What we’ll be paying is over double going forward.
  • Business Rates – I think the relief stops this year so I expect that to go up.
  • Electricity – This is now about double what we paid a year or so ago.
  • Rent – We now have less space and get charged more money than the rent we fixed on our lease 10 years ago.
  • Wages – The entire wage bill has gone up and National Insurance and Pension costs along with it.

The conclusion.

Overall there isn’t going to be much change to beer prices this year, costs balanced, some things will go up a little, some stay the same and the occasional one will come down, definitely nothing unaffordable. We will be rolling out these price tweaks Friday 11th / Monday 13th.

Thanks very much for supporting us through 2024, I hope we can be one of your breweries of choice through 2025, your orders are very much appreciated. Cheers šŸ™‚