Merkai Brewing Co

Merakai Brewing Co.

Bringing collective equality to brewing

Merakai Brewing Co. are making beers with a little bit of a difference. With a focus just as much on what’s on the outside of the can as inside, Merakai built themselves from the ground up on the foundations of equality and taste — working alongside artists and local charities to really make a difference within the community. We had a chat with owner Emma O’Neill-Parsons and Olly Parsons to fi nd out more about their collective.

Tell me a little about why you started Merakai?

(Emma) We started Merakai out of a need to create something with meaning and we wanted to put a bit of good out into the world. I had a dream 10 years ago that we’d do our own thing, I just didn’t know it would be owning a brewery and making beer. Olly’s progression from home brewer to professional brewer was really quick. He homebrewed for a few years, approached our local brewery asking for work, Arundel hired him for work experience and brought him on full time soon after. I saw what he could do and the reaction to his beers and then it clicked, and here we are.

What does Merakai do (aside from brewing beers)?

(Olly) “We promote inclusion and diversity and try in our own way to highlight human issues that affect our community. We also like to support artists by giving them the opportunity to express themselves by using our label as a canvas.”

(Emma) “Merakai Brewing CO. is built on the foundations of Community, Equality and Taste. It’s really important to us that we are being active and supporting causes we believe in, using the platforms we have to promote others’ work and support antiracism, LGBTQ+ organisations and stigma surrounding mental health.”

Who are some of your favourite collaborations with and why?

(Olly) “Our fi rst and only collab (to date) has been the Strawberry Frose with the Strawracha Hop’T Sauce. Hop’T sauces are amazing and Sammi Marwan (owner) is just a lovely human.”

(Emma) “We did a non-beer related collab for the release of our Helles ‘How’s Your Head Hun?’ the beer was created as a conversation starter, and a reminder to check in. We did a month-long mental health campaign that featured activities, fundraising and conversations with some amazing people in our community, we also raised a great amount for our local mental health charity Worthing Mind too.”

What challenges did you face when you fi rst started the brewery?

(Emma) “There were a few, starting during a pandemic (we launched at the end of November 2020). Olly decided to launch with a DIPA (which cost us a fortune as we did contract brewing). We had a couple of local retail contacts, but that was it, it was a giant leap of faith, and we hit the ground running. As I said, I’d been preparing for us to do this for a couple of years, we had an understanding of what we needed to do but sales were looking scary when pubs and shops were shutting daily.”

How have you overcome those challenges to now growing to a brewery with multiple beers out there?

(Emma) “By building relationships with amazing retailers (thanks BSM), we know the beer is excellent, it was just a case of getting into people’s hands as quickly as possible.”

(Olly) “We have the brewery space by pure luck. We bought a second hand 10BBL kit in September (2020 before we launched) with the hope that we’d fi nd a place. We spent months looking and nothing came up, the brewery I was working for moved out of their rented industrial unit and we chanced it, they accepted us, and here we are. Where we are now comes down to a combination of hard work and luck.”

What are your favourite kind of beers to make and why?

(Olly) “Our latest fruited gose, the Strawberry Frose - We Like You Berry Much - I’d not made the style of beer before, but it turned out pretty good!”

What are your top two beers in your collection at the moment?

(Emma) “I enjoyed the Helles ‘How’s Your Head Hun?’, and the Frose ‘We Like You Berry Much’ which is unusual for me, as I normally like stouts, imps and belgian style beer.”

(Olly) “Agree, the Frose ‘We Like You Berry Much’ and our NE IPA ‘We’re Connected Aren’t We?’ because they are styles I like to drink personally.”

You’ve also released a hot sauce! Why did you pick a hot sauce?

(Olly) “Sammi (owner of Hop’T sauce) came to us with the idea that he wanted to do his fi rst beer and sauce collab. Of course we said yes as I mentioned before his sauce is great and we

We also seemed to get in ahead of the crowd too, we’re seeing a lot of brewery and hot sauce collabs at the moment, which is great...”

love hot sauce. You can have it on anything! We also seemed to get in ahead of the crowd too, we’re seeing a lot of brewery and hot sauce collabs at the moment, which is great.” (Olly) “It’s great, my kit is in, I did the Frose in this brewery. We’re really happy to be here. Come down and see us if you’re in the area! Check out our site to book and stuff.”

We hear on the grapevine that you’re also in the process of building your brewery site. Tell us more about that.

(Emma) “Yep, we already did. We’ve been in our location since May, and will be opening up for intimate brewery tours and tastings that we’re super excited about!”

What other exciting plans do you have in the works that you can tell me about?

(Olly) “Only that we’ve got some amazing collabs coming up towards the end of the year that we can’t talk about but they are really exciting and we can’t wait for you to see what is coming.” (Emma) “As it’s our fi rst year we’re focussed on putting out great beers and getting to know and grow our community (shout out to the Merakai Collective). If the past two years have taught us anything, you can have plans and they can change overnight so we’re trying to keep it simple and do the best we can.”

Want to fi nd out more about Marakai Brewing Co? Check them out online at merakaibrewing.com.