Growing Cheshire pub group meets challenges with exclusive beer and wine #Blog

Victoria Hayes
4th May 2023

Two sister Cheshire pubs, born of the pandemic years, have rallied to today’s economic challenges by sticking to the knitting and giving their regulars more of what they want, brewing their own beer and offering exclusively sourced French house wines.

Both the Chester city centre venue The Henry Potts on Watergate Street and The Hare at Farndon were launched by Jerry Brunning’s Pubs Ltd group in the shadow of Covid 19; ‘the Potts’ last summer and The Hare in autumn 2020.

Now staff at both pubs are throwing themselves behind the drink initiatives by brewing the house cask ale and enhancing their own knowledge of the five blends of Bordeaux house wines on offer.

Recently team members from both pubs joined the brewers at the Wrexham based Big Hand Brewery to brew the JPA (3.6% abv) house bitter, now on sale (see photograph). This modest strength pale ale was first developed with the help of experts at Sunderland’s Brewlab, the centre of excellence for British brewing, to offer an easy but distinctive drinking experience. The imaginative will quickly work out what, or who, the ‘J’ stands for.

The five draught house wines were researched by Cheshire based wine consultant Kevin Sambrook, working with a talented Bordeaux ‘négociant’ to provide an exclusive line up for Pubs Ltd. They include two dry whites, a claret, a Rhone red and a rosé, all served via the company’s own innovative method of tap dispense for freshness. The pub teams can take wine qualifications and join regular tutored tasting sessions, enabling them to guide wine lovers with their choices.

Alistair Logan, General Manager at The Hare, said “Our house wines and JPA are a real attraction to The Hare. Our regulars can rely on them and people new to us are often first intrigued and then impressed.”

Operations Director Lindsay Cox said: “You could argue it was bad timing to open both pubs in the most difficult trading times for modern hospitality, but we’re thrilled to see them developing in such a challenging environment.

“Our teams are fundamental to our success and they have fully got behind our distinctive offer, helping to brew and develop JPA and learning about our exclusively blended and directly imported wines.

“House wines tend to indicate the style and quality of a venue and we are proud of ours; they give our customers exceptional value at a reasonable price.”

Tracie Vine, who runs The Henry Potts, said “Our exclusive house beer and wines demonstrate how much we care about quality at The Potts, adding to our excellent range of cask and craft beers and adventurous wine list, together with our first-class menu of modern British dishes.”

The Hare at Farndon – on the Cheshire/North Wales border – was reborn from the former The Greyhound, closed for several years until Pubs Ltd restored it as a popular village pub complete with log fires, wooden floors and walls adorned with the company’s hallmark prints and photographs. It also has two charming holiday cottages available to rent, right next to the pub.

The Henry Potts is located on Watergate House, Watergate Street, Chester – close to the city walls and racecourse – in the former basement home of the once hugely popular Fat Cat. Watergate House was built in the 1820s for Henry Potts, Clerk of the Peace for Cheshire. ‘Potts’ aims to be ‘your local in the city’ and the new-look refurbishment retains many features, with intimate alcoves, original beams, posts, and floorboards.

Pubs Ltd was created by veteran pubs entrepreneur Jerry Brunning, the founder of the original Chester based Brunning & Price company, which launched the canal-side Old Harkers Arms – ‘Harkers’.

The group also incorporates the award-winning 18th century Swan at Marbury – brought back to life with a major investment in 2018 – and the medieval Black Bear in Whitchurch, which also saw extensive refurbishment work carried out during the Covid closures.