Meet Get Tanked, a Northern based craft beer company set up in 2010 by two mates Gary & Tom (G & T…Get Tanked…get it?) who wanted to have a go at brewing beers with flavour. Beers they actually wanted to drink because it genuinely tasted the dogs bol*%cks.
They started off setting up their kit in Gary's garage & crafted their first IPA flavoured with Fruit Of The Hala Aka Puhala Tree. Admittedly it was pretty grim. However, 10 years down the line after years of training and honing their craft, they become expert brewers, now specialising in IPA canned beers, experimenting with unusual flavours from Marmite to Wasabi, to create their own range of craft beers.
They sell their beers all over the UK but still brew it from their northern strong hold.
Each year Get Tanked Brewery continue to bring new & bizarre beers into their current range of 14 mad flavours. Their approach to innovating what is already a pretty saturated market has led to rapid growth and a current turnover of just over £3M, with a recent win at the HonestBrew Independent Beer Awards.
Their commitment to innovation involves (1) continuously coming up with new recipes by drinking lots of the beer (2) testing out the new recipes and refining them….then doing it again and again and again by drinking lots of the beer, until (3) they have an IPA ready to add to take to market & add to the range…so others can then get drinking lots of the beer!
Get Tanked Brewery invests heavily into the process of developing new recipes, trialling new beers (any excuse) and taking them through to production – this requires skilled staff and incredibly expensive equipment.
Gary & Tom had heard of R&D Tax Relief but had been given the impression it wasn’t really something they’d be able to benefit from. Apparently, they weren’t really overcoming technological uncertainties. However, they’d always found this difficult to swallow (unlike the beer), knowing the cash investment, time investment challenges (and failures) they’d experienced over the years.
After deciding to change Accountant – for totally unrelated reasons – R&D cropped up yet again. But this time things were different. Their Accountant agreed and was more than confident they could make a claim. Boom. Here’s why:
Get Tanked had a technical challenge to experiment with new recipes for their mad flavours (low alcohol versions too), that hadn’t been done before, meaning there was uncertainty around how to they were going to do this. TICK.
The recipes were for new flavoured IPA products to add to the growing range of beers. TICK
Get Tanked was started by Gwil and Tim in their garage but over the years they’d employed experienced and qualified people to develop the recipes – can you believe there is a degree in brewing & distilling?! TICK
So, initially there was that sinking feeling of ‘shit, always trust your gut & ahh how much cash have we missed out on?!’ but then the £35,000 soon to be claimed put a smile on their faces.
The R&D claim for Get Tanked Brewery was an awesome cash injection but brought with it so much more. It brought forward that next wacky IPA that’s been on hold – The Dogs Bol*%cks Brew. It enables forward planning of new IPAs to bring into the range. It meant they could invest in that new bit of canning kit to speed up the production process and increase output. It meant Gary & Tom could focus on the areas they need to, knowing they are in the hands of an Adviser who properly understands their business.
So, sadly Get Tanked Brewery isn’t real, well I actually did have a very vivid dream about it once, but nope, unfortunately it’s not real. You can’t grab yourselves a quick The Dogs Bol*%cks IPA with extra froth to start your day, I mean end. 😊 Sounds awesome though right?!
But how easy and interesting was it, to get your head into R&D Tax Relief through a story, instead of extracts of text from HMRC’s snorefest guidance. They say a picture tells a thousand words; well a story can bring that picture to life!
If you have client’s you’d like to have a chat about, book in a call and we’ll get to the bottom of whether they should be claiming too. For DTX’ers using Radish, you can get your hands on a ‘Are you eligible?’ infographic to use with clients in the download area.
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