CRAFT BEER CHALLENGE ENGAGES COOPERS
COOPERS Brewery is seeing a “patchy but promising” start to beer sales in the new financial year, and returning to its malting roots after a 15year gap will also bring in additional revenues.
Australia’s largest locally owned brewer said sales in 2017 grew 2.9 per cent to a record 83.8 million litres, helping the SA-based group cap 24 years of consecutive growth in volume.
As with previous years, consumption in SA was on the decline to 19 million litres, from 19.2 million litres in 2016.
Managing director Tim Cooper said the state’s challenging demographics and increasing competition from craft beers were affecting sales.
“Mostly though, it’s because SA has an ageing population with stagnant overall growth. Most other states have younger, growing populations,” he said.
NSW was its strongest market with sales up 6.9 per cent. NSW made up 27 per cent of total sales, followed by SA with 22.9 per cent, Victoria with 18.7 per cent and Queensland with 16.2 per cent.
Profit before tax fell to $33.4 million, down 3.5 per cent from $34.6 million in 2015-16, due to writedowns associated with its Mr Beer (USA) business.
Overall turnover for 201617 rose to $252.4 million compared with $245.9m from the previous year.
The brewer will pay fully franked dividends of $12.50 per share to its 150 shareholders.