Australia: Online beer company Brewtopia plans market listing on NSX

Brewtopia, which claims to be "the only beer company built by the people for the people," plans to list on the Newcastle Stock Exchange on February 10, Asia Pulse News communicated on February 3. The Sydney-based company now plans to raise A$1.5 million (US$1.13 million) by issuing new shares at 50 cents, first to its customers, and then to the public.

Established two years ago by Brewtopia managing director Larry Hedges and some mates, the outfit allows clients to customise their own beer by designing labels and choosing packaging online.

"We're about making sexy premium beer," the company says on its website. "You decide what we do and how we do it. No fancy crap about 'imported hops', 'first crop barley' or sweaty blokes hard at it in the coal mines. "It's beer. You get drunk, fall over, start a fight and mozy on out of town," it said.

When Mr Hedges, 35, and his mates launched the idea in the highly competitive Australian beer market in 2001 they had a web-based marketing plan but little else. Yet within weeks of pitching their customised beer concept to 140 friends and beer-drinking buddies via email, Brewtopia had over 10,000 people on their database.

"The idea was born on a golf course, like all great ideas are, over a couple of beers," Mr Hedges said. "We were drinking beer that was good, but just didn't justify the price and all the premium tag that the beer had." So Mr Hedges and his mates emailed their idea about starting a beer company to their friends and encouraged them to get other members to join.

"Then we asked those members to vote on different aspects of the company right from the beginning, like what style of beer we should make, what colour bottle, what the label should look like and where we should sell it," he said. In exchange for their feedback, the members were given free beer and a Brewtopia share allocation.

Since the launch of Brewtopia's exclusive beer, Blowfly, in December 2002 the company has gathered almost 50,000 customers on its database and now supplies beer branded with company logos and individually designed labels.

"Our beer is a European-style lager, kind of a cross between Becks and Boags and it goes down like gold," Mr Hedges said. "And Brewtopia has customised beer labels for The Foo Fighters, as well as corporate clients including Yahoo!, Sony, Telstra and Foxtel."

Others who have had their faces on bottles include Mark Taylor, Phil Kearns and Channel Nine's Ray Martin, he said. "We even did a personalised label for (Prime Minister) John Howard as a gift when we first started," Mr Hedges said. "That was a real first play for the custom-centred market."

The company already has some new brews in the works and now custom labels non-alcoholic drinks, water, t-shirts and caps. Mr Hedges said apart from enlarging beer bellies, Brewtopia is raising extra cash to expand interstate, especially in Melbourne, and into the US.

E-malt.com, the global information source for the brewing and malting industry professionals. The bi-weekly E-malt.com Newsletters feature latest industry news, statistics in graphs and tables, world barley and malt prices, and other relevant information. Click here to get full access to E-malt.com. If you are a Castle Malting client, you can get free access to E-malt.com website and publications. Contact us for more information at marketing@castlemalting.com .