Another brewery has closed its doors during a brutal year for craft beer in Australia. Golden West Brewing Co in Perth has collapsed and gone into voluntary administration.

Golden West was established in 2021 in the Perth suburb of Leederville, with the brewery winning a trophy at the 2023 Perth Royal Beer Awards for its Smooth Bourbon Vanilla Porter.

Golden West joins more than a dozen independent breweries across the country that have faced insolvency in the past 12 months. Perth brewery Running with Thieves Brewery & Distillery also narrowly avoided closing its doors after being acquired by the Simm Group of Companies. 

Cost of living pressure and Australia’s rapidly escalating excise tax on alcohol have been blamed for the closures.

Administrator Mathieu Tribut at GTS Advisory told Perth Now: “The company had insufficient capital to continue trading. It’s a sad story. No one is to blame, and the boys did their best.”

Breweries tumble as craft beer recession deepens

Following the tax excise on beer increasing again on February 5, at least three other breweries have fallen victim to the Australian craft beer recession.

The excise has added about 90c to the cost of every pint in a blow to both beer lovers and brewers.

Australian Brewers Guild, trading as Hawkers Beer and based in Reservoir in Melbourne, appointed DBA Reconstruction & Advisory as its administrator earlier this month, while Mark Lieberenz and Anthony Phillips of specialist insolvency and restructuring firm Heard Phillips Lieberenz have been appointed the administrators of Big Shed micro brewer located in Royal Park.

Newcastle’s Steel City Brewing has also ceased production after parting ways with Lion, which had been brewing the product in Sydney since its 2021 launch.