ARRAN Brewery is hoping to raise £10 million for a major expansion by offering shares to members of the public.

The money will be used to invest in a new brewery on the island which will offer a ten-fold increase in capacity.

The ambitious plan also includes a bottling hall on the mainland of Scotland, a first move into export sales and setting up a chain of pubs.

Owner Gerald Michaluk expects to launch the funding plan, similar to the Equity for Punks scheme fellow Scottish independent BrewDog used to raise £2m, in September and have the money in place by February next year.

Mr Michaluk, who runs Marketing Management Services International (MMSI) in Glasgow and also has interests in property and helicopters, said talks with Renfrewshire, North Ayrshire and East Ayrshire councils were getting to an advanced stage over where the bottling hall could be located.

He said: "It is something we have been planning for a while.

"People will be offered different classes of shares and we are looking at investments starting from around £200.

"We could produce more than we are doing just now but because of the way duty works I would pay the same on 5001 hectolitres as I would on 50,000 so it makes sense to be bigger.

"We believe there is a huge potential for the export of our products.

"We have taken the last few years getting things right in the UK. We are now in a good position and this is the next step."

The brewery equipment that Arran has chosen is a CombiCube kit design from German firm Krones.

Mr Michaluk said: "The brewery comes off the back of a truck from Germany, gets installed into a building and is basically just plug and play so should be ready to go quite quickly.

"We already have the brew team recruited and they will be going to over to Germany to learn how to work the equipment before it gets installed."

The expansion into the pub trade will initially focus on the central belt of Scotland.

While Mr Michaluk was reluctant to say how many outlets he hoped to open, he did confirm overseas expansion was being considered.

He said: "It is difficult to attract bank funding for pubs at the moment.

"Ours would mainly sell Arran products along with other guest ales and beers from Scotland.

"We would also look to open up pubs overseas as many Irish themed bars have been successful doing that."

The island brewer is also considering ways to do its first export deals into Europe and the United States.

As part of that strategy MMSI has also just bought Beers of the World magazine from Norwich-based Paragraph Publishing for an undisclosed sum.

The print version of the magazine will relaunch in September with 20,000 copies in the United States and 5000 in the UK.

There will also be online subscription options and apps for smartphones and tablet computers.

Mr Michaluk added: "We looked at the cost of promoting ourselves and thought we could do it as cost effectively by owning the magazine.

"It will be an independent editorial process but allows us the opportunity to purchase advertising at a cheaper rate."

Fred Moody, who joined MMSI in 2005 and has experience in IT and print design, will manage the magazine.

Mr Michaluk bought Arran Brewery, based at Cladach, near Brodick, out of administration for an undisclosed sum in June 2008.

It was originally set up in 2000 by Richard and Elisabeth Roberts.

More than 500,000 bottles of its beer are now produced annually and it has deals with Asda, Tesco, Sainsbury and the Co-op.