A FAMILY craft brewing business in Clackmannanshire is expanding after receiving a seven-figure investment from the UK arm of banking group HSBC.

Williams Bros Brewing Company in Alloa said the funding, which has been invested in new equipment and facilities, means it can now package 16,000 cans an hour – up from just 2,000 before the new machinery was installed.

“It’s all part of a longer transition and gives us a leg up to get to where we want to be,” said Williams Bros managing director Scott Williams. “We want to be way more efficient than we are at the moment and to widen our distribution.”

The company, which employs more than 70 staff, currently sells around seven million litres a year of craft beer in the UK and overseas. Major supermarket clients include Lidl, Aldi, Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Asda, Morrisons and The Co-op. It has about 20 export markets, including France, Sweden, Denmark, Japan, Mexico, Canada, Italy and Spain.

Mr Williams said the business was trying to multipack manually before the new equipment arrived, but “we couldn’t do very many in a day and it was cost prohibitive, so we couldn’t get big listings.”

The funding from HSBC has paid for new automatic end-of-line labelling and multipacking facilities to enable Williams Bros to produce four, six and eight packs of beer.

“A lot of [craft beer] sales are in cans and an awful lot of these sales are in four-packs,” Mr Williams said. “To be able to compete in that market, we needed to have machines that could do that automatically.”

The new equipment means the company can now offer its product at a price point that allows the supermarkets to make a margin and sell to consumers at an everyday price they are happy to pay, he added.

Scott and his brother Bruce were introduced to brewing by their father, Roy, who opened a bakery and homebrew supply shop in Crossford, Dunfermline in 1968 as a weekend side gig to his job as an engineer with the Ministry of Defence.

The business moved to Glasgow in the 1970s and in 1988 brewed its first batch of heather ale – an ancient type of Gaelic beer called leann fraoch that the Williams say has been brewed in Scotland since 2000 BC.

“We were trying to recreate beers that were made centuries ago,” Mr Scott said. “Heather ale goes back 4,000 years, before hops were in the country.”

Locally foraged heather is still used to brew the beer.

“On a sunny day, when the heather is in flower and we have permission to pick, we go out with a squad of guys and put the heather straight into our freezer store,” Mr Williams explained.

Other historic ales brewed using local botanicals include an elderberry ale based on a 16th century monk recipe and a Scots pine ale based on a Highland recipe used until the 19th century. Foraged seaweed and bogmyrtle are also used in the range.

Williams Bros Brewing Company was formed in 2004 after the family acquired a former Maclay’s brewery at Kelliebank in Alloa. Bruce’s son Chris now runs the business with Scott, his uncle.

Mr Williams said the business, which has also developed a range of contemporary craft beers, had doubled turnover to around £12m over the last five years.

HSBC UK said the ability to significantly increase production had allowed Williams Bros to increase overall sales values in the last financial year, despite the slowdown in the hospitality industry while bars and pubs were closed during lockdown.

“The brewery has already demonstrated its ability to rise to a challenge, having increased overall sales throughout 2020 and into 2021,” said Paul Valente, relationship director at HSBC UK. He looked forward to seeing Williams Bros continue to thrive, he added.

Mr Williams said future plans included contracting-out the new packing facilities to help other drinks companies.

Other future projects include the launch of a craft alcoholic ginger beer and a partnership with a small batch craft soda company based in Paisley.