Black Hops Brewing in Burleigh Heads on Gold Coast becomes first company in Australia to reach its crowdsourced funding target

THE founders a Gold Coast brewery have cause for a few celebratory drinks today after becoming the first company in Australia to reach its crowdsourced funding target.

THE founders of Burleigh Heads-based Black Hops Brewing have cause for a few celebratory drinks today after becoming the first company in Australia to reach its crowdsourced funding (CSF) target.

Black Hops raised $400,000 in just six days from 545 investors who chipped in an average of $733.

Funds raised will be used to complete the brewery and taproom fit-out underway at a unit at 665 Pine Ridge Rd, Biggera Waters.

Co-founder Dan Norris said it has been a “crazy” experience.

Black Hops Brewing is fitting out a second brewery in Biggera Waters on Pine Ridge Rd.

“We were hoping to achieve the target (of $400,000) but we did not expect to do it in six days,” he said.

“It has been a good start to the year.”

Black Hops launched the offer through equity crowd-funding platform Birchal on Friday and reached its minimum goal of $150,000 within eight hours.

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Rules for equity crowd-funding, which is a tool enabling investors to invest in start-up companies and small businesses in return for equity, were changed by the Federal Government in October last year. Legislation was amended to allow private companies to raise up to $5 million each year without needing to becoming an unlisted public entity.

Black Hops Brewing co founders Eddie Oldfield, Dan Norris and Michael McGovern have cause for a few celebratory drinks today after becoming the first company in Australia to reach its crowdsourced funding target. Picture Mike Batterham

Investors, who in the past needed to be high-net worth individuals and sophisticated investors, can chip in as little as $50 up to a maximum of $10,000.

Birchal co-founder Matt Vitale, whose crowd-funding platform hosted the Black Hops offer, said it was a “textbook execution” of a CSF campaign.

He said Black Hops is the first company in history, either public of private, to reach its CSF funding target.

“It was an achievable target and was priced right,” he said.

Black Hops Brewing is fitting out a second brewery in Biggera Waters on Pine Ridge Rd.

Shares in Black Hops were offered to investors at $1.18 per security.

The CSF offer completion values the brewery at $18.4 million.

The new brewery will greatly enlarge Black Hops’ production capacity to 2.5 million litres a year from the current 500,000 with the option to increase that to five million with extra tanks.

The total cost of the new operation is between $2-3 million, with Black Hops raising $1.7 million in a previous funding round four months ago.

Mr Norris said he expects the premises to be ready next month.

The crowd-funding offer was due to close on February 14.

Mr Norris, Eddie Oldfield and Michael McGovern launched Black Hops in 2014.

In 2015 Black Hops launched its first brewery through a reward (non-investment based) crowd-funding campaign on Pozible (Birchal’s sister platform).