Steve Kons: Burnie paper mill brewery, distillery plan scaled back after grant fails to materialise

Former deputy premier and Burnie mayor Steve Kons has revealed changes to his long-awaited transformation of the city’s former paper mill into an alcohol mecca.

The closed Tas Paper Burnie mill, formerly Associated Pulp & Paper Mills (A.P.P.M.), Burnie

Former deputy premier and Burnie mayor Steve Kons has revealed his long-awaited transformation of the city’s former paper mill into an alcohol mecca will no longer have a public-facing component.

Mr Kons revealed in 2018 his plan to transform the former Associated Pulp and Paper Mills Pty Ltd (APPM) Services Building at 1–3 Reeves St, South Burnie, into a tourism hotspot featuring a distillery, brewery, bars, tasting rooms, kitchen, and hall suitable for large events such as 10 Days on the Island.

His grog hub, which a June 2020 business plan costed at $6.275m, would produce whisky (400 barrels/annum), gin and vodka (163,000 litres/annum) and beer (144,000 litres/annum), and employ 14 FTE workers.

Former Burnie mayor Steve Kons. Picture: Grant Wells

However, speaking to the Mercury on Sunday, Mr Kons revealed his plans had been scaled back after he failed to secure approximately $2m worth of grant money he was seeking from the Tasmanian Government under streams including its Tourism Innovation Grant Program.

Mr Kons said the facility would no longer have a public-facing component, with the focus purely moving to production.

“We can’t create something that’s going to lose money left, right and centre,” he said. It’s understood Mr Kons has invested north of $4m into the project.

“We’ll also do contract brewing and distilling for others. It was an expensive undertaking for us to do and there are a lot of people who want to brew and distil.”

Mr Kons revealed that the distilling component of his operation would likely be known as Mussen Distillery – a reference to Gerald Mussen, the New Zealand-born entrepreneur who played a key role in the formation of APPM – while the beer side would be called Tasmanian Ikon Brewing.

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Mr Kons, who remains a Burnie councillor after losing the mayoralty to Teeny Brumby last October, said much of the internal fit-out was complete, but for loose ends including fresh paint and the installation of toilets.

“It’s all set up ready to go, it has been for a few months. I’ve been taking bit of a break from it because it’s been a big project, bigger then I thought,” he said.

Last year, Mr Kons told the Advocate newspaper he expected the facility to be open by the end of 2022. When first announcing his plan in late 2018, Mr Kons forecast a January 2020 opening.

The latest step in the five-year journey has been the securing of a liquor licence from the State Growth Department – it was granted on September 5.

The next step in the process is the hiring of brewers and distillers to make his dream a reality, Mr Kons said.