A craft beer podcast started in Lockdown #1
I don't need to remind you all about the pandemic hitting the World in 2020. I'm sure you all have your memories of how it changed your lives and careers, perhaps for the better, but mostly I'm sure for the worse.
My "day job" was/is Corporate Event Management, heavily leaning towards events being carried out overseas. This meant that I travelled a great deal around the World, but mainly Europe, managing groups of people at conferences, golf trips, incentives, product launches, and so on.
I love it (I'll keep in the current tense from now on!) and think that I'm actually very good at it. However, with meetings of people outside their household and overseas travel banned, work dried up immediately.
As the months went on and things got worse, then better, then worse again, it seemed that I would be on furlough for a very long time. I have always loved beer, and have been in the craft beer bubble as a consumer for a while. I had considered starting a podcast in 2019, but was too busy to actually get it going. In the summer of 2020, I decided that now was as good a time as any - after all, time was aplenty!
Matt was an awesome guest and I really started to feel my way into the world of being a podcast host.
The first episode was conducted over Zoom, as they all would over the coming year, and it was just a friend and I chatting about beer. I had plans to involve people from around the industry, but I wanted to get to grips with producing an episode first.
The first "proper" guest was Matt Lincoln from Siren Craft Brew in Finchamstead, near Reading. Matt was an awesome guest and I really started to feel my way into the world of being a podcast host. Amity Brew Co, beer writer Melissa Cole, North Brew Co and London Beer Factory all followed, and with 6 episodes under my belt, I started to feel a part of the conversation about beer.
Fast Forward to today!
Now its well over a year since my first episode. As I write this, I'm about to go and edit episode 33 - one that I recorded in person at the brewery's tap room. I've had some amazing guests along the way thus far (check them all out here!) and lots of great comments from listeners too. I have some interesting things planned for Year 2, so why not give the podcast a follow?!