While an ever-increasing phenomenon across the UK, the micro-pub is something that had so far evaded Oswestry.

That is, however, until the arrival of Bastion Alehouse in Leg Street, the fruits of 35-year-old Jamie Jones's labour in creating the first of its kind in town.

Jamie, who is from Chirk, is a former brewery technical worker – among other roles – and admits the arrival in Leg Street is the end of a very long journey.

The micro-pub is one that can operate out of any premises, foregoing the traditional make-up of a pub, with many stripping back to basics and giving punters a choice of local real ales.

And Jamie believe his experience has allowed him to carry out the research nerd to make Bastion an instant hit for what Oswestry needs.

"I just think there was something missing in Oswestry, really," he said. "There was a gap in the market, as such, as it's completely different to almost every pub in the area.

"In that sense, I mean the ale, the atmosphere – I didn't set out for it to be a pub but just a nice settled area for good beer.

"It's always independent breweries and mainly local beers; nothing mass produced from globally breweries but definitely from around the area.

"I'm from Chirk – I've always worked. I've had various careers in my time as I became a mechanic straight from school, joined the Marines and then worked for a brewery and that's where I learnt about the beer industry.

"I worked in tech services, so installing and maintaining beer lines, which was to an extent similar to the skills of an innkeeper, as it were.

"There I worked all over so I picked up some good and bad points of what to do in a lot of places, which is different to a lot of people running micro-pubs who will have a training course.

"The differences between them and me is that I when I worked at the brewery, it was on a global scale so I learned everything I needed to from a dispensing point of view.

"But I was looking at the micro-pub aspect. Around here, there's nothing like this at all but in the UK, there's a more than 300.

"I've spent a long time visiting them – I've done my research but this has been an idea in my head for a long time.

"In terms of that research and what I've done here, we only have a small space to contend here and some of the places I visited were bigger and smaller.

"So from that, I learned about what I could do to make the most from the space available. And even now, we're trying to get the balance right about what beers we can have on, to have something for everyone.

"But what works for a micro-pub in Stafford might not work here."

Jamie admits the starting up of the business has left him 'pretty knackered', but he believes that he has already found a solid customer base.

And he thinks he knows the key to keeping them happy – fresh beers all around!

"I think we're pretty much there on that process of finding what's best for us though," he added.

"We've got a group of regulars that come in most days, plus we have a good social media presence already that I've built up so that people can see what we've got on.

"The beers are always rotating – once a barrel is done then there's a new one on but some of the local stuff, such as Stonehouse, we'll have on a few times because that's popular.

"It's also part of what we're trying to do. The more crafty, keg type beers offers such a wide choice and we're spoilt for independent beers around here.

"The plan was to open in Chirk, when we first started thinking about it but that was possibly down to being lazy because I lived there. But I did my research and realised there was probably not as much of a customer base there as there is here.

"This part of town is really good for independent businesses – we do work with Hayes Kitchen around the corner. We're only open until 10pm so it's not raucous.

"You don't have to go too far now to get a good beer.

"On a scale of one-10, I'm pretty tired. But I can cope with that, I just never realised how much hard work it would be.

"With the premises being small, I thought it would be a doddle but there's a lot going on behind the scenes. This is enough for now."