Beer Cartel will roll down the door on its St Leonards store for the last time on Monday, 31 December as it shifts the business to an entirely online model. For now.
The change is driven by the new location. Richard Kelsey, Beer Cartel Co-Founder said that the requirement of the new site and licensing restrictions meant having a bricks and mortar store was not possible.
“Our move to the new site just up the road in St Leonards has been done to realise the efficiencies from bringing our two business units, Beer Cartel and Brewquets, back into one warehouse. During the past three years driven by Covid we’ve seen significant online growth and as a result had to move the Brewquets business into a separate warehouse to keep up with demand. With our lease at our current Reserve Rd (Beer Cartel) site coming to an end we have found a new warehouse which will support the business for the next 5-10 years,” said Mr Kelsey.
Kelsey thanked the early craft beer loving customers of Beer Cartel who supported the business in its infancy and when online sales of alcohol in Australia were small.
"It was the support of those that came to the store that helped keep us moving forward during the early years," he said.
In the decade since opening, Beer Cartel has welcomed customers from Blue Mountains and the Central Coast.
“There’s been lots of familiar faces and relationships that we’re definitely going to miss, but we’re not going away, we’ll be look at bringing more of the offline side of the business online," he said.
He also has not ruled out the possibility of another physical store opening in the future.
“We’ll be looking at options for this going forward and see if there are any opportunities to open a store, including partnering with others in the industry,” Kelsey said.
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