St Austell

The business started as Walter Hicks Wine & Spirits at the Seven Stars Inn on East Hill in St Austell, moving to its Trevarthian Road site in 1893. Founded as a family-owned company, the brewery has remained independent and family-owned since.

St Austell's reach has expanded considerably over the years. The acquisition of Bath Ales in 2016 added a second brewing site in Warmley, and the brewery opened a Small Batch Brewery in 2018 for smaller production runs. It also holds a minority share in Harbour Brewing Company. A pub estate of over 160 inns, pubs and hotels spans Cornwall, Devon, Somerset and Dorset, and six distribution centres across the West Country support a wholesale operation that supplies thousands of pubs, bars, restaurants and hotels. The brewery operates a sustainability strategy called 'Crafting a Brighter Future' across its brewing and hospitality estate.

The alcohol-free part of the range is an IPA, produced as an alcohol-free counterpart to an existing recipe in the portfolio and brewed using a restricted fermentation process, a method that limits how much alcohol forms during brewing rather than removing it from the finished beer. The same wholesale network and pub estate that distributes the brewery's wider range puts the alcohol-free IPA within reach for sober-curious drinkers across the South West.