Only Fine Beer

September 20, 2006
Great selection, lots of nice kit from Belgium. Searching the website can be a pain since some of the beers have been spelled incorrectly, they also often dont have the beers on the site in stock. Decent p+p prices and the package arrived when they said it would. Overall its a great shop but its worth phoning before you order to check that they have your beers in stock.

August 3, 2006
Very good selection of british ales, helpful and friendly staff, always worth a visit. Because it is situated in the suburbs of Chelmsford, there’s always a chance to find a place for Your car........ Should be combined with or rounded by a visit to the excellent "Queens Head" in Chelmsford !

October 24, 2005
Am I the first RB member to visit since the move to Essex? I see nobody has rated it in over 20 months. I don’t know what the old place was like, because I never visited, but this new place wasn’t quite what I expected. It’s dark, dingy and a little dirty but there is a large selection of bottles from around the world. I found the Belgian selection somewhat pedestrian actually, but it has the best German & United States selection I’ve seen in the UK, plus lots of British beers and several other special beers from around the world. Freshness is possibly an issue, as some of the beers have clearly been on the shelves for 5 years or more (perhaps that’s why its kept so dark in there), service was very friendly but not really that knowledgeable (not Gavin serving). Far too unorganised to properly work out what they have and get the beers you are really interested in. Also, don’t believe the website for an accurate representation of their stock, they only had 3 of the 9 beers I was after. All in all OK, but far too far out of the way to bother visiting again.

February 14, 2004 [ Updated October 27, 2005 ]
Man, do I love this shop!! Definately my favorite beer shop of all time!! The selection is huge, I guess there is more than 1000 different beers to select from!! Some are in the shop but if you ask Gavin (the owner) politely ;-) he might show you the room behind the shop and even the loft were he has a great selection of vintage and very rare beers!! Gavin is a very nice person and very helpful in all means!! Bus No. 15 goes directky to the door!!

January 26, 2004
Way hard to get to, but worth the haul. As I understand it, this shop is moving, so many of you will never have to make the trek into no man's land to get to Bottles. Massive selection of UK micros, and I thought Bottles in some ways was better than Pitfield Beer Shop because Bottles seemed to have more, well, bottles. Bottles' downside is that the place is chaotic, unorganized, many beers are dusty and old and the selection is rather downscale. Also, Bottles location sucks. As I recall, there was a Commercial St and a Commercial Rd, and you must walk down the latter from Aldgate East's tube stop to arrive at Bottles.

January 22, 2004
One of favourite places to visit in London. Small, cluttered shop, with beer literally everywhere. Lots of beers to chose from. Great selection of beers from mainland Europe, the British Ilses, as well as a few from the US and from many different countries around the world. To make things better, Gavin and his staff are extremely nice, and always offering help and advice. A great store, if a little out of the way, well worth the walk from Aldgate East tube stop.

January 21, 2004
Gavin is wonderful, and if he's not there when you visit you've missed a chance of some great conversation and the chance of getting a good discount. The shop is a total mess with very little place to stand or gather your bottles because there are cases everywhere and the counter is very small and always crowded with more bottles. And what you see is not everything - there is a large and equally cluttered store-room behind the counter with even more beer, a lot of which is not on display. Gavin is aware that his store is in a daft location (the bulk of his customers are locals buying cigarettes and cheap lager), and he has plans to move to East Anglia. He always seems on the brink of financial disaster, but struggles through somehow. Bottles is a legend and is a must visit shop for any beer geek coming to London. Support the real beer enthusiast and buy your beer from Gavin!

January 21, 2004 [ Updated January 22, 2004 ]
Huge selection of Belgian and British rarities in an shop totally filled with beers. Little room to move, but lots of treasures to be discovered. During my visit, Gavin wasn't there. A young girl was very friendly and tried to be helpful, but couldn't tell me very much. In an ugly and out of the way street in London, stacked with little shops run by foreigners.

January 20, 2004
Out of the way place. Whitechapel might be the closest tube, but it's a ramble through nondescript residential areas - easy to get lost. Aldgate East is more direct, if farther. Cramped shop, trip over bottles, great selection, helpful staff. Well worth visiting if you have the time to get there.

January 20, 2004 [ Updated January 21, 2004 ]
I prefer this to Pitfield, not because its selection is better (Pitfield probably beats Bottles on Belgians; vice versa on the rest of the world), but because it is always a sense of adventure being here. Amid the London drunks, one of whom walked in while I was there and asked to buy "super-strength lager", Gavin has great suppliers keeping him stocked with Westvleteren and tons of other rarities. Found some Weltenberger there one day, plus some rare countries including Cuba. Gavin has worked very hard here yet does not seem to be doing any more than scraping by. A place I am very happy to patronize--although you have to plan on spending an hour each way getting there from central/"tourist" London (a bit less if you're on the east end like the Tower or Bank).