Founded 1799. Probably the most hated brewery in the country, due to such tricks as promoting their IPA as if it had been Champion Beer of Britain (it wasn't) and selling beers under numerous brewery names (Westgate Brewery being the most recent) with little or no indication whatsoever that they all come from the same brewery (We've heard of them being promoted in GK houses as "guest beers" in the pretence that they came from elsewhere - even the brewery website describes many of their own ales as "guest ales"). They have also been accused by HMRC of using an "illegitimate game" in order to deny the nation millions of pounds of tax. The company also abuses many of its staff by employing them on zero hours contracts. It also owns the Loch Fyne restaurant chain, which pays its staff below the minimum wage and forces them to consider their tips as part of the wage paid to them to get round the law.
The XX Mild is surprisingly good, but Beermad refuses to drink it, along with other GK beers, on principle.
Reported by the first edition of the Good Beer Guide as offering 'First rate beers too often spoilt by pressurisation.'
brewery
no
not recorded (before 2005)
03/02/2016
