Trig Brewery: Pull the trigger

In an increasingly difficult time for pubs and breweries, new openings offer a rare glimmer of hope for the future of British brewing. “It wasn’t an easy time, but starting on a 150 litre kit is definitely what made it doable,” reflects Patrick Hall, founder of Trig Brewery, which opened in York in 2023. For those unfamiliar with what 150 litres looks like; it’s two large home brew kits worth of liquid, or an average bathtub-full. Trig’s plan has always been to start tiny and grow organically, counting even the most minuscule increment of progress as a win. This slow and steady approach has seen the brewery safely to three years, during which time — you’ll be glad to know — it has graduated to a bigger brew kit. 

In fact, at the time of writing Trig has been 18 months in its first home, a small industrial unit able to accommodate the five additional fermenters and 16 hectolitre brewhouse that the brewery can now call its own. Prior to that, Trig contract brewed its best-selling beer so it could put its own, tiny kit to more efficient use making specials and developing recipes. Today, the brewer’s core range consists of five beers, brewed — in different combinations — across cask, keg and can. 

These include Mesa, a 4.2% gluten free light pils and Trig’s best seller by a country mile; Wayfarer, a 4.4% New Zealand Hazy Pale Ale; False Summit, a 5.5% American IPA; and Interloper, a 5% Oatmeal Porter. Interestingly, Patrick says that, in York specifically, cask taps offer the most opportunity to newcomers; “York is a very cask driven city, so there's a lot more cask taps available for guest beers, whereas if you look at somewhere like Leeds or Newcastle, there's definitely more keg beer going on.”

Instead of seeing this as a barrier to entry, Patrick accepts today’s beer landscape as it is. “Everybody knows how difficult it is for the beer industry right now, but our thinking was; if we can make the numbers work now, we can make them work any time” he says “We knew we weren’t starting in the boom of 2018, and we weren’t expecting an easy time getting into places. People in bars have built up relationships with breweries — which we understand, and is what we want to work towards — plus, with the price of things, if people are only going out for a few, they want to know the beer is going to be good. So, right now, we’re really trying to nurture relationships with the people we work with.”

Patrick has been on the other side of this relationship many times before. In fact, his first foray into the beer world came when he found himself managing bars in Newcastle in 2012, just as the craft beer revolution was taking off in the UK. West Coast beers inspired him, features of which linger in the gentle bitterness prevalent across Trig’s range today. In Patrick’s telling, he eventually left hospitality, but remained an avid homebrewer, and always intended on coming back to beer as a brewer. “It got to a point where my wife was like ‘either do something about it or stop talking about it’,” he laughs. It was the push he needed to pull the trigger, and no — that’s not where the name came from.