Beer and Stoke Go Hand in Hand

13 September 2010

Beer And Stoke Go Hand in Hand

The McCashin family have just launched a new brand of beer called “Stoke”.

McCashin’s Brewery in Stoke, Nelson has a long history of beer and brewing. The Stoke site started out in the 1930’s as the Rochdale Cider Factory but was bought in 1980 by Terry McCashin and renamed McCashin’s Brewery.

Terry has been credited as starting the craft beer revolution in New Zealand. When he opened the brewery in 1981, the only other breweries were Lion Nathan and DB. It had been so long since anyone had applied for a brewing licence that no one knew where to find the application forms.

Craft beer is once again flowing from the Stoke site vacated by corporate giant Lion Nathan, which bought out the original McCashin family label, Macs, in 1999.

Although Lion bought the Macs label, it only leased the Stoke brewing plant. By 2008, when Lion had moved all beer production to other centres, the McCashins were left with an empty building.

"We had to have a business that paid the rent," said Dean McCashin. And so he and wife Emma began brewing. They started with cider – and last Friday, approximately 21,000 litres of Stoke amber, dark and gold beer came off the bottling line.

“The name Stoke was an easy choice” said McCashin. “The brewery in Stoke is iconic and even during the time it was closed, campervans and cars would turn up with their Lonely Planet Guide to do a brewery tour.”

McCashin's Stoke beers are expected to be commercially available over the next fortnight

www.stokebeer.co.nz

www.mccashins.co.nz

here's to good health!

ENDS

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