Crafting a new phase of business
One of Mullingar's most innovative businesses held the official launch of their latest innovation. Bevcraft are the leading craft beverage packaging partner in Ireland.
They provide mobile canning, wholesale packaging, repacking and on-site blending with in-house lab testing and pasteurisation services.
Today (Friday, January 16) the company invited guests for the launch of their Beverage Innovation Facility at the Forest Park, Mullingar facility. Ministers Peter Burke and Robert Troy, representatives from Enterprise Ireland and officials from the Westmeath Local Enterprise Office were given a tour of the new facility.
“It's a new product development and production facility for brand owners and beverage manufacturers,” co-founder Darren Fenton said at the launch, “This has sustained 20 jobs in Mullingar. Mullingar is crucial to our past, present and our future. We see many upsides to this facility as we continue to scale and grow and work with craft beverage producers across Ireland.”
Mullingar is very much the home to Bevcraft Group, but they continue to forge a global presence. Darren Fenton and Ciarán Gorman started Bevcraft almost ten years ago. In the intervening decade the business has evolved as market shifts changed the landscape of what they offered.
They started off offering mobile canning solutions to craft beer companies across Ireland. Since then they have diversified to provide canning for a wide range of beverages.
“Everything we do is to a very high standard. If you are a small brand owner and you want to launch a product we can do something as small as a single pallet,” Ciarán told the Examiner, “We'll take in raw ingredients, blend them in a mixing tank over here in the corner, and essentially make a concentrate which we can dilute down into one, two or three thousand litres.
“Most small scale production facilities don't have a pasteurisation facility of this type. And then we pack off and leave the customer with a pallet of finished product. So ready for export, ready for distribution,” he said.
The production line was in operation on the morning of the launch. The facility canned pallets of kombucha: “We are unique in that we have BRCGS (Brand Reputation Compliance Global Standards) accreditation, but we are still able to service the smaller, entry level start-up producers. We also serve some of the larger global beverage producers who want to produce something on a trial basis,” Darren explained.
In the years since the company was founded they have had to deal with difficulties caused by Covid and change in the craft beer market: “Now beer is one of the smaller parts of their canning business, with soft drinks.
“Craft beer has faced a lot of challenges. We could have taken the decision to “cut our way out” of that downturn. Instead we sustained all the jobs and pivoted to different products. We have created this new facility to allow us to use the skills we have to do something different. The majority of our business is now non-alcoholic,” Ciarán said.
As well as the 20 employees across two sites in Mullingar, the entire complement of staff numbers 60 across the group: “It's a great step for us to be able to roll out this facility,” Darren concluded.