Most of what we share with Macardles Friends is photographs. This one is numbers. But stay with us, because the numbers tell a story.
Tucked away in the Macardle Moore Collection at the Louth County Archives are the brewery’s own financial papers: the 1863 partnership deed, the certificate of incorporation, the directors’ attendance book and a run of annual accounts.
This month they became the subject of the first ever accounting history of Macardles, written by Dr Desmond Gibney and published in the Accounting, Finance & Governance Review. His research drew on the digitisation project the Society runs with DkIT. Here is what the ledgers tell us.
1. Two partners, £750 each
The partnership deed is dated 1st January 1863. Edward Henry Macardle and Andrew Thomas Moore each put in £750 of capital, with interest paid on their balances.
Profits were not split evenly at first. Macardle took two thirds and Moore one third. In later years they moved to equal shares.
The partners’ capital accounts for A. T. Moore and E. H. Macardle, from 1863.
The books ran to a year end of 31st August, with half-year accounts to the end of February. That date was no accident. Brewers of the day were advised to close their books when stocks of malt and hops were at their lowest.
Accounts survive for 13 full years and nine half-years between 1878 and 1893.
2. Going limited in 1895 and keeping it in the family
Macardle, Moore and Company Limited was incorporated on 19th November 1895 with a nominal share capital of £40,000. Only two Irish breweries registered as companies that year: Macardles and Beamish & Crawford of Cork, whose nominal capital was £186,400.
Hidden in the archive is a clue to how it was done: a copy of Palmer’s Private Companies (1890), a how-to guide for converting a partnership. The pages on transferring shares are marked up. The book appears to have belonged to John McNiffe, the company’s trustee.
The first four subscribers took one share each: Margaret Macardle, Nellie Macardle, Anna Moore and Thomas Levins Moore. The first board was Margaret, her sons Thomas Callan, John St. Patrick and Michael J., along with Anna Moore and Thomas Levins Moore.
In 1908 the family went further. Extraordinary meetings in May and June capped the company at 50 shareholders, banned any offer of shares to the public and restricted share transfers. Macardles was going to stay a family business.
The 1908 changes to the Articles of Association.
3. Two hundred and twelve meetings
The directors’ attendance book runs from November 1895 to April 1910. In those 15 years the board met 212 times, almost monthly. The busiest years were 1896, the first full year as a company, and 1908, the year the rules changed. Both saw 20 meetings.
Signatures from the first board meeting of the new company.
Every director present had to sign the book. Margaret Macardle signed more often than most.
The frustrating part is that the minutes of those meetings have never been found. We know when the board met and who was there, but not what they said.
If you ever come across a Macardles minute book in an attic, a solicitor’s office or a box at an auction, please get in touch at info@macardles.ie. It would be one of the most important finds this archive could make.
4. The numbers, 1909 to 1915
Four years of limited company accounts survive in good enough shape to compare. All figures are in pounds sterling, rounded.
| 1909 | 1912 | 1914 | 1915 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Profit on brewing and malting | 14,010 | 12,966 | 12,875 | 24,740 |
| Net profit | 15,236 | 14,606 | 14,555 | 19,889 |
| Cash in hand and at bank | 15,877 | 17,651 | 17,873 | 20,612 |
| Reserves | 105,579 | 125,612 | 133,323 | 87,000 |
| Managers’ salaries | 2,000 | 2,000 | 2,000 | 2,000 |
A few things jump out.
- No borrowing at all. The balance sheets are debt free, with current assets on average more than ten times current liabilities.
- A steady 10% dividend. Every year the shareholders received 10% of the £33,750 issued capital, with a 1% bonus in 1912, 1914 and 1915 and a further 2% bonus in 1915.
- A slice for management. Around 6% of profits was paid out as commission on top of £2,000 a year in managers’ salaries. Much of that almost certainly went to the families themselves.
- No sales figures. The accounts never say how much beer was sold. Irish companies were not required to disclose turnover until 1986.
5. The 1915 puzzle
The 1915 Directors’ Report is one of the treasures of our archive, and you can see the original here. It is gloomy reading. The directors warn of
“the high cost of materials, increased working expenses, enormous Government taxation and a reduction in trade owing to the depopulation of the country as a result of War.”
The 1915 Directors’ Report.
They ordered a complete revaluation of the company’s assets. And it shows. Reserves fell from £133,323 to £87,000. Debtors were written down by over £20,000 and premises and plant by nearly £17,000.
Yet in the very same year, profit on brewing almost doubled, from £12,875 to £24,740. And the shareholders received a bigger bonus dividend than ever.
How do you square the two? Part of the answer is the war itself. Macardles did a very big trade supplying ale to the British Army and shipped beer to troops in Liverpool and the Mediterranean. Part may be a board being prudent, perhaps a little too prudent, about what lay ahead.
6. The tax that was crossed out
Look closely at the 1915 report and you will find something wonderful. A typed line sets aside £4,000 for Excess Profits Duty. Someone has struck it through in ink.
The £4,000 was instead added to the £5,000 already going to the general reserve, making £9,000.
Excess Profits Duty was brand new. Introduced by the Finance (No. 2) Act 1915, it taxed profits above a pre-war standard at 50%. It has been described as the first general corporation tax in Britain or Ireland.
So in one pen stroke on a sheet of Macardles paper, we can watch a Dundalk board wrestle with the birth of corporation tax.
7. What they left behind
The value of each estate at death gives a sense of what the brewery built. Dr Gibney converted the figures to 2025 values.
| Died | Estate | In 2025 terms | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Edward Henry Macardle | Feb 1887 | £6,136 5s 3d | €1.12 million |
| Andrew Thomas Moore | May 1887 | £99,805 9s 4d | €18.27 million |
| Margaret Macardle | Dec 1921 | £56,454 11s 11d | €4.47 million |
| Sir Thomas Callan Macardle | Dec 1925 | £32,420 10s 9d | €2.61 million |
Andrew Moore’s fortune came mostly from outside the brewery: leather, distilling and banking. But the Macardle figures tell their own story. Edward left a comfortable estate. Margaret, who led the company for a quarter of a century, left roughly four times as much in today’s money.
What next
Dr Gibney’s paper ends by pointing at the gaps: the 1950s link with Ind Coope, the 1962 formation of Irish Ale Breweries, the Guinness takeover of 1988 and the closure in 2001. Much of that material is sitting in our archive waiting to be scanned and shared.
Our thanks to Dr Desmond Gibney and to the Louth County Archives Service for their work on this collection.
Sources: Macardle Moore Collection, Louth County Archives Service (PP470); Gibney, D. (2026), Accounting in Macardles Brewery in the Late 19th and Early 20th Centuries, Accounting, Finance & Governance Review, 37, doi.org/10.52399/001c.165335.
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Do you have photographs, documents or family stories connected to Macardles? We would love to hear from you at info@macardles.ie.
