Founded in 2018 by Jesse Wilson, who was inspired by après-ski culture, the fruit lager brand is now the fifth biggest craft beer in the on-trade and one of the fastest growing, according to data from CGA.
After seeing 96% growth in the past 12 months overall, year-on-year sales in April 2025 were up 138% and revenue is on track to hit £3m this month, with more than 1,100 taps across the country currently pouring its flagship peach lager, according to Wilson.
He told The Morning Advertiser (The MA): “We’re pioneering this sort of new category space, which was always the vision.
“I want to get to the point where people are thinking about their tap line-up and saying we need a fruit lager. It’s a big growing space; it sells a lot more than cider and it attracts different customers. And that’s been the mission from day one.
“We have set a bit of an aggressive ambition in terms of doubling the size of the brand every year, which is starting to get very hard because we’re lapping some pretty big numbers.
Proud achievement
“I’d love to be sat here in a year’s time saying we achieved our ambition and some, which would probably take us into being maybe the third biggest craft brand in the on-trade; that would be a really proud achievement having been unranked two years ago.
“We’ve got pretty narrow distribution for very strong rates of sale and having developed that way is great because it actually leaves a lot more room for growth.”
Jubel has expanded with listings in Fullers and exclusive brews for Young’s but has prioritised growth within the independent free trade and bespoke support for operators, something the founder said has been key to its success.
He told The MA: “The on-trade is our biggest channel by some margin, it’s about 65% of our business. But it’s also important emotionally because pubs are such a cornerstone of, and so influential, for British culture.
“We are delivering pretty exceptional growth but we haven’t really touched into any of the big nationals yet in a meaningful way and that’s really encouraging because the independent free trade is such a fantastic channel.
“We’ve grown very incrementally and steadily rather than just trying to dive straight into the biggest customers in the country. There is so much of the market we haven’t tapped into yet, which is encouraging.
“As a brand, we are most interested in what works for the pub. We look at that through consistent branding but we are able to be bespoke for individual pubs, which is probably a bit of a secret as to why we have done really well in the free trade.”
“May is going to be our record month by some margin. Instead of tapering off, our growth is speeding up”
Jubel Founder Jesse Wilson
In addition, Wilson asserted Jubel’s position between lager and fruit cider appeals to a broad demographic and offers pubs a sessionable, refreshing option that taps into consumer desire for premium serves amid rising costs.
Though the brand is keeping its focus on its peach brew in the on-trade to ensure it can continue its current level of quality and support, he continued: “We don’t want to spread ourselves too thinly and try to do too much.
“What we’re doing at the moment is really working, the key challenge will be to stay focused and keep doing what’s working rather than getting distracted and pulled into different things that start diluting our impact and don’t necessarily work.
“It is very easy when you are looking at the year ahead to be bullish on all the things you want to do better and take an optimistic view on sales and underestimate costs.
“But the past few years have taught us nothing is certain, pretty much any and all problems that could happen have happened. We’ve always tried to make sure we have strong commercial discipline and are not over forecasting what we think we’re going to sell.”
Looking to the future, the co-founder explained Jubel is investing in its team to continue managing this exponential growth and support operators.
Ongoing investment
“May is going to be our record month by some margin. Instead of tapering off, our growth is speeding up, which is very exciting, and sometimes hard to keep up with.
“We’ve got a growing account base and we don’t want to drop our level of support, so we’re growing the team to continue to provide the high touch level of customer support that we’ve always done with an increased number of taps.
“It feels like we’re in a really good rhythm internally as opposed to reaching break point, which is good.
“We’ve been quite confident through the challenges and are continuing to invest in the brand rather than battening down the hatches and going into defensive mode to ride out the storm,” he said.
Sustainability is also something the B-Corp certified brand is looking to invest in for the future, having recently moved to only using regeneratively farmed barley and malt.
Wilson explained: “The big benefits of that will be it’s a 100% traceable supply chain and pesticide free, plus it’s about 80% less carbon emissions than conventional farming.
“We have very much set out to try to make sure our businesses is a force for good and this is a pretty exciting update in line with that.”
