How Banks's became a legendary Wolverhampton brewery - and is now set to close in its 150th year
“Standing tall above the Wolverhampton city skyline with its iconic chimney, Banks’s brewery has been brewing great beer here since 1875,” says the introduction on the Carlsberg-Marston’s website.
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And now it looks like the brewing giant will be calling time on this great city institution just in time for its 150th anniversary next year.
The legendary brewer, famed for its adverts featuring Roger Moore and Noddy Holder, began life as Banks and Company, a maltster which started brewing at Newbridge in 1874.
The following year it moved to Park Brewery in Chapel Ash, producing the legendary Banks’s Mild, and has remained their until this day.
The company saw considerable expansion in 1890 when it merged with George Thompson & Sons of Dudley, and also the Fox and Victoria breweries of Wolverhampton. This gave the newly formed Wolverhampton & Dudley Breweries 193 outlets for its beers, and saw the emergence of Wolverhampton as a major brewing centre.
But it was the construction of the Park Brewery in 1898 – designed by architect Arthur Kinder – that truly catapulted Banks’s into the big time.
In 1943 the company took over Dudley-based Julia Hanson and Sons, adding a further 200 pubs to its estate. It also brought the Hanson’s range of beers under its control, giving it a near-monopoly in both the Wolverhampton and Dudley areas.
