Brewery and Distillery Equipment Transport Across the UK

UK brewing has been through a decade of openings, expansions and consolidations, and Companies House now records over 2,600 active companies with brewery, brewing or distiller in their registered name. Every expansion moves vessels in, every closure moves them out, and a large second-hand market moves them sideways between the two.

T&C Logistics moves brewing and distilling equipment for breweries, distilleries, equipment dealers, installers and pub groups - single vessels, complete small-batch plants, cellar equipment and keg movements. We have run specialist transport since 2020 with over 2,400 deliveries completed and more than 3,000 vetted driver-partners nationwide. Goods-in-transit cover is £50,000 per consignment on our own vehicles, rising to £1,000,000 through partners. Quotes from £50 (ex VAT), quoted in full upfront.

What brewing and distilling equipment does T&C Logistics move?

Fermenters and conditioning tanks, mash tuns, coppers and kettles, hot and cold liquor tanks, small stills, heat exchangers, pumps, kegging and bottling equipment, casks and kegs, and cellar dispense equipment.

Vessels are the defining item and the planning number is rarely weight. An empty stainless fermenter is light for its size; what decides the vehicle is height, diameter and whether the vessel has legs, a cone or a jacket. A 10-barrel conical fermenter can be over 2.5 m tall, which puts it outside a standard van long before payload becomes an issue.

Vehicle choice runs from a Luton van with tail lift through 7.5-tonne and 18-tonne vehicles, with a step frame trailer where height is the constraint.

Why is height the constraint rather than weight?

Because an empty stainless vessel weighs far less than its size suggests, while a tall tank in a box body can exceed the vehicle's internal height or the overall road height limit once it is upright on a bed.

The practical arithmetic is worth doing before booking. A vessel 2.6 m tall standing upright inside a box body with a bed height around a metre puts the top of the tank well above four metres, which is above the height that can pass under a great deal of UK infrastructure. Vessels of that size normally travel on a step frame or a flat bed, or laid down and cradled where the manufacturer permits it.

Whether a vessel may be laid down is a manufacturer question, not a haulage preference. Some vessels are designed to travel horizontally on cradles and some are not, and a jacketed or dimpled vessel laid on an unsupported point can distort. Send the vessel dimensions and the manufacturer's transport guidance and the vehicle can be matched properly.

What is different about a used-plant purchase?

Everything is unknown until someone looks. Second-hand brewing plant is a large market, and vessels bought at auction or from a closing brewery are frequently still connected, still in place, and larger than the buyer expected.

The recurring problems are consistent: the vessel is still plumbed and wired and nobody has been booked to disconnect it; it was installed before the building was finished and will not come out the way it went in; or it sits on a mezzanine reachable only by a lift that cannot take it. None of these are transport problems, but all of them stop a transport job.

What helps is a site visit or good photographs before the vehicle is booked - the vessel in place, the route out, the doorway, and any level change. Disconnection needs a competent engineer, and where the plant includes pressure equipment that is a specific competence. See our auction house collections for equipment bought at sale.

Do you handle pressure vessels and connection work?

We transport them; we do not open, disconnect, test or recommission them. Pressure systems in a brewery are subject to the Pressure Systems Safety Regulations 2000, which require a written scheme of examination and examination by a competent person.

That covers a good deal of brewery plant - steam systems, compressed air, carbon dioxide, and any vessel operating under pressure. The regulations place duties on the owner and user of the system, and the competent-person role is a defined one. A haulier has no part in it, and any carrier implying otherwise should be treated with caution.

The practical sequence is: your engineer isolates, depressurises, disconnects and prepares the vessel; we collect and transport; your engineer reinstalls and arranges examination. Where a vessel is moving as part of a plant relocation, the examination scheme usually needs revisiting at the new site, and that timing is worth building into the programme.

Can you move casks, kegs and cellar equipment?

Yes. Empty cask and keg movements are high-count rather than heavy, and cellar dispense equipment - cooling, gas lines, python and pumps - moves alongside them.

Keg logistics has its own rhythm: breweries need empties back, pubs need fulls delivered, and the two legs are frequently the same journey. An empty steel keg weighs relatively little but a full vehicle load is a substantial count, and secure stacking matters more than payload. Casks are more fragile than kegs and the shive and keystone holes are the damage points.

Cellar equipment moves when a pub refits or changes hands. Cooling units and dispense equipment are electrical and water-connected, so the same disconnect-before-collection rule applies. Gas cylinders are a separate matter entirely - carbon dioxide and mixed gas cylinders are classified dangerous goods, and our ADR-certified drivers cover that where a load genuinely requires it. See our hazardous goods service and ADR Class 2 courier service.

Do you carry alcohol as well as equipment?

Finished product movement is a separate service with its own duty considerations - see our alcohol courier service. This page covers plant and equipment.

The distinction matters because duty-suspended alcohol movement carries obligations that equipment transport does not. Where a brewery relocation involves both plant and stock, they are usually best handled as two arrangements rather than one, and the stock leg needs planning against your own duty position rather than around the vehicle schedule.

For equipment, no such complication applies: an empty vessel is freight. What we do need is realistic dimensions, a clear picture of the access at both ends, and confirmation that disconnection is arranged. See also our food and drink industry hub.

What happens on a brewery closure sale?

Several buyers arrive for several lots, usually on the same short window, and the site becomes a queue. Planning your own collection against that queue is what determines whether it goes smoothly.

Closure and insolvency sales run to a hard deadline set by the landlord or the administrator, commonly a few days. Every buyer wants their lot out, the access is single-file, and the vessels at the back cannot leave until the ones at the front do. A buyer who books transport for the last day of the window has no contingency at all.

What helps: knowing your lot number and its physical position, whether the vendor provides any lifting equipment on site, and whether power is still connected for anything that needs it. Auction terms usually place removal entirely on the buyer, including making good, and they usually exclude any assistance from the vendor.

Book earlier in the window rather than later, and send photographs of the lot in place if you have them. See our auction house collections for how sale-day collections are handled.

Can you move plant to or from Ireland?

Yes. Both Northern Ireland and the Republic are served, and the routing differs: Northern Ireland is a domestic movement, while the Republic involves a customs procedure.

For equipment rather than duty-suspended product, the customs position is comparatively straightforward, but it still needs paperwork and it still needs someone to prepare it. Build the lead time into the plan rather than treating an Irish delivery as a longer domestic one.

See our Northern Ireland freight service and UK to Ireland pallet service, and our customs support for the documentation side.

What does brewery equipment transport cost?

One fixed price per dedicated job, quoted upfront, fuel and goods-in-transit insurance included. Brewing plant is never consolidated onto a shared network.

From £50 (ex VAT). Final price depends on distance, vehicle, urgency and time - quoted in full upfront before you book. Related: catering equipment transport and commercial refrigeration transport. Call 0121 720 3841 or use our contact page.