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DURING the US gold rush, some canny operators got rich selling pickaxes rather than mining the precious metal itself.

The indirect route to success will sound familiar to FeverTree shareholders, who have enjoyed soaring tonic sales thanks to the gin craze.

Last year’s hot summer, combined with the World Cup and the Royal Wedding, also added a bit more fizz to proceedings.

Fever-Tree was in the right place at the right time and had the products and execution to capitalise on its opportunity.

The business model is lean and scalable – Fever-Tree only has around 100 staff, outsourcing operations such as bottling and distribution.

That means it can expand without paying out for supportive infrastructure.

It has already gobbled up a big portion of UK mixer sales, so overseas expansion looks most exciting for the future – particularly the US.

The firm’s shares are now worth about 16 times more than when they launched on the stock market in 2014, and have a lot of growth expectations priced into the mix.