Brewery appoints finance director to oversee growth

Scottish brewery Innis & Gunn has promoted Esther Binnie to the role of Finance Director, as it seeks to double turnover to £250 million in the next three years.

Binnie will be key in driving the growth, having worked in a variety of roles since joining the company more than seven years ago and seeing it grow from 5 to 50 employees.

Most recently, she worked on integrating the Inveralmond brewery that was acquired last April and on the senior finance team, where she was responsible for the financial modelling for the brewery’s successful crowdfunding campaign last November. This saw the brewery smash its target by raising £2.5 million, around £1 million more than the initial target.

Innis & Gunn chairman Tony Hunt added she had made a significant contribution to the brewery’s growth, notably in the equity crowdfunding campaign and the acquisition of the Brewery.

“Her passion and energy for our business is inspiring. We have many exciting initiatives in the pipeline for 2017 and beyond and Esther is going to make a great contribution to our Board,” he said.

Binnie described 2016 as a “transformational year” for Innis & Gunn and the start of an exciting new chapter for the company following the crowd-funding exercise, which will accelerate the company’s plans to open more Beer Kitchen bars next year, allowing it to expand south of the border a full year ahead of schedule.

“My priority is to ensure that we accelerate delivery of our growth priorities, effectively investing the capital raised from investors to build our bars, add new brewing capabilities to our Brewery, and bring exciting new beers to the market,” she said.

The overfunding means that around 4.79% of the share capital has been sold, versus the original 2% intended, with 2012 investors now on board, it confirmed.