Cains was a

brewery A brewery or brewing company is a business that makes and sells beer. The place at which beer is commercially made is either called a brewery or a beerhouse, where distinct sets of brewing equipment are called plant. The commercial brewing of bee ...

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, founded in 1858 by Robert Cain. The company merged with Peter Walker & Son in 1921 to form Walker Cains. Peter Walker & Son had a large brewery in Warrington so sold its Liverpool brewery to Higsons in 1923. Boddingtons of Manchester took over in 1985. In 1990, Whitbread acquired Boddington's brewing operations and closed the brewery. It was reopened by GB Breweries, who became part of Bryggerigruppen in 1991, and in 2002 was sold to Gardener-Shaw for £3.4 million. The brewery closed in 2013 with debts totalling more than £8m.

History

The Cains brewery was founded by Irishman Robert Cain in 1858 when he bought an established brewery. Cain had begun his brewing career aged 24 when he purchased a

pub A pub (short for public house) is a kind of drinking establishment which is licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term ''public house'' first appeared in the United Kingdom in late 17th century, and was ...

and brewed his own ales. Within 25 years of founding his brewery, Cain had established 200 pubs, including the

Philharmonic Dining Rooms The Philharmonic Dining Rooms is a public house at the corner of Hope Street and Hardman Street in Liverpool, Merseyside, England, and stands diagonally opposite the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall. It is commonly known as ''The Phil''. It is reco ...

, the Vines and the Central Commercial Hotel, which are currently

listed Listed may refer to: * Listed, Bornholm, a fishing village on the Danish island of Bornholm * Listed (MMM program), a television show on MuchMoreMusic * Endangered species in biology * Listed building, in architecture, designation of a historicall ...

as being of architectural merit. His personal mansion had each window arch inscribed with his monogram. In 1887 construction began on a second brewery. In 1921, 14 years after Cain's death, the Cains brewery merged with Walkers of Warrington, becoming Walker Cains. Then in 1923 the original Stanhope Street Brewery was sold to Higsons, who continued to brew Cains ales. In 1985, Higsons was bought by Boddingtons of Manchester. Five years later Boddingtons opted to concentrate on pub ownership and sold all its breweries to

Whitbread Whitbread plc is a multinational British hotel and restaurant company headquartered in Houghton Regis, England. The business was founded as a brewery in 1742, and had become the largest brewery in the world by the 1780s. Its largest division ...

, at which point the Stanhope Street site was closed.

Rebirth of Cains

The Stanhope site with its modern canning lines had been heavily invested in under Boddingtons' ownership and appeared an attractive asset. It was acquired by the previous owners of Gee Bee Soft Drinks who had sold that business to Princes. The new owners re-established the business under the Robert Cain brand but most of their production was focused on production for supermarkets. Viewing Cains as a route into the UK market, Faxe Bryggeri A/S (now Royal Unibrew) then acquired the company and invested in its ales and local pubs. Unlike its larger competitor Carlsberg, Faxe failed to crack the UK market and put Cains up for sale in 2002.

The Dusanj Era

Cains was acquired in 2002 by the Dusanj brothers making them the first Asian owners of a British brewery. At the time it had a turnover of £30 million, but took just over ten years to go into administration with debts, indicating a loss of £38 million - sinking over £3.5 million per year. In 2007, a

reverse takeover A reverse takeover (RTO), reverse merger, or reverse IPO is the acquisition of a public company by a private company so that the private company can bypass the lengthy and complex process of going public. Sometimes, conversely, the public compa ...

of AIM-listed pub operator Honeycombe Leisure plc was agreed by the company's board, giving Cains access to Honeycombe's 109 outlets and a stock market listing. The company was renamed Cains Beer Company PLC and, like Cains Brewery, ceased to function and accrued insurmountable debts within a year. In 2008, the company was placed in

administration Administration may refer to: Management of organizations * Management, the act of directing people towards accomplishing a goal ** Administrative Assistant, traditionally known as a Secretary, or also known as an administrative officer, admini ...

due to unpaid tax and other debts amounting to £38 million, despite its annual turnover of £65.5 million. Negotiations with its bank failed to reach a conclusion that would have avoided administration. The brewery and eight original pubs were bought back by the Dusanj brothers for £103,750. As the Dusanji family holds the

freehold Freehold may refer to: In real estate *Freehold (law), the tenure of property in fee simple * Customary freehold, a form of feudal tenure of land in England * Parson's freehold, where a Church of England rector or vicar of holds title to benefice ...

to the brewery site and controls the terms of any

lease A lease is a contractual arrangement calling for the user (referred to as the ''lessee'') to pay the owner (referred to as the ''lessor'') for the use of an asset. Property, buildings and vehicles are common assets that are leased. Industrial ...

for brewery operation, no other buyer could be found. In 2013, it ended contract brewing and production of supermarket beers, and then ceased brewing altogether, finding a contract brewer for its own beers. 38 staff were made redundant. Cains was down to an estate of three pubs – the Brewery Tap, Dr Duncan's and The Dispensary. By 2015, it had an estate of five pubs, the additional two being Kelly's Dispensary in Smithdown Road and The Edinburgh in Wavertree. In 2013, Cains began a redevelopment of the site for leisure and housing with a small craft brewery to continue production of its ales. In 2014, Cains arranged for small quantities of its beers to be contract-brewed for export and sale in it pub estate.

Cains Brewery Village

Liverpool City Council granted planning permission for Cains Brewery Village in 2013. This was described as a tourism, leisure and retail attraction. The million square foot site would have included a 94-bedroom hotel, cinema, bistro bar, restaurants and an open-plan retail hall for artisan food producers. 2014 saw potential tenant Baltic Yards Ltd unveil plans for a Sunday market in the Brewery Village, but the company failed to get off the ground and was dissolved in 2015. A food hall opened on the site in 2017. Open four times a week and operated by Baltic Markets, it offers food, drink, entertainment and live events. Brewing restarted at the site in the spring of 2022, using the original recipes.

References

*Christopher Routledg
''Cain's: The Story of Liverpool in a Pint''
(Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2008).

External links

{{commons category, Cain's Brewery, Liverpool
Official Cains Brewery Website (archived)Official Brewery Village Website
1858 establishments in England Breweries in England Manufacturing companies based in Liverpool British companies established in 1858 Food and drink companies established in 1858