A popular brewery in Wales is set to relocate after it was bought by new owners. Boss Brewing is moving to a new purpose-built premises elsewhere in Swansea after being bought out by new owners after it went into administration last year.
Dai Evans, who owns Wild Weather Brewery in Reading, stepped forward to acquire the Neath Road, Landore brewery, a Grade-II listed former cinema, after administrators were appointed on October 26 last year.
The brewery made headlines in 2020 after they took on fashion giant Hugo Boss. And it sparked comedian Joe Lycett tp legally change his name to Hugo Boss in support, after he heard that Boss Brewing had received a cease and desist from the company for using the word 'boss'.
The company was featured on his consumer show Got Your Back.
Boss Brewing had to shell out nearly £10,000 defending itself in a four-month legal battle against the clothing titan, which had a net income of €236 million (£218m) in 2018.
The company was established in December 2014 and went on to achieve great success, winning awards for its beer and growing exponentially with its products being exported as far afield as China, Germany, Canada and Scandinavia. But it fell into difficulty after the coronavirus pandemic with its revenue falling from £40,000 a month to £15,000 a month, putting pressure on the cash flow of the company, compounded by the prices and energy costs increasing and a growing number of pub closures.
Mr Evans's acquisition means that all staff members at the brewery retained their jobs and Wild Weather Brewery will now move to Swansea temporarily to join forces with Boss as both companies look to "ride the storm" amid difficult economic conditions. Get Swansea stories straight to your inbox with our newsletter.
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Operations manager Laura James said: "Boss Brewing, as it was, went into administration back in October. We have a new owner now, Dai, who has another brewery in Reading called Wild Weather. Unfortunately, it's not a great time for the hospitality or brewing industries. It's a challenging economic situation and so many breweries are closing their doors which is very hard. What we are doing is joining forces, with Wild Weather temporarily relocating to Boss.
"We're looking for a new chapter as Boss Craft Brewing Company. Wild Weather will relocate to us, and we're in the process of relocating to a new building within Swansea and its surrounding area. We will be moving from our current site and looking for more of a purpose built brewery." Ms James said being in an old cinema was "fantastic but does have a few hurdles.
"We're split over two buildings, but in our new site it will all be under the same roof, and we'll be able to get a bit more of a flow in the new brewery. We're all very excited, we're hoping with the economic situation at the moment, by joining forces we can ride the storm a little bit together."
As part of its upcoming relocation Boss will also be undergoing some changes. Ms James continued: "We're going to be bringing out a lot more beers, changing beers and rebranding, but at the moment we're just trying to ride the storm and plan the next chapter of Boss. We'll effectively have two breweries under one roof.
"We're really excited to bring Wild Weather to Wales, it is a fantastic craft brewery and is known for its weird and wacky proper craft beers, like Banana Bomb and Cherry Sours and everything like that. We're looking forward to bringing some very non-traditional beers to south Wales."
Discussing how things will work when both brands come together, Ms James added: "The economy for breweries is becoming more and more difficult, and we're hoping to share resources. When everything settles down in the real world, Wild Weather will move back to Reading, but we just need to secure both brands for now.
"We're in the process of negotiating our new site, but we haven't finalised on what the brewery name will be. We're looking at investing into the new brewery, we're looking to have a new taproom and work with other breweries as well. The sooner we are in the new site the better, but things will take a bit of time because we need groundworks doing and so on. In the meantime, operations will carry on in the existing sites.
"It's nice to have a new chapter of the business, closing the door of what was and opening the door of a new brewery at a new site and hopefully it'll be well received," she continued. "We're hoping to make some really great beers that people will enjoy. All we want is to have a brewery known for great beers - that's what we want."
The existing base of Boss Brewing is currently up for sale. Once known as Landore Cinema, the listed building opened its doors in November 1913. Its owner was Merthyr Co. Ltd and it had 570 seats. Its proprietor became Swansea Cinemas Ltd in 1939, but in 1945 it was listed as closed. To learn more about the building for sale click here.
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