Modest Beer

Modest Beer began in a parent's garage, where tax accountant Chris Morris brewed a small experimental batch of Kölsch for a friend's restaurant. The beer proved successful enough to turn a homebrewing experiment into a longer-term collaboration, leading Chris to build a proper brewery at the end of 2019.

The brewery's earliest days remained deliberately small-scale, but growth soon required more space. Within two years Modest moved out of its garage beginnings and into a commercial unit in Randalstown, marking the first major step in developing the project into an established independent brewery.

Another move followed as the brewery continued to develop, with Modest eventually establishing its current home in Bangor, County Down. The move gives the brewery a considerably larger base than the garage where the first commercial idea took shape and places the business firmly within the brewing community of Northern Ireland's north-east coast.

Despite that growth, Modest retains the understated personality reflected in its name. Its own story describes Chris's transition from a 'mild-mannered tax accountant to mild-mannered brewer', with the brewery approaching its development with a characteristically self-deprecating ambition: it never set out to make the best beer in Northern Ireland, but hopes that perhaps someday it will.

Today, Modest Beer remains a small independent Northern Irish brewery led by Chris Morris, having progressed from an experimental garage-brewed Kölsch through its Randalstown brewery to a new home in Bangor. It is also recognised through SIBA's Indie Beer initiative, reflecting its status within the independent brewing sector.