Signature Brew

Idea

Introduction

Signature Brew was founded by a brewer and a musician with one simple philosophy - brew beer that makes music better.

Since 2011 we’ve been on a mission to brew more collaboration beers with bands and musicians than any other drinks brand in the world. Now via the national and international growth of our flagship beers Studio Lager and Roadie All-Night IPA we’re looking to bring our vision of uniting people through the power of incredible beer, great music and unforgettable experiences to the masses.

Our original goal of making beer better at the venues and festivals we loved to go to still drives us today and through our community of partner artists and venues our D2C customer base is growing across the UK.

From our state-of-the-art brewery in East London - complete with iconic live music venue - we’re brewing fresh award-winning beer week in week out and passionately supporting grassroots music at the same time.

Substantial accomplishments to date

• We are the only brewery to be named Brewery of the Year, twice!

• We’ve created more than 60 collaboration brews with international bands and musicians. Including; alt-J, Idles, The Skints, Big Joanie, Hot Chip, Darkness, Sports Team, Mastodon, Hospital Records, Mogwai, Frank Turner and Heriot.

• Our venues are the place to be. Recently we’ve had Skrillex, Tony Hawk, Tinchy Stryder, Steve Harris (Iron Maiden), Kate Nash and Aisling Bea all turn up for a pint or jump on stage!

• Artists don’t just support via collaborations and performances many have invested in Signature Brew and are as passionate about our growth as us.

• Our legendary Pub In A Box was launched in the first lockdown in 2020. We hired out of work musicians to help deliver the packages for us and our altruistic pivot during COVID gained press coverage from the likes of BBC News, Sky News, LadBible, GQ, Esquire, The Guardian and Rolling Stone.

• When lockdown was lifted in 2021 we helped independent venues all over the UK get trading again via our Beer Grants campaign that saw us give away £250k of beer.

• We work with some of the best music venues in the country such as Rough Trade, Strongroom, Bush Hall and The British Music Experience.

• All of our core beers have won Great Taste Awards.

• Plus we support great music charities such as Music Venues Trust and Backup Tech.

• We’re committed to sustainability and leaving footprints on the festival field, not on the planet.

Monetisation strategy

At Signature Brew we have four routes to market.

• On-Trade: We sell kegs and cans direct to pubs, bars and festivals and via wholesalers. We have over 400 permanent stockists in the on-trade and target 25% of these being music centric venues. The on-trade is our biggest source of revenue and where we forecast the majority of our growth will come from.

• Off-Trade: Central to our 2024 sales strategy is growing our off-trade sales in supermarkets via carefully selected listings that demonstrate our brands working in the space whilst building brand awareness. In addition our beers are available in convenience stores off-licenses and bottle shops.

• D2C: Our online shop is a regular source of income via purchases of our award-winning beer plus sees spikes in revenue when we launch artist collaboration beers.

• Our Venues: Beer sales from our own venues equate to ~15% of total revenue although we expect this will reduce proportionally in the coming years.

Use of proceeds

We believe we have laid all of the foundations to now realise the potential of Signature Brew, and so we're now looking to raise funds to fuel growth over the next few years.

In reaction to the cost of living crisis which saw our purchasing costs increase by 20% we dramatically reduced marketing spend to below 2% of revenue. Having navigated that headwind we're now ready to increase the marketing & sales budget in order to maximise the opportunities ahead of us and ensure we progress through what we foresee as a seminal period of growth for our brewery.

In addition to the marketing budget increasing to 8% of revenue we'll also commit funding to the expansion of our community of artists with a focus on four coordinated campaigns a year that harness the incredible musicians we work with and expand our reach and awareness nationally.

And finally we’ll commit 10% of the fund raise (~£70k) to CAPEX with a view to increasing the production capacity of our Blackhorse Road brewery by 10,000HL per annum.

*Based on unaudited management accounts.