The owner of Stone & Wood has acquired Two Birds, Australia’s first female owned brewing company. The acquisition of the Two Birds business by Fermentum includes its brewery, tap room and brands.

Two Birds co-founders Jayne Lewis and Danielle Allen will continue driving the brewery as a distinct business unit at Fermentum.

“For Two Birds to continue striving towards our vision, we realised we needed to join forces with another business for an injection of broader knowledge and experience, some much needed capital and a spark of energy,” said Allen.

Fermentum said it “has been on the lookout for opportunities with a good brand and a production footprint in the right market that could help us evolve and develop for some time”.

“We have always admired what Jayne and Danielle have achieved since they launched their fledgling business in 2011,” the company said.

“They have a unique origin story and by blazing a trail for diversity they have provided an inspiration for everyone in our industry as it strives to develop and embrace diversity and inclusion at a level which is a true reflection of our society.

“We are looking forward to working with Jayne and Danielle as they lead the Two Birds business through the next exciting chapter including celebrating the 10th Birthday later in the year.”

Lewis added: “We are excited by the opportunity to keep building on the Two Birds legacy as part of Fermentum. We admire what the team have achieved with Stone & Wood over its 12 years, and they obviously have the know how around how to build a business through sustainable growth.”

Having a scalable brewery at Spotswood in Melbourne will provide Fermentum with the opportunity to invest in its capability and capacity and allow it to save on beer miles by moving production of Fixation Brewing Co products closer to its home market.

Two Birds Brewing Co will join Stone & Wood Brewing Co, Fixation Brewing Co, Forest for the Trees, Granite Belt Cider Co, Sunrise Drinks and Square Keg in the Fermentum family of businesses.

The Two Birds products will be sold through Square Keg in Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania, by the Stone & Wood team in Queensland and NSW.

Major brewery expansion ahead for Fermentum

“We continue to be constrained by our production capacity at our Murwillumbah brewery as once again we didn’t get through the Christmas peak without having to allocate stock,” Fermentum added.

“While COVID-19 had an impact on our rate of growth through the first period of lockdowns we have been blown away by our resilience and the traction we have gained as we have grown out of the shutdown period.”

Transferring the production of Fixation beers to Spotswood will help the company deal with the on-going growth in the short term.

The company is also looking to build production capacity as brewing in our current location may be unsustainable in the long term. Four years ago, it purchased a 34,000 sq mtr block of land just down the road from its existing brewery in Murwillumbah. Two years ago, Fermentum completed a scope and design project for a shovel ready project plan to build a large-scale brewery capable of producing an annual volume of 40 million litres but expandable over time to around 80 million litres.

It is currently working through the funding process for the project and is exploring all options – cash reserves, debt, capital raise or a potential IPO. The initial stage of the brewery build would be around $50million and would involve building out the site and infrastructure, installing a new 200hl brewhouse and packaging lines, plus relocating existing equipment from its current site. Further investment over time would be required to expand capacity in line with growth.

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