OSSETT BREWERY HISTORY

The story of Ossett Brewery starts with Bob Lawson; a brewer for over 40 years who began his career working for Beverley Bros. Brewery in Wakefield.  From there he moved to Matthew Brown’s in Blackburn and then in 1969 on to Joshua Tetley & Son in Leeds where he spent almost 25 years before moving to the Kelham Island Brewery in Sheffield where he stayed for a further 3 years.

After all this time spent brewing beer for other people, Bob and a partner decided to start their own business and in 1997 a small micro brewery was built at the rear of the Brewers Pride public house in Ossett. The first beer aptly named Bobby Dazzler was brewed in August 1998 and was an instant success.  Brewing was carried out on a 5 barrel brew length plant and for several months all  of the beer produced was retailed through the Brewers Pride pub.  It wasn't long before several local  freehouses were demanding Ossett beers and sales started to increase week by week.

As the beers were sold further afield Ossett Brewery began to win awards at festivals up and down the country; and as the reputation of the business grew so did its customer base.  Within three years further expansion took place raising its brewing capacity to 40 barrels per week.

Ossett beers continue to win awards with Silver King proving a real favourite at beer festivals up and down the land. Perhaps our greatest achievement to date was in 2003 when Excelsior was voted National Champion Beer at the prestigious Society of Independent Brewers (SIBA) Beer Awards.

Old Gurner’s Ale (a crisp Pale Ale) the first Ossett bottled beer appeared in 2003 and was brewed initally for export to Tokyo.   The brewery now sells two bottled beers, Excelsior and the award winning Treacle Stout.  These beers can be found in selected pubs and speciality off-licences around the U.K.

With the departure of his partner early in 2001, Bob became sole owner of  Ossett Brewing Company.  In late 2002 Bob’s son, Jamie, who was a successful investment banker in Japan decided on a career change and joined Bob, turning Ossett Brewery into a family business.

Ossett Brewery Pubs

After a short time working in the brewery, Jamie took on the responsibility of finding suitable pubs as tied houses for Ossett beers. The Black Bull in Liversedge having been a 'local' for over 300 years, was bought, refurbished and reopened in May 2003. The Bull was followed in October 2004 by the Rat & Ratchet in Huddersfield and then by the Three Pigeons in Halifax in March 2005. The fourth and fifth additions to the estate are the Shepherds Rest in Sowerby Bridge which opened in October 2005 and the Travellers Inn at Hipperholme near Halifax which opened in December the same year. The Shepherds Boy in Dewsbury was completely refurbished during a two week closure and opened its doors on 17 February 2006.  The Drop Inn, Elland (formerly the Oddfellows) opened to the public on 7 April 2006.  The Riverhead Brewery Tap opened as an Ossett house in December 2006.   The Masons Arms in Ossett was taken over on February 1st 2007.  The Masons emerged from a two week refurbishment as The Ossett Brewery Tap.  Fernandes Brewery Tap and brewery were added to the estate in August 2007 bringing Ossett pubs to ten in number with two independent micro-breweries. 

New Brewery

By 2004 the original brewhouse was producing almost 40 barrels a week and was operating at a level way beyond its initial design specification. Bob made the decision to look for bigger premises to allow the company to expand. Amazingly a suitable property less than 80 metres away was available and so, late in 2004 work began on building a new brewery.

The first beers were brewed on the new plant in April 2005 and then finally in August all production moved to the new site.

The new brewery originally consisted of three 20 barrel fermenters.  Since then, two additional 40 barrel fermenters have been added and these have increased our maximum capacity to approximately 140 brewer's barrels per week. 

Our Beers

At Ossett we have a very distinctive house style. Our beers are all generally; light coloured, hoppy, flavoursome and have a citrus or floral aroma. Rather than this house style being a particular philosophy of ours it has simply been driven by customer feedback and demand.

 We have five permanent beers and each month we brew two 'specials' allowing us to offer our customers a line up of seven beers at any time.