It feels like only yesterday: on the 7th of January 2016 I sold my very first bottle of Lowlander Beer. Inspired by the limitless possibilities to brew naturally delicious beers with botanicals I took the plunge and started this adventurous journey.

Nine botanical beers, a sparkling Botanical Brut, four headquarters, a ‘wall of fame’ full of awards and a crew of thirteen further we celebrate our fourth birthday, wow…

After a few weeks of reflecting, celebrating and recovering from what was quite the eventful 2019 we’re back and ready to ‘beuken gek’!  (a.k.a. to rock it ;-)). The past year was one with many highlights but I would like to share a few personal ones: 

  • Hosting our Lowlander Botanical Brewkitchen pop up restaurant concept at the Horecava, where we build a 200m2 Botanical Greenhouse and more recently hosting a fabulous 4 course botanical pop-up dinner at the Wintergarden of the Krasnapolsky hotel in Amsterdam. (Psst: for this year; we are going to launch it in our own permanent space!)
  • Winning the overall best designed beer award at the World’s Beer Award; incredibly rewarding to see that all the work we put in to the detail of our packaging designs, the stories and illustrations are being recognised through this amazing award.
  • Brewing some of the best quality and most consistent botanical beers – we have been awarded another 21 new medals and awards this year including best IPA of the Netherlands at the World Beer Awards.
  • Driving over €7 million of PR value, without spending 1€ on advertising – from our “donate your Christmas tree” to the “Grow Your Own Garnish” campaign where we enticed people to grow their own botanicals to the many many “best of…” lists we featured in across the world.
  • Our constant quest to innovate is what I love most – we have launched the first true 0.00000% wit beer, introduced the Winter IPA brewed with needles from discarded Christmas trees, launched a summer tropical ale with the name of Islander and managed to squeeze in a festive bubbly beer wine hybrid with our Botanical Brut (oh and within a few months we are launching another three incredibly cool innovations!)
  • We finally could afford to pay for some research (rather than begging all the time) and the numbers were mind blowing: a crazy 11% of new customers into the speciality and craft beer category came in through Lowlander… wow so our idea of getting open minded explorers to try something different seems to be working.
  • As a team we have grown in numbers. We welcomed Stefan, Bob, Anna, Tom, Claire, Noren, Justin, Phil, Joep & Merel to the team and (hopefully) said “see you later” to Joost who is exploring Australia. I feel immensely proud of the team for achieving what we have achieved together this year and feel blessed that we work together the way we do.

So, the end of an era. The year just flew by, what an adventure it was! To round 2019 up: we have doubled our botanical business again (4th year running). In the Lowlands despite being the youngest, we are the most premium and fastest growing and are now in the top 5 of new wave beer brands; in the UK we are getting some real traction (with some exciting news to come this month) and isn’t it crazy that Lowlander is now available in more than 20 countries?!

I want to take the opportunity to say thank you to everyone who has supported us. Whether you joined our pop-up dinner at the Wintergarden, bought something in our webshop, shared our posts on social media, designed our latest labels, visited our Botanical Brewkitchen at Horecava, helped us to pick thousands of Christmas tree needles, sold Lowlander beers in your bar, made a friend try a Lowlander, wrote about us, enjoyed some bottles at your local bar or bottle shop or ordered a Lowlander at a festival: you know who you are. ⁠

To a botanical, naturally delicious 2020 all; bring it on!

Proost,
Frederik

Our Birthday treat to you

To celebrate our fourth birthday AND Lowlander’s Try January we’re giving away 10.000 botanically brewed Lowlander beers*! Because it might be the month of resolutions; at Lowlander we believe not all indulgence needs to be seen as sinful, just as not all restraint is necessarily virtuous. Start the year positive and discover new favourites and celebrate our birthday with us. Joining is easy; sign up to receive a voucher and you just might find your new lifetime favourite tipple.

No 18, no alcohol. Participating bars (NL only) can be found here