The owner of Captain Bligh’s Brewery and Distillery in Hobart is retiring and putting the business up for sale after almost 13 years.
Steve Brooks, 62, said he had done his final brew at the 64 Warwick Street site and was now looking for “a new captain”.
Buyers could take the whole business or parts of it, he said.
“I’m open to anything,” he told Pulse. “I just sort of made the decision that at my age, it’s time, time for more relaxation than work.”
Steve and Karen Brooks bought the business in 2014, when it was a small cidery and installed a brewery.
A copper pot still followed in 2018 and the site now produces whisky, rum and other spirits as well as beer.
The business said brewing on the site dates back to 1849.
Before buying the business, Brooks was a career nurse who managed mental health services on the mainland.
He said he set up the business to “buy myself a job” and leave nursing and that money had “never been anything that particularly motivated” him.
Ideally, he would like to sell to someone who wants to get out of “the grind” and buy themselves a job, as he did.
Meeting people had been the highlight of his time at the brewery, Brooks said.
Several people he trained as brewers have gone on to start their own businesses or work at other breweries.
“I’ve always just really liked people,” he said. “So it’s been the people.”
His blood orange stout became the brewery’s most popular beer.
This week, the brewery has been canning a new whisky and cola, which Brooks said was “complete and utter sacrilege” to single malt.
He considered calling it Smoky Cokey but never got around to the artwork, so it is simply called Whisky and Cola.
The brewery holds a monthly tasting bar with live music and food vans on the third Friday of each month.
The next is this Friday, October 16 and the last under Brooks will be in December.
Brooks said two people sent him their flight details within an hour of his retirement announcement and he expected the December tasting to be “pretty big”.
Interested buyers can contact the brewery.
