OF course there aren’t any flies in Rob Rainey and Cheryl Ford’s kitchen - but if there were and one of them was on the wall and could talk, we’d have heard details of some frantic conversations over bottles of wine.

Talk about kitchen cabinet, their biggest decisions in the past decade have been made sitting at their table, sipping vino.

Fortunately for them, they got the right answers and the result is a thriving brewery in Bishops Lydeard now celebrating its tenth anniversary.

Their first major discussion at that table was about what former nuclear engineer Rob and Cheryl, a baker, should do with their lives.

Rob had quit work at Sellafield to buy the Rising Sun, in West Bagborough, where Cheryl worked.

Fast forward to the day he sold up, Rob didn’t fancy going back to engineering and Cheryl wanted to stay away from ovens.

“Rob had always been interested in beer,” said Cheryl. “He’d produced his own kit after being unimpressed by one from Boots.

“He was in a wine and beer circle in Cheshire and always won the beer competitions. He was the only one using grain and hops to make it.

“So we decided to start a brewery in Wellington in partnership with my dad and started brewing in March 2008.”

Somerset County Gazette:

Cheryl Ford.

The first product was Quantock Ale, followed by White Hind - names, you’ve guessed, dreamt up at the kitchen table.

The first accolade soon followed, with beer of the festival from Devon and Exeter CAMRA and the awards keep coming, with seven in the last eight weeks alone.

The couple took on their first apprentice brewer, James Higgins, in 2010 and both sides are obviously happy, as he’s still churning out the beer.

That same year, Quantock’s stout won the South West bottle champion title and national and international bronze.

“By then we realised we were doing something right,” said Rob, who then created the firm’s most highly decorated ale, Wills Neck, using hops from an American merchant.

“The brewery started to grow and we were getting more recognition. Plastered Pheasant got lots of awards too.

“We took on someone else, but we’d outgrown the Wellington premises - it was difficult shuffling around between pallets of bottles.”

Somerset County Gazette:

Rob Rainey.

That heralded another kitchen table chat and eventually a move to Quantock’s current home, on Broadgauge Business Park, in Bishops Lydeard.

“We’d always wanted to be beside the West Somerset Railway, but it looked to be above our budget,” said Cheryl. “We went away, did our sums and it wasn’t happening unless we stuck everything into it. So we emptied our pension pots and savings and moved in.

“The market was swamped and it was either move or sell. Everyone was telling us not to do it. One night over a bottle of wine, we were saying, ‘Shall we, shan’t we?’ and finally said, ‘Yes’.

“It was a big worry and it took lots of work getting it ready.”

Brewing started in Bishops Lydeard in August 2015 and the couple invested in two more conical fermenters, enabling four brews a week.

The first two fermenters had arrived in 2013 following a Crowdfunding appeal, that also helped fund a cooler, rebranding, a driver and a drayman.

An inspired decision was to open their own shop on the premises, producing more profit by cutting out the middleman.

Other landmarks have included Quantock Gold 76 in 2016, sold in buffet cars on the West Somerset Railway to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the re-opening of the line to Minehead.

The new premises have seen increased footfall from the railway, as Rob says, “steam trains and real ale go together like peas and carrots”.

A permanent bar, The Tap, in the same room as the brewing operation, was launched at a mini beer festival in July 2016 and it now opens daily, with street food on Fridays and events on Saturdays.

Quantock hosted Somerset CAMRA’s annual festival in 2016 and ran its own festival last summer.

Life at Quantock Brewery has been a roller coaster and in early 2017 it went into administration for four weeks, although it continued trading throughout.

So it was back to the kitchen table again, this time with three bottles of wine.

Cheryl said: “We were struggling because the brewery industry was saturated and we couldn’t compete with others selling cheap beer.

“We were approached by somebody interested in backing the brewery and moving it forward.

“Rob and I were saying, ‘Do we, don’t we take the offer?’ “We were worried about how much change there’d be, but thought at least Quantock Brewery would always exist and we wouldn’t have to tell our employees we were closing and they didn’t have a job. We decided to go with it.”

It’s proved a wise decision and the business is about to employ more staff, beer is rolling out the door and the shop and The Tap are flying.

The couple recently poached Jodie Norris from a Wetherspoons pub as national craft manager.

“We’re back, we’re expanding and we’re here to stay,” said Jodie. “Quantock is in most Somerset pubs and we’re being contacted by interested people. We’re going national and we’re working with supermarkets.

“We’re an experimental brewery. We’ll try anything. That’s how most of our new beers have come about.

“We’re about traditional beers made with modern methods.”

Somerset County Gazette:

Jodie Norris behind the bar.

Rob is producing hoppy craft beers thanks to a new hop gun. Canned beer is another innovation set for later this year.

There are two big dates beer lovers should ink in their diaries.

First, the Quantock Relaunch at the brewery on Saturday, May 26, when guests can enjoy ‘beers rooted in the heart of Somerset’, live music and street food, while three new products will be unveiled.

Then a three-day free admission community festival from Friday, July 27, features live music, street food, craft stalls, family fun with plenty for the kids during the day and, of course, beer, all raising funds for road safety charity Think Amy.

Both events were no doubt planned at that kitchen table.