For Briar Harley, born into the brewery life, there’s plenty of excitement in sharing the news that come June a third generation will born into the Mount Brewing family.
Briar and husband Niall, who own Mount Brewing in partnership with her parents Glenn and Virginia Meikle, are expecting a son in June.
“I am pregnant, so we’ve got our next generation on the rise,” she tells me during a look back over the past 30 years.
The Meikles started Mount Brewing when Briar was six weeks old, so the brewery has been a constant in her life — she turned 30 just a few weeks before the official brewery birthday celebrations this month.
Her parents continue to help out in the brewery, especially taking up the reins on Sundays so Briar and Niall can have a day off.
The young couple have run the brewery for the past three years after returning from an OE and doing what most kids do — telling their parents what was going to happen!
“Niall and I were overseas traveling and trying to decide what we wanted to do with our lives. And the brewery was just there. We kind of felt like it was there for the taking almost. No one’s really putting much time into it.
“I don’t even remember talking to my parents about it. I was just like, ‘oh, we’re going to move home and kind of jump into the brewery’. And they were like, ‘cool, that sounds good’. And that was it, really.
“So, since then, we have kind of moved in and taken over the whole business.”
Briar had worked in and around the brewery since she was 16, either in the bar, at the Super Liquor store they own next door, or on the marketing side.
She admits that during the brewery’s first 20 years, it just “ticked along”, because her parents had plenty of other businesses to run.
What changed things, in an unexpected way, was the brief partnership with Funk Estate in 2016.
The Funk Estate team relocated to Mount Maunganui, bringing their brew kit and canning line down from a short-lived venture in Auckland. The two breweries shared one space for about three years until Funk Estate went into liquidation.
In the complicated wash-up, Brand House bought the Funk Estate brand and recipes while Mount Brewing took over the hardware.
“With Funk Estate, it didn’t end great,” Briar says. “But at the end of the day, we did get their kit and their canning machine and that really helped us step up — we’re still using that same brew house from Funk Estate and while the canning machine has been replaced it helped us transition from bottles to cans.”
Funk Estate’s move to the Mount coincided with the refurbishment of the Rising Tide, the brewery’s bar and home to Johney’s Dumplings.
“It was definitely like a — what do we say? — a bit of a workingman’s bar.”
Briar Harley on the Rising Tide
I can remember being in there when it was getting redone and the place had a definite edge and the drinks were cheap — Mermaid’s Mirth was cheaper than Waikato Draught on tap and there were certainly a lot of Waikato Draught drinkers there.
“It was definitely like a — what do we say? — a bit of a workingman’s bar,” Briar admits. “We still have some of the same regulars that were drinking Waikato Draught back then.”
As for the cheap pints of Mermaid’s Mirth? Necessity says Briar.
“Back then, it was so hard to get people on board with craft beer. I remember working at lots of events and markets and everyone just thought it was home brew.
“I think that was probably the hardest time, because no one would take it seriously. So I think the only way you would get people to drink it was on price.
As a hat-tip to the locals who supported the Rising Tide before it got its makeover, the brewery released a classic New Zealand draught as one of six beer on their Road to 30 celebrations and it will be part of a mixed-six birthday pack, released this month.
Another key plank in that six-pack is Mermaid’s Mirth, the American Pale Ale that first put Mount Brewing on the map of craft beer enthusiasts.
“Yeah, we call her our flagship beer. She has been, our biggest seller and the longest in the core range. It still outsells every other can.”
It was also the beer that converted her Donegal-born Irish husband.
Niall is from Ballyshannon, modernly famous as the home of rock guitarist Rory Gallagher who is immortalised with a statue in the main street. And naturally Niall has an affection for a certain dry Irish stout, which the brewery has done a great job in replicating with Harley’s Irish Stout.
And like any good Guinness bar, fans of the beer can get their name on the wall, in this case a brite beer tank, by notching 100 pints as part of the Harley’s 100 club.
“It was our marketing manager, Emma, who came up with the idea over winter because we were like, man, what are we going to do in winter to kind of get people into the bar. And obviously Niall does the Guinness 100 at our local Irish bar so it was an opportunity to tell the whole Irish story and about it being more than just a beer.
“One of our big goals this year is along the lines of: you can’t just brew a good beer anymore, it needs a story, it needs context, it needs so much more for people to get behind it.”
They went the whole hog by creating an Irish pub within the Rising Tide.
“Niall played Gaelic football in Ireland, so his jersey’s up there on the wall and it’s just really nice, actually. And it’s gone better than we hoped. I think we’re going to leave the set up, just because people want to keep trying to get on the board.
“And what we’ve found is that people who wouldn’t necessarily drink stout are now doing so. There’s a few of my brother’s friends, who are in their 20s and they’re coming in and trying to get in the Harley’s 100. So it’s a good way of getting that younger demographic more into the brand.”
The broader business now includes a second Rising Tide closer to Mount Maunganui, as well as the Super Liquor store and they also run events.
Briar says there is room for the brewery to grow further and she’d love to open new venues along the coastline.
“We’d love a bar right down at the Mount and we’d love a bar in Papamoa.
“I was just in Gisborne the other weekend, and man, Sunshine Brewing — the whole community is just behind Sunshine. It’s so nice to see so many different types of people who drink Sunshine beer and Gizzy Gold. Even in the fishing club, they’ve got Gizzy Gold on tap.
“And I would love to build that community side of the brand here, although I’m sure every local brand says the same, don’t they?”
It’s a valid aspiration for a brewery with an eye on the future generation.