Meet Jesse, Co-Founder of JUBEL

Having graduated from the entrepreneurial rights of passage of delivering papers, washing cars, mowing lawns, and selling printed t-shirts, I finally launched my own business in 2018.

I seemed destined to work in the drinks industry given beer was such a strong theme in my family. My Grandad was a publican, my Great Uncle ran a brewery, and my Dad was a broker for breweries. Following in my family’s footsteps, whilst at University I won a couple of competitions pitching new beer concepts to AB InBev and Heineken, the two biggest brewing companies.

Whilst also at University, I took what was to become a career-changing ski trip to the French Alps. Here I discovered demi-pêche; a pint of lager with a peach top. Dangerously easy to drink with the refreshment of a fruit cider and the sessionability of a crisp lager, I was determined to bring the drink to the UK. I bottled it (excuse the pun) after graduating and went for the less risky option of the Mars Chocolate graduate scheme which made my parents happy but I was miserable; I was a complete square peg in a round corporate hole.

Outside of work I spent time learning how to brew. Fruit lagers didn’t exist yet and it took two years of trial and error to find the perfect recipe for JUBEL. After landing on a batch that was drinkable, I took it to a music festival and made an innocent-style commitment that I’d quit my job if I sold out over the weekend. I flew through the batch of beer and handed in my notice the following week to pursue my dream to be an entrepreneur. I used to listen to an entrepreneurial podcast every morning driving to work at Mars and I didn’t want to look back at the end of my career with regret that I had never pursued my passion so it pushed me to just go for it.

After six months of sleeping on the floor in a warehouse whilst trying to raise some investment, partner with a large-scale contract brewery, and line up some routes to market, JUBEL was finally launched in April 2018.