Gage Roads looks to make a statement

Gage Roads Brewing Co Ltd has recruited The Brand Agency to develop an advertising campaign to be launched in August.

The Palmyra-based craft brewer is expected to spend about $500,000 on the campaign aimed at differentiating it from the sea of boutique and pub breweries that have emerged in the past few years.

Gage Roads managing director Peter Nolin said the campaign would be an evolution of its brand rather than an overhaul.

The brewer is also set to launch four new beers later this year to add to the current line-up of its Premium Lager, IPA and Pils.

“We have been in the marketplace two years and we have a better idea of where we sit and what makes Gage Roads different and unique,” Mr Nolin told WA Business News.

“We will capitalise on our differences. We are a premium brewer and we compete with the big companies because we are putting six packs on the shelves, but we are also a craft brewery. We have the best, high quality ingredients and our beer is full of flavour.”

The marketplace will become even more crowded for Gage Roads if Mick Stroud is successful in floating his Big Island Brewing Ltd.

Four WA breweries have listed on the stock market in the past 18 months, while at the same time there has been a boom in microbrewery pubs opening across the state.

Mr Stroud has been attempting to raise $10 million from investors to fund the development of his brewery, which is yet to brew a beer.

The prospectus was scheduled to close on May 21. A spokesman for Mr Stroud said Big Island had extended its public share offer.

He said Mr Stroud was visiting investors on the eastern seaboard who had shown interest in investing his proposed nine million litre capacity premium brewing business.

Struggling to find investor support is something of a familiar story for Mr Stroud, who attempted to raise $10 million from investors in 2001 to float his wine services group, 1Auswines.com.

The businessman eventually shelved the internet and retail 1Auswines.com plan, which incorporated the West Perth site of the Perth Ice Works.

Instead, he raised money from seed investors to buy industrial land in Jandakot to build a new wine bottling facility.

Gage Roads, which raised $4 million from investors last year, will use a mixture of outdoor, magazine and radio for its advertising campaign.

Gage Roads national marketing manger Nick Hayler said he had spent the past two months working with The Brand Agency on developing the concept.

He said the project had been signed off and the agency would develop the creative component in anticipation of an August campaign launch.