Arkell's Brewery creates new beer to celebrate 100th anniversary of MG motors

Published by

Peter Davison

George and Alex Arkell with their MG-themed beer

Swindon brewery Arkell's has created a new beer to celebrate the 100th anniversary of automotive brand MG.

Petrol Head is a 4.5 per cent ABV pale beer brewed using traditional Norwegian Kveik yeast which adds a unique orangy flavour to the beer.

There is an association between the Victorian brewery and the Arkell family. In 1923 Oliver Arkell was the first person to buy an MG – a Raworth-bodied MG Super Sports model.

Only six of the model were made and none are known to survive, but the archives of The Early MG Society contains photos and documents concerning the link.

MG owners and enthusiasts celebrated the 100th anniversary of the marque on Saturday (May 27) at the British Motor Museum in Gaydon, Warwickshire.

There were four organised road runs starting from different locations, one of which was Arkell’s Brewery.

Head brewer Alex Arkell said: "It seems only fitting that we produce a beer for the centenary, given that our brewery ancestor is recognised as the first person to have bought anMG sports car, and we are thrilled that MG enthusiasts chose our beautiful and historic steam brewery as a road run starting point."

Peter Davison

Peter Davison is deputy editor of The Business Magazine. He has spent his life in journalism – doing work experience in newsrooms in and around Bristol while still at school, and landing his first job on a local newspaper aged 19. By 28 he was the youngest newspaper editor in the country. An early advocate of online news, he spent the first years of the 2000s telling his bosses that the internet posed both the biggest opportunity and greatest threat to the newspaper industry and the art of journalism. He was right on both counts. Since 2006 he has enjoyed a career as a freelance journalist. He lives in rural Wiltshire with one wife, two children, and three cats.