Brewery Visit in Burgess Hill- Interview with Dark Star Brewery with nice gifts!!

I visited 'Dark Star Brewery' in West Sussex between Brighton and Burgess Hill to have an interview with a brewery manager, Paul.

I could not get there without my friend, Charlotte's help. (Obviously, I should put her name on my acknowlegements after my nice supervisor!!) She gave me a lift from the station to the brewery as there is no public transportation!! She is my fantastic drinking friend/course mate in Bournemouth. After she left and got back to her home in Burgess Hill, I was feeling lonely as I lost my fabulous drinking friend!! So it was a nice reunion too!

I met Paul at his office, and got an interesting findings. His ideas inspired me a lot, especially he focued on customers and free houses. In England, free houses mean 'public house (pub)'. These pubs offer customers lots of choices from various breweries. National franchised pubs, Wetherspoon and Taylor and Walker are good examples. Although they are franchised pub groups, they sell lots of guest ales from many breweries to attract customers. On the other hand, 'tied pubs (breweries' own)' offer only their beers - it means customer have few choices.

He also gave me nice gifts- four bottles of beers!! Not one, FOUR!! That's a nice surprise, and I shared them with Charlotte as her dad really loves 'Dark Star' ales.Actually I did my research in four beer festivals, and found lots of fans of Dark Star. Paul is right- customers' word of mouth is very valuable tool.

After my research, we had a nice catch up and 'proper' drinks at the lovely pub, she used to work!! Although I am a professional in real ales, she is an expert in 'ciders'. We enjoyed drinks with a massive lunch- sausages and mash, fish finger sandwich and nice puddings!! Although working for dissertation is very stressful, we sometimes need our break too!!