BEERBLEFISH BEGINNINGS
Beerblefish Brewing Co. was founded in 2015 by James Atherton and Bethany Burrow. James had been an avid home brewer since his student days, but had a break from it due to lack of space until he and Bethany moved into a house with a cellar. He bought an all-grain brew kit and started producing beer in the basement, leading to a surplus of yeast floating about the house that caused mince pies to rise and gingerbread men to look pregnant.
A couple of years later, James became a founder member at the now-defunct UBREW in Bermondsey. He and Bethany brewed there regularly on a 50 litre kit until so many people were telling James that his beers were good enough to sell that he started to think seriously about setting up commercially.
Beerblefish was born on 3 August 2015 – the hardest part was choosing a name, as they didn’t want something tied to a location in case the brewery moved. The story of how they landed on Beerblefish probably isn’t what you expect – ask them about it over a pint!
James and Bethany are very clear that the business shouldn’t exist purely to make profit and, for that reason, in 2017 they decided to structure it as a social enterprise. Hit the button below to find out more about Beerblefish’s social enterprise aims.
THE EDMONTON ERA
Beerblefish moved to Edmonton in April 2016. The brewery was on Edmonton’s most glamorous industrial estate, in a tiny but efficiently stacked unit.
Over the spring and summer of 2016, James, Bethany and an army of friends painted, wired, installed, built and kitted out the brewhouse, culminating in two trips to Suffolk to pick up a second hand 4.5BBL kit made mostly from Grundy tanks that had been converted in the 1970s. It had lain unused in a barn for about five years before Beerblefish acquired it and needed extremely thorough cleaning and quite a lot of fixing up before it could be commissioned.
The first brew in Beerblefish’s own brewhouse took place in October 2016.
NEW ERA IN WALTHAMSTOW
In May 2021, the team got the keys to their new home in Walthamstow. The new place is 3.5 times the size of the Edmonton space and houses the brewery and a new taproom which opened in July 2021.
THE BEERBLEFISH TEAM
Over the years, an enormous number of people have contributed to Beerblefish’s operations, many of whom are friends who’ve pitched in (pun intended) just when we’ve needed it – we couldn’t have done it without them!
We welcomed our first employees in June 2018, including our first military veteran. Glenn, our General Manager, has been with us since then and we recruited our Brewer, Michaela, in August 2020.