Sunrise Beverages comes out of the shadows

Returning to the Curious Brewery near Ashford International train station in Kent recently after some years I was still amazed at how large the place is for what was effectively a beer brand side-project of wine company Chapel Down.

It only ever produced a fraction – less than 20% – of its capacity and so Chapel Down under financial pressure from shareholders sold the brewery on at a discount price in 2021 to Luke Johnson. I’m visiting the Curious Brewery again to meet Richard Mather, co-founder and CEO of Sunrise Beverages – the current owner of the business, who has built up a portfolio of beer brands amidst the ongoing downturn in the sector.

Mather and his team have been very selectively acquiring brands to build a complementary portfolio having identified that there were some serious bargains to be had in the market. They have been able to capitalise on a scenario of simply too many breweries chasing too few available taps in pubs.

He has great form in the brewing sector and deal-making having spent a decade at SAB Miller within the M&A (Mergers & Acquisitions) team in South Africa, Hong Kong and India before then spending 10 years at investment firm Genesis whose fund invested in consumer-facing firms such as breweries including holding a stake in SAB Miller.

While still at Genesis in 2021 he teamed up with a former colleague to acquire St Peter’s Brewery in Suffolk – that had been on the block for some years. “It seemed a fun thing to do at the time,” he says, adding that the world then changed.

In a post-Covid-19 environment the CBILS loans that many breweries had taken on were causing them serious pain. The rising interest rates were also a real blow because in some cases breweries were hit with 10% rates (4% over base rates). On top of this was the Ukraine war that pushed up barley prices, a saturated market for breweries, and the rise of world beer as a category added to the pressures.

On leaving Genesis Mather says: “I realised there was something bigger going on. It was a once in a generation opportunity to build a portfolio of brands.” He had watched SAB Miller in previous years buy and sell the likes of Meantime, Peroni and Pilsner Urquell for hundreds of millions of pounds and then here he was in a market in 2023 where he could pick up brands like Curious for much more modest sums. This was added to the portfolio with St Peter’s Brewery. Wild Beer Co. also came with the Curious acquisition.

“When we bought Curious we got serious about building a company…and one year ago we completed on Portobello Brewing Company and Gipsy Hill,” he says.

Much work is now taking place with Mather suggesting the company is being “meticulous” with the brands it owns so they can be sold as a portfolio of drinks into individual pubs and pubcos. “You have to be credible against the large [brewery] suppliers. Pubs have reduced numbers of taps and consumers want something different. They do not want 12% beers and they are sick of Beavertown. We can provide alternatives that are much more interesting compared to the global brands,” he explains.

The core portfolio of beers being focused on are Gipsy Hill Hepcat, Portobello London Pilsner, and to a lesser degree Curious Lager, from the UK acquisitions along with Efes and Orion for which Sunrise have signed UK licensing deals. These core beers will predominantly be produced at the Curious Brewery site in Ashford while the non-core beers from Portobello and Gipsy Hill will be brewed at their original facilities. “The majority of sales will be from the core beers and the others will be smaller sales,” says Mather.

Less certain is the broader potential of the Curious and St Peter’s beers with the latter’s range to be simplified and new branding playing more on the heritage of the brewery at its impressive moated manor house in Bungay, Suffolk. Meanwhile, Curious is to be re-launched with the branding focusing on its premium/luxury position and use of Champagne yeast in its production.  

What is not necessarily needed are more brewing brands and so further acquisitions of craft breweries looks unlikely. Although Mather does add that if there is a geographic opportunity then there could be deals and Sunrise does not yet have the equivalent of a Lucky Saint or a Big Drop in its portfolio.

Glynn Davis, editor, Beer Insider