Northern Monk returns to the crowd for £1m raise to support growth

Leeds craft brewer Northern Monk is to launch an equity crowdfunding campaign as it looks to become “the biggest craft brewery in Europe” by 2035.

The raise, which has opened for pre-registration, will have an initial £1m target and is based on a £40m valuation. It is the second time Northern Monk has turned to crowdfunding to charge its growth ambitions, having raised £1.5m at a £10m valuation in 2018.

Funds will be used to open a flagship Northern Monk venue in London, upgrade and improve the brewery’s original production site and taproom in Leeds, drive a commitment to reach net zero by 2030 and grow the brewer’s 114-person strong workforce.

The raise is separate to a £500k investment announced earlier this year to grow capacity by 20%, which was funded through a combination of asset financing and existing cash reserves.

Half of the initial £1m target has already been committed by Active Partners. The consumer-focused investment firm, which has also backed the likes of Honest Burgers, Finisterre and Secret Cinema, has held an ownership stake in Northern Monk since 2019.

Since it last turned to crowdfunding in 2018, Northern Monk revenues had grown by 400% and were on track to hit £20m in the company’s fiscal 2025, founder and managing director Russell Bisset told The Grocer.

“We’ve grown 70% year on year on average over the past 11 years, and we are really proud of what we’ve achieved,” he said. “We’ve brought real value to the people that joined us. We’re one of the biggest founder-led independent craft breweries in the UK and we are on a mission to try and be the biggest craft brewery in Europe by 2035. We don’t see any reason why we can’t achieve that.”

The raise’s valuation – set at 2.4 times annual turnover – was “really competitive” when compared with other recent crowdfunders in craft beer, Bisset claimed.

“I really want to frame this as an opportunity to our community, to open the door to them and let more people in,” he said.

The decision to open a venue in London, meanwhile, was driven by a desire to reinforce Northern Monk as a national brand, Bisset said.

“A couple of weeks ago we sold as much Monk beer in Tesco in Brighton as we did in Leeds that same week,” he said. “It’s really encouraging to see. But as a bit of a statement of intent we are really determined to get this flagship site in London off the ground.”

Having established itself as the fastest-growing “mid to large” craft brewery in the off-trade [NIQ 12 w/e 13 July 2024], Northern Monk was to now turn its focus to the growing its presence in pubs and bars, said Bisset.

“We’re still quite off-trade heavy, but we want to rebalance that,” he said. “We’ve brought in Alex [Minett] who has seven years experience as off-trade director at Red Bull so we’re really well shaped and proud of the performance in grocery, but we want to bring all of that to the on-trade and really ignite the brand.”

Northern Monk grew off-trade sales by 11.7% to £12.7m last year [NIQ 52 w/e 21 April 2024].

The brewer, founded in 2013 by Bisset and Brian Dickson, is stocked in retailers including Tesco, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s and Asda.