Martin Dickie and James Watt

Founders, Brewdog

Founded in 2007, the back-to-basics Aberdeenshire brewery has demonstrated that holy grail of entrepreneurial talent: finding a niche in an ostensibly overcrowded market. Bored with the customary offering of beers dominating the UK market, founders James Watt and Martin Dickie decided to create their own home-brewed craft ales, which they began selling at markets out of the back of their van. Brushing aside the hostility of the established big dogs of the industry, today Brewdog is a world-class eco-brewery which, after five successive years of impressive growth, now has a multimillion pound turnover and a number of successful bars throughout the UK and as far afield as Italy and Brazil. In 2014, it also won British Entrepreneur of the Year at the Great British Entrepreneur Awards 2014. The company expects to create hundreds of new jobs over the next three years.