Owners David and Maureen James were delighted with the turn-out as dozens of people arrived within minutes of them opening the doors to the former stables in Clay House Yard where they have set up the East Coast Brewing Company.

About 600 pints were served as up to 150 people passed through the brewery, which is down an alleyway next to the Foords car park, off Mitford Street.

Before setting up their new enterprise, the couple owned the much larger Fernandes brewery in Wakefield, which has now been sold to Ossett.

The brewery is currently producing four beers – Bonhomme Richard (3.6%), John Paul Jones (4.3%), Commodore (4.1%) and Moodies Mild (6%). Mr James said many of the visitors worked their way up to the strongest beer, which was most people’s favourite!

While many of the visitors came from Wakefield, others came with fellow CAMRA members from other parts of the region, including Rotherham, Hull, Skipton, Mansfield, Nottingham, York and Scarborough.

Bob and Ruth Frudd said they had already sampled some of the Filey-brewed beer in Wakefield and had come up for the day to see where it was made. “It’s very nice,” said Mr Frudd. “I’m sure the brewery will be a great success.”

Wakefield CAMRA member Maureen Waller described the beer as “just beautiful,” adding: “Everyone was so upset when Dave and Maureen left. They’ve got a real following in Wakefield. It’s not just how friendly they are – Dave brews a superb beer.”

Maureen and her husband Derek – who are friends of the Jameses – presented the couple with a special cake to celebrate the start of their new venture.

Mr James said: “A lot of people are going for quality these days, not quantity,” adding that the people of Filey deserved better than they’d had in the past.

Next month he is launching two new beers – High Tide and Low Tide, which will be the Wakefield Beer Festival’s special and will be available at the same time from Bonhomme’s bar in Filey.

“They’re totally new beers,” said Mr James, who has won many awards for his beers in the past and hopes to repeat his success at Wakefield.

Mrs James said it had been a tiring but very successful weekend. “Everybody enjoyed themselves and it gave people a chance to have a look around and ask questions.

“The whole thing about the beer is to get people into Filey, and we will be doing official brewery trips in the future. There will be a charge, but we’ll have food and a bar, and then a talk about how beer is brewed.”

The couple hope that giving their beers names with a link to the town’s heritage will get people talking about Filey – and hopefully visiting.

Although the beers are only sold at a limited number of pubs, they are much in demand across the region and can now be found at pubs in Hull, Wakefield, Scarborough and south Yorkshire, in addition to Bon-homme’s bar in Filey.