The owner of a gin distillery has offered to limit the number of tours and tastings after neighbours objected over fears about the prospect of noise.
Inger Smith, 52, co-owner of Madame Jennifer Distillery, made the offer at a Brighton and Hove City Council licensing panel hearing today (Friday 20 March).
Immediate neighbours raised concerns about noise from visitors as the panel considered an application to extend the opening hours until 10pm on Fridays and Saturdays and until 9.30pm on Sundays.
The distillery operates from a unit in Poets Corner House, in Montgomery Street, Hove, and can only sell or offer tastings of its own products. But Ms Smith and her partner, Ian Curtis, 51, would like to offer tastings from other independent Sussex distillers.
At the licensing panel hearing, neighbour Fynn Hudson-Prentice said that he usually went to bed early because of his job as a professional cricketer for Sussex.
Mr Hudson-Prentice said that his main concern was the extra noise of people coming to and from the building and potentially more traffic in the area.
He said: “Our bedroom backs on to where the distillery is which means our evenings would be more disrupted with a lot of noise around.
“Having more people around with more alcohol involved … people don’t abide by being quiet when leaving the premises.”
Another neighbour, Julian Burrows, said that the shutters made a noise – and two houses were being built on a site next to Poets Corner House which would prevent the use of the car park.
Mr Burrows said: “Is the distillery then going to use the parking area as an outside drinking area?
“With the hours mentioned, 9.30pm and 10pm, it’s activity where alcohol is involved and some people don’t have a switch off.”
Ms Smith said that any drinking would take place inside the premises which was one of seven businesses operating in the building – and the car park was not linked with her business.
During tours and tasting sessions, which would be limited to 10 people with pre-booked tickets, customers would drink approximately 50 millilitres of gin or two units of alcohol.
She said that Madame Jennifer Distillery opened in 2017 and had offered tours for the past six years.
Ms Smith said: “The changes to the times are just to make things a bit easier because we have sales both on and off the premises.
“People can pop in and buy a bottle of gin if they let us know they’re coming in and usually we offer tours on Friday and Saturdays.
“There is no plan to offer a bar-style premises. It would all be pre-booked via our website.”
She hoped to offer tastings from other independent producers to encourage people who have been on tours to come back again.
The licensing panel was made up of three councillors – Ivan Lyons, Paul Nann and Sam Parrott. They retired to make their decision which should be made public within five working days.
Considering that the changes are minor and there have been no prior complaints despite tours running for six years, these complaints seem very weak. I suspect there will be no issue with allowing this through.
Benjamin “I suspect there will be no issue” — based on what exactly? You don’t live next door, so it’s easy to dismiss concerns as “weak.”
People directly affected are raising issues about noise and disruption, which is kind of the whole point of a licensing process. Not every opinion needs to be waved away just because it doesn’t seem like a big deal from the outside.
You’re entitled to an opinion, but it’s not automatically more valid than the people who actually have to live with the outcome
I just articulated that. Again, GPT misrepresents. 13th time.
Benjamin, saying “misrepresented” for the 13th time doesn’t actually address anything — it just avoids the point.
You described the neighbours’ concerns as “very weak” and dismissed the likelihood of any issue. When that gets challenged, you immediately fall back on claiming misrepresentation instead of explaining what was supposedly wrong.
That’s the pattern people are noticing. Any pushback gets reframed as someone else misunderstanding you, rather than you engaging with the criticism itself.
If you genuinely think your point was misrepresented, then clarify it properly. Repeating the claim over and over just looks like a way to dodge the conversation.
Did you manage to get some sun bathing in yesterday down on the beach chat GPT asking ?
No, but saying I just articulated the reason would prompt a human to read the comment made before to find the answer to the very question they had just asked…
I didn’t dismiss neighbours’ concerns. I said that, given the scale of the changes and the fact that similar tours have operated for six years without complaints, the objections appear relatively weak in planning terms.
That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be considered, just that based on the available evidence, they may not carry significant weight in a licensing decision.
Benjamin, this is honestly getting exhausting. You keep circling back to the same accusation instead of engaging with what I’m actually saying. Whether or not AI was involved doesn’t change the substance of the argument, and dismissing it on that basis just avoids the point.
To be clear (again), nobody is proposing Community Payback as a long-term fix. The point was about using it as a short-term, targeted measure to deal with a specific problem. If you disagree with that approach, fine—then say why. But repeating the same line about AI and “flawed arguments” isn’t really addressing the discussion.
If you want to have a proper conversation about the policy itself, I’m happy to do that. Otherwise, we’re just going in circles.
You’ve gotten your articles mixed up James, lol.
WOW a cricketer needs to go to bed early. Its ten people give the business a chance. Or pitch your tent on the cricket ground. Plus when you get up early don’t be making a noise hitting the ball as the cricket ground is surrounded by housing.
Does the professional cricketer work 9-5, 7 x days a week? Does he ever play away matches including international or just local matches? Sounds like a business which has been operating for nearly 10 years with few issues should not be impacted by a few people who’ve chosen, let’s face it, to live in a city, and not a sleepy village which might suit them better.
Licensing laws are specifically used to limit public disturbance. I imagine, as multiple people have complained, that it is causing these people concerns and impacting their quality of life. How is that ever ok? Poets Corner is a really quiet residential area. I don’t blame them being miffed. I would be too. It’s not fair to gaslight people who actually live there and are suffering the consequences.
I would kindly say that there have been no complaints, further confirmed at the panel.
Quite ironic Fynn Hudson-Prentice is complaining since at the end of last season he ended up hauled up in front of a disciplinary panel after disgracing himself whilst drunk!