Orchard to Bottle: How a Chemical Engineer is Redefining Craft Beverage Production at Spreyton
In the craft beverage world, most producers buy their fruit, juice, or concentrate from external suppliers. Very few get to control the entire journey from the tree to the can.
At Spreyton, that full control is not just a marketing line. It is a genuine operational advantage, and it sits at the heart of how Production and Beverage Manager Shivam Tandon approaches his role.
A Different Kind of Production Manager
Shiv came to Spreyton with a background in chemical engineering and process engineering, specialised in brewing. His career began in the classic way many modern brewers start, as a university student who turned to homebrewing after watching YouTube videos and realising his science degree could be applied to fermentation.
He later formalised that passion with a chemical engineering degree, a Certificate III in Food Processing (Brewing), and time spent teaching brewing. Yet when he moved into cider and broader beverage production at Spreyton, the biggest shift wasn’t the switch from grain to apples. It was the sudden ability to influence almost every variable in the process.
“An apple is very different to malt or grain,” Shiv notes. Having the orchard on-site means he can work directly with the raw material in a way most beverage manufacturers never can.
Why Full Visibility Changes Everything
When a producer sources fruit from multiple external growers, consistency becomes harder to lock down. Sugar levels, acidity, flavour compounds, and seasonal variation all sit outside their direct control.
At Spreyton, Shiv has visibility from the moment the fruit is picked. That closeness allows tighter process control: better prediction of fermentation behaviour, more precise adjustments to pH and sugar, and greater confidence in batch-to-batch consistency.
Every batch is still put through analytical testing, pH, alcohol, residual sugar, and other key markers, but the data is more meaningful because the starting material is better understood.
This combination of traditional orchard access and modern engineering discipline is relatively rare in the Australian beverage industry.
Science Doesn’t Kill Creativity — It Enables It
While Shiv’s approach is data-driven, it doesn’t come at the expense of innovation. New product development still relies on experimentation. Multiple pilot-scale batches are common before a recipe is signed off for full production.
One clear example is Spreyton’s Hard Raspberry Lemonade. After spotting growing demand in the RTD category, Shiv spent months testing different raspberry sources and lemon varieties until the balance of flavour, acidity, and drinkability felt right. The result has become one of the company’s fastest-moving products.
The same rigorous process is applied across Spreyton’s expanding range of cider, ginger beer, sparkling waters, juices, and non-alcoholic drinks.
A Model for the Future of Craft Beverages
As consumers increasingly look for authenticity, transparency, and consistent quality, the ability to control the full production chain becomes a genuine competitive edge.
Shiv’s work at Spreyton shows what happens when process engineering meets orchard-level control. The science remains the same — yeast converting natural sugars into alcohol and carbon dioxide — but the level of influence over every stage of that process is unusually high.
In an industry often split between large industrial producers and small artisanal makers, Spreyton occupies an interesting middle ground: big enough to apply serious engineering discipline, yet close enough to the land to retain real character in the glass.
That balance, more than any single product, may be the most interesting part of the story.
Visit Spreyton Cider Co
Come and experience Spreyton for yourself. Enjoy seasonal Tasmanian food, cider tasting paddles, craft beer, spirits, non-alcoholic drinks and fresh apple juice beside our working family orchard.
Spreyton Cider Co is located at 6 Melrose Road, Aberdeen, Tasmania 7310. Only 10 minutes from Devonport or Latrobe
Cellar door: Open daily from 10.00 am to 5.00 pm and until 8.00pm on Friday nights
Kitchen: Lunch daily from 11.30 am to 3.30 pm and Friday dining from 11.30 am to 7.00 pm
Contact: Call us on (03) 6427 3664 or visit the website: spreytonciderco.com.au.
Plan your visit, book a table or shop the Spreyton range online.
