Beer tycoon’s dream to rebuild pub where he had his first pint
ENTREPRENEUR AND PAL RAKE IN £10M WITH ONLINE BUSINESS
A BEER tycoon is hoping to rebuild the pub where he had his first pint.
Stefan White, from Stockport, coowns Bier Company with his best mate Tom Renshaw.
Their online shop stocks craft beers from breweries across the UK and has seen them rake in a whopping £10m in revenue.
Stefan hopes to one day bring back the beloved Fir Tree pub in North Reddish.
Stefan said: “I grew up right next to the Fir Tree pub, that was where I had my first pint. But it was knocked down for a Lidl. The plan is that hopefully in the future I have enough money to rebuild the Fir Tree pub.”
The Fir Tree was demolished at the end of 2020 despite residents pleading for the ‘beautiful building’ to be protected.
Stockport council received 16 letters of objection to the plans. One read: “The Fir Tree was once a thriving pub at the heart of the community and with the right management team, staff and security in place, it could thrive once again.
“The Fir Tree is sorely missed by the people in the community, especially in North Reddish, where there isn’t a single pub. Pubs are the heart of any community and something that North Reddish is currently missing.”
As a child, Stefan was always finding ways to make extra pocket money – he charged his younger brother and sister 2p a time to jump off of his top bunk bed and sold his Easter eggs a month later for £1 cheaper than supermarkets. While his peers were watching the Disney channel, he watched Dragon’s Den.
“I used to think the Dragons could save you,” Stefan said.
Stefan and Tom’s remarkable rise came after they graduated from university. They set to work making a beer snacks empire a reality. Each day, they would pick a London borough and pound the pavement all morning knocking on independent pub doors trying to sell their product – similar to scenes on The Apprentice.
By the afternoon, they’d make calls to pub groups, and by 3pm, start shifts working in bars as kitchen porters and bartenders, finishing at 2am.
Stefan, 27, was earning £1,300 a month, but with his rent at £1,250, he knew he had to make it work.
Their breakthrough came with Stonegate Group, who put their Bier Nuts and Bier Crisps into 300 of their pubs, which then landed them in other chains, growing from zero to 2,000 pubs in nine months.
But disaster struck in March 2020 as the Covid pandemic hit. locking down pubs, losing the duo 95 per cent of their revenue stream and forcing them to rethink their strategy.
Drowning their sorrows in supermarket beers, Tom had a lightbulb moment and suggested expanding into craft beers online, creating ‘care packages’ for customers to help them through the pandemic.
Initially, this was a 12-week project while pub doors were closed, but packages were flying off the shelves following the release of their hit ‘Super Dad’ giftbox for Father’s Day – which sold out in 10 days.
The uni mates-turned-business partners now have their sights set on further expansion into Europe and the US. Stefan said: “This business will be the first name that pops into your mouth when you talk about craft beer. It’ll be the brewery once we launch that, the snacks, in pubs, online presence, draft beer dispensers in your homes. This business will be everything. Currently, that’s Brewdog – but it won’t be in five years’ time.”