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You Want People Like This To Succeed

Passion, determination and local independent trade

Andy Taylor
3 min readDec 20, 2023

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I moved to Cardiff, Wales about 6 and a half years ago. Almost immediately I noticed a new shop appear — it traded in two of my favourite things (music and beer) and had a brilliant name: Pop’n’Hops

In the intervening years there have been twists and turns in both of our “journeys”. I now run my own companies which, amongst many benefits, gives me the time and flexibility to pursue hobbies.

That shop that intrigued me has moved location (by just one place on the High Street), leant in on one aspect of its initial offering (beer) and survived the greatest threat to business in generations — the pandemic.

COVID really did affect so much of our lives didn’t it?

People couldn’t browse for records during lockdowns, but they could order beer to be delivered. That’s how and why Pop’n’Hops lost the music element and doubled-down on the beer.

As my professional podcast production business grew, and a new passion for homebrewing developed in my locked down evenings and weekends, I decided a good intersection of my skills would be my own “just for fun” beer podcast.

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