Australian craft retailer Beer Cartel has celebrated a successful close of its crowd funding campaign, raising almost $1.45 million from 1,063 investors.
Funds from the campaign, which launched through crowd funding platform Birchal in late June, will now be used to accelerate Beer Cartel’s growth in to the future.
The final figure raised of $1,448,338 sees Beer Cartel record the second highest equity crowd fund in Australian liquor industry history after Sydney’s Batch Brewing secured $1.5 million back in April to finance their expansion plans. Prior to Batch’s raise, the previous highest alcohol-related crowd fund was $933,500 back in 2018 by Margaret River company The West Winds Gin.
“We’re truly excited by those that have invested in Beer Cartel and become shareholders. Our customers, staff and suppliers have always been of huge importance to the business, (now) we add a new cohort, our wonderful shareholders,” Beer Cartel co-founder Richard Kelsey said. “We had the second highest number of people register their interest in investing in the business that Birchal has ever seen. It’s been very exciting seeing this now translate into people investing in the business.”
While the result was truly exciting, Richard said it was only just the start.
“Now that the raise has finished the real work begins, being very strategic and using these funds to continue to grow the business. We have a number of areas identified where additional investment will drive Beer Cartel. We are going to be quite measured in how we roll these changes out but look forward to seeing some strong gains in the business.”
Some key stats from the raise:
- $1,448,338 raised in total throughout the campaign
- $540,000 raised inside 48 hours of launch
- Minimum target of $250,000 achieved in first 24 hours of launch
- 579% overfunded on the minimum target
- 1,063 new shareholders
- 2,566 expressions of interest registered prior to launch of the campaign
“Over the last five years we have been growing approximately 25 per cent year-on-year,” Richard said. “While we’re really happy with this, the raise allows us to focus on a number of key projects that were already planned but were going to be much slower to implement through internal funding.”
Those key projects include refinements to their website, further building marketing capability, growing subscriptions and developing a membership model to benefit existing customers.
Meanwhile, CoConspirators Brewing‘s own Birchal-based crowd fund closed successfully overnight with the Melbourne brewery raising $619,348 from 407 investors.
CoConspirators, who had hoped to raise a minimum of $500,000, have said the capital will go towards finishing their new brewpub in Brunswick after contract brewing since founding in 2016.
Rebellion Brewing‘s crowd fund will close at 10pm AEST tonight (July 22) and at the time this article was published the company that owns gluten free beer brand O’Brien had raised $637,328 from 417 investors. They were also hoping to raise a minimum of $500,000.