Haydon Morgan

Long serving Lion brewer Haydon Morgan is set to take over from Chris Sheehan as head brewer at Malt Shovel Brewery, home of James Squire.

Sheehan has taken up a new role within the Lion business as Queensland head brewer – craft. He will have oversight of the new Eumundi Brewery on the Sunshine Coast, the Charming Squire brewpub in Brisbane and Byron Bay Brewery in Northern NSW.

Sheehan said it wasn’t an easy decision to leave Malt Shovel, particularly given the recent launch of its new experimental range, Malt Shovel Brewers.

“That brewery’s doing a lot of innovative stuff now, it’s good fun. But the opportunity to live in Noosa with a young family was too good to pass up,” he told Australian Brews News.

“And having lived up in Queensland and worked at the XXXX Brewery, I see Queensland as the new frontierfor craft beer – I think the scene up there will go nuts.”

The brewing kit will be installed at the Imperial Hotel in Eumundi in May, with brewing on-site to begin shortly after.

Sheehan’s successor Morgan joins Malt Shovel from the Tooheys brewery in Sydney, where he worked in roles including technical brewer, as well as acting head brewer.

Morgan has attained the highest level of brewing qualification offered by the Institute Of Brewing and Distilling, Master Brewer.

“We’ve got a long handover, given we’ll be in the same team alongside Little Creatures’ Russ Gosling in Fremantle and Warren Pawsey in Geelong,” Sheehan said.