#125 | Building Britain’s Breweries

There’s a strong chance you, or someone you know, has enjoyed a beer that has been made possible by the hand of Nikola Marjanovic.

Following a degree in food technology, specialising in microbiological processes, at Serbia’s University of Novi Sad, he became a quality engineer before then taking the position of brewing supervisor at Apatin Brewery.

Three years later Nikola swapped Serbia for Scotland, becoming brewery manager at BrewDog. In more than six years, he oversaw a period of significant growth at the business.

Upon leaving the Ellon brewery, he would head south to take the job of head of brewery operations and expansion at Beavertown before then moving to operations director last November. During that time, Beavertown was acquired by Heineken and also opened its new brewery in Enfield.

Opening in August 2020, the new facility was armed with the ability to produce up to 500,000hl and to brew in 150hl batches.

Thanks to the popularity of beers such as Neck Oil, Beavertown has only grown further since. And similar to his time in Ellon, Nikola has been integral in overseeing the commission and addition of equipment that brews and packs these beers. 

In this episode we speak to Nikola about his role in specifying, building and expanding some of Britain’s biggest breweries, the main hurdles and challenges he’s encountered along the way, and his passion for learning, self-improvement and training, especially when it comes to his team.