Cameron's Brewery aims to add 50 pubs

Director Chris Soley told the PMA's ​sister title, M&C, the company would also look at private equity backing for a major acquisition of up to 200 pubs and that longterm that aim was to “return ourselves to the traditional regional brewer model of owning 500 pubs”.

Soley said the currently 10-strong Head of Steam brand would be the immediate focus for expansion, with heads of terms agreed on five sites to open in the next six months. He said beyond that the company would seek to roll the concept out beyond its North East heartland while also developing another brand.

He said the company was continuing to develop Head of Steam with staff currently receiving training towards the aim of having a beer sommelier in every outlet.

Strong finances

Soley said the company’s finances were strong with EBITDA for 2014 at c£5.5m and at the halfway point of this financial projected to rise to c£6.5m. He said like-for-like sales across the managed estate were up around 2% and had grown c10% in the tenanted arm. On the brewing side, he said own brand sales were up 40% - but from a low base – while contract brewing sales had risen 3%.

He said: “We are in a very good situation because we have gone through a period of getting ourselves in shape operationally and putting the foundations in place to go forward quite aggressively.

“We hope to secure our refinancing g by the end of December. Our current bank is RBS but we are having discussions with several parties. That will give us £5m further firepower towards our five-year plan of taking on six leasehold pubs a year. We still want a significant freehold bias so we would look at adding some more leased and tenanted pubs as well – between 10 and 20 over that period.

“Beyond that we should have the cashflow in place to self-fund from that point.”

Asked if he would look to get private equity backing, Soley said: “If there was the opportunity to look at a really significant acquisition – in the 200 people bracket – we would need some support and private equity might be the way to go.

“Long term we want to return ourselves to the traditional regional brewer model of owning 500 pubs. If there was an opportunity to take 150/200 off a large pub operator we would be very interested. But it’s not something we’re pushing at the moment.”

Soley said the next five sites for Head of Steam would see the brand double up in Leeds and Newcastle and add its first in Sheffield, York and Hull.

National brand

He said: “We think Head of Steam has the ability to become a national brand. We would look to move across the Pennines into Manchester and Liverpool and then work our way down the country from there. That’ll be the focus for the forthcoming year.

“Beyond that we would like to add another brand to the managed estate that we could rollout alongside Head of Steam. That’s very much on the drawing board at the moment though.”

On brewing, Soley said: “We have moved away a bit from our traditional regional ales and focussed on a completely new range of cask, both permanent and seasonal. A-Hop Alypse Now has been really successful and has now become permanent. Fridge Magnet is another one that has done really well – that’s been helped by the innovative design where we have the magnetic letters on the pump clip.

“We’ve got quite a few pipeline innovations in terms of additional casks and craft keg as well. We have a pipeline of new craft keg launches that we are going to release, including a stout, which will be launched soon.

“We have spent ahead of the curve in sales and marketing for own brands.”

He said while craft beer sales were booming, they still only represented 7 to 10% of total sales.

He said: “Even in craft led pubs, the larger percentage of sales are driven by standard and premium ales and lagers. But it gives us a point of difference and a competitive advantage. It gets the beer lovers into the pubs.”

Camerons currently operates 57 leased and tenanted pubs and 14 managed