Dunoon Goes POP
a new social enterprise based at the POP shop
inspired by the People Of Place or POP.

It started with George

In the 1880s an enterprising pharmacist called George Stirling opened a soft drinks factory in Dunoon behind his shop on Argyll Street. The factory continued to produce and distribute soft drinks in reusable bottles until the late 1970s.

Soft drinks were a product of empire, drawing sugar and spices from across the globe and infusing them with bubbles of carbon dioxide.

Dunoon Goes POP is a reimagining of how soft drinks could be produced in Dunoon again, but in a way that enriches our understanding of people and how we can make and consume drinks to locally to regenerate the planet and economy.

Dunoon Goes POP is a reimagining of how soft drinks could be produced in Dunoon again, but in a way that enriches our understanding of people and how we can make and consume drinks to locally to regenerate the planet and economy.

Doing things differently

We want to bring soft drinks production back to Dunoon in a way that minimises our impact on the planet and maximises our positive impact on the community. We’ll do this by connecting people to the fascinating heritage of soft drinks-making through practical workshops, growing ingredients and gathering local heritage stories.

Thanks to National Lottery players, we have funding from Heritage Lottery Fund and the National Lottery Community Fund and we’re running two Dunoon Goes POP projects to help us work towards a socially enterprising approach to local soft drinks production. And, we’re looking for local people to get involved.

Supported by:

How can I get involved?

150-bottles of pop with Dunoon Burgh Hall

We thought that mixing heritage stories, rhubarb growing and pop-making would be the perfect recipe for Dunoon Goes POP to celebrate 150 years of Dunoon Burgh Hall.

To do this we’re making 150 bottles of a rhubarb-flavoured commemorative pop, a drink that celebrates the Hall’s architect Robert Bryden. You can get involved by:

adding your rhubarb patch to our rhubarb map
providing us with some rhubarb
attending a heritage story workshop
gathering heritage stories>
helping us to make 150 bottles of pop.
buy limited edition soft drink syrups, raise a glass to Dunoon Burgh Hall.

As and when these opportunities are available, we’ll include links to them above.

Dunoon Goes POP garden creation

We are all about using locally grown plants to create really delicious flavours for our soft drinks.

So far our locally-inspired flavours:

Local clothing designer and shopkeeper Margaret Parker’s Parisienne lemonade infused with lavender. American Year’s cola with coriander, lavender and citrus, a new spin on a classic flavour. And, our rhubarb flavoured pop inspired by Dunoon Burgh Hall’s architect Robert Bryden.

With our community’s help, we’re turning an abandoned space at the back of the POP shop into a garden of flavour-giving plants that are good for soft-drinks, teas and our wellbeing. We want this garden to be good for wildlife as well as for people.

We’ll share opportunities to get involved as they arise.

Thanks to the input from a group of local people, we created a design for the new garden. Using sustainable practices, we’ve been growing and nurturing flavoursome plants to include in the new garden through a series of workshops with our community. Our new garden will grow plants that can be used in drinks making, which also have interesting stories, including lavender, caraway, marshmallow, yarrow and apples. And, of course, some tasty rhubarb. We’re also building new raised beds using durable materials.