Innis & Gunn buys Inveralmond Brewery in Perth: Craft brewer Innis & Gunn has bought the Inveralmond Brewery in Perth. The company plans substantial investment in the brewery to create a state-of-the art brewing centre for Innis & Gunn and Inveralmond beers. This will also extend the capacity available to grow both the Inveralmond and Innis & Gunn family of beers. This investment marks a period of growth and evolution for both businesses. The purchase has been entirely funded by £3.1m of capital raised through the Innis & Gunn “beer-bond” crowdfunding programme, whereby craft beer “fanvestors” invested in the business last year. Those “beer-bond” holders will now see Innis & Gunn’s ambitious expansion plans accelerated by the brewer choosing to invest in developing an existing brewery, rather than building a facility from scratch. The Inveralmond brewing team will remain unaffected by the acquisition. The new brewery will be fully equipped with a new oak barrel maturation warehouse as well as Innis & Gunn’s unique proprietary infusion equipment, which in the past has been used to infuse beers with aromas and flavours from oak, bergamot, coffee beans and other artisanal ingredients. The company is also planning to install new “Hop Gunns” to maximise hop aroma in certain beers through an amplified dry-hopping technique, and is assessing the feasibility of installing a small bottling line in 2017. Additional beer tanks will be added to the brewery to facilitate the expanded production volumes, but also to supply the brewers’ growing number of Beer Kitchen retail outlets, already open in Edinburgh and Dundee and soon to arrive in Glasgow, with unpasteurised Innis & Gunn lager. Since its foundation in 2003, Innis & Gunn has become one of the UK’s most successful international craft beer businesses, with an annual turnover of £12m in 2014 – up from £10.5m in 2013. In 2014, Innis & Gunn sold over 20 million bottles of beer, making it the second biggest supplier of craft beer to the UK off-trade. From its headquarters in Edinburgh and the new brewery in Perth, to be called The Innis & Gunn Inveralmond Brewery, the company will continue to expand its scale in the UK and abroad, where the business already successfully exports to over 20 countries. Dougal Gunn Sharp, founder and master brewer at Innis & Gunn, said: “The acquisition of Inveralmond gives us the dedicated brewing facility that we need to meet the growing demand for our beers. It gives us a home where we can innovate and experiment with some of the new brewing processes we’ve been dreaming up. This is more than an Innis & Gunn brewery; we’re building a totem for innovation and a launch pad for our continued expansion at home and abroad. We’ve been friends with Inveralmond for years and I have huge respect for the beers that they make. Ossian, their lead beer, is available on draft at all of our Beer Kitchen bar-restaurants and sells brilliantly because of its amazing flavour, clarity and consistency. As we searched for a site for our new brewery, it became clear there was an opportunity to combine the strengths of both businesses and for us to acquire their brewery and brands. Taking over an already fantastic brewery gives us a rolling start in the development of our new state-of-the-art equipment and processes, meaning we can grow much faster than if we started from scratch. It means we’ve avoided a lot of the red tape and planning issues around building a site from the ground up and we can concentrate on what we do best – brewing beer.” Fergus Clark, founder and managing director of Inveralmond, said: “To me this feels like a real win-win. Our Inveralmond beers will gain access to a sales and distribution infrastructure that will massively accelerate the growth of our beers both at home and Internationally, while at the same time Innis & Gunn gets the brewery they want 18 months earlier than if they had to build it themselves. We are really looking forward to starting to brew Innis & Gunn beers on site and seeing where this exciting stage of our combined development will lead.”

RBS provides £15m facility for Roll-out: RBS has provided a £15m revolving credit facility to Roll-out Restaurants, the restaurant off-shoot of Soho House. This funding will support Pizza East, Dirty Burger and in particular Chicken Shop, which serves rotisserie chickens that are marinated overnight, steamed and then spit-roasted over charcoal. Phil Brown, UK corporate coverage, leisure and travel at RBS, said: “We are keen to support innovative operators in this exciting market and are delighted to announce this support for Roll-out Restaurants to fund their next phase of expansion.” Kate Helliwell, finance director at Roll-out Restaurants at Soho House & Co, said: “We are hoping to add ten to 15 new sites a year to our portfolio so approached several banks to secure the finance we need for this expansion. We chose RBS because they clearly understood what we were trying to achieve and offered the most flexible commercial solution. Phil and his team’s knowledge of this sector is incredible.” Brown added: “New concepts are being created on an almost weekly basis in the UK, this makes for a more vibrant and dynamic casual dining sector. Successful groups like Roll-out Restaurants are offering customers a unique experience and transforming the way Britons eat out.”