News

Abyss Brewing looks for investment and eyes expansion

15 December 2023 By Jessica Mason

Abyss Brewing is offering fans of its beer the chance to “be part of it” and invest in the business.

The investment drive, which will see Abyss open its first new site in early 2024, is offering potential investors 15% of the business with a pre-money valuation of £3.3 million.

The East Sussex-based brewery has revealed it is in its first round of its raise in which it intends to eventually release more equity by 2025.

The award-winning brewery, born in the cellar of Lewes’ renowned Pelham Arms, emerged from the creative minds of friends Andy Bridge and Andrew Mellor in 2016, and, according to Bridge is “fuelled by a love of hop-forward beer styles, psychedelic artwork and community”.

Bridge explained to db: “In 2021 we seized the opportunity to transform an 18th century malthouse into our long-held dream of a dynamic taproom with a fresh rotation of monthly brews, events and hypnotic visuals, capturing the attention of both die-hard craft-beer fans and a wider audience. Since our inception six years ago, our network has vastly grown, with demand for our enticing beers soaring way beyond our current capacity. The time has now come to expand. Now, we want fans of our beer to be a part of it and join us on our journey.”

Speaking about reaching out to interested supporters, Bridge pointed out how investment would “open exciting new Abyss retail sites in the south east and allow us to upgrade and expand our current brewery. We plan to develop our revenue from £1.1m in 2023-24 to £3m within three years as we expand production and roll out further tap-rooms”.

Bridge highlighted how, importantly, Abyss is “one of the 5% of UK breweries to increase production in 2022/23 and highlighted how it has “brewed 1,000,000 pints since it launched” as well as managing to “increase its trade customer base by 30% in the last year alone”.

He added that “the brewery and tap has poured over 150,000 pints to date” and now sells to more than 350 independent retailers” as well as having made strides to expand into the “growing gluten-free and no/low alcohol market with core gluten-free products Super Pale and Gonzo”.