Sam and I would like to wish everyone a very Happy New Year and hope that your heads do not hurt too much after last night's merrymaking.

We hope that you and your friends and guests have been enjoying the fruits of your recent beer and winemaking efforts and that, from a purely selfish point of view, you have seriously run down your stock and need to come and visit us soon to start replenishing your supplies.

If you know anybody that received a Beer Making Starter kit or minibrewery set up for Christmas and think that they may be in need of a few pointers as to what to do, please direct them to our "How To Brew" instruction page, where they can view the whole process in pictures and can even download a pdf file to keep as a reference guide.

As you may have heard over the last few months, the world grain prices have increased dramatically and Muntons, the local malsters who make most of the UK's homebrew beer and lager kits, issued an across the board 15% price increase on all of their kits in September 2010. We absorbed this increase at the time and suppressed it in the run up to Christmas, but as the new VAT rate of 20% is due to be introduced on 4th January 2011, we have taken the opportunity to adjust all of our prices in one go and, as a result, you will notice a change in the price of your favourite beers when you next come in, but rest assured, brewing your own beer and wine will continue to be more fun and much less expensive than buying it from the pub, off licence or supermarket.