Catch.com.au is partnering with HelloDrinks.com.au to enter the online liquor category.
Catch currently has around a 1.5% share of the online retail market and 1.2 million active customers. It had $315 million sales, on a gross transaction value basis, in the 2018 financial year and $8.1 million in earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation. EBITDA is forecast to increase to $17.4 million next year.
The site offers different daily deals and discounts across categories including fashion, tech, beauty, sport and even groceries.
HelloDrinks will distribute beer, wine and spirits from its warehouse in Rosebery to Catch customers across the country.
Co-founder and director of HelloDrinks, JP Tucker, told Inside FMCG he was “incredibly proud” to partner with Catch.
“What they have done to date has been nothing short of amazing,” Tucker said. “Their recent purchase of a new state-of-the-art warehouse in Melbourne shows their intent to continue their growth.”
He added to Inside Retail: “We tried to identify who’s making the big moves, who’s trying to take on the Woolies and Coles. Catch have got big plans, and liquor is an obvious [category] for them to tap into.
Currently, Tucker said he is competing with online retailers such as Boozebud, Mybottleshop. But he hopes the partnership with Catch will allow HelloDrinks to take on the $12billion packaged liquor market in Australia, 75% of which is owned by the supermarkets, with Woolworths’ Dan Murphy’s being the major player.
HelloDrinks currently stocks around 350 products and expects to offer 80-90% of the range on Catch, and is working with suppliers on pricing so the margins can work.
Second run at liquor for Catch
It’s not the first time Catch has entered the alcohol space. Back in 2012 it bought a 70% stake in Australian wine e-retailer Vinomofo, then sold it again 13 months later.
Co-founder Justin Dry told the Sydney Morning Herald in 2015: “Catch had what we needed and it should have worked. If we could get even a fraction of their clients: boom. We’d be made. But while their customers were happy to spend $500 on sunglasses, there wasn’t enough interest in really good wine.”
Dry described the split as mutual, with neither team desperate to drop the other but both recognising their customer bases weren’t as compatible as they had hoped.
Dry and his Vinomofo co-founder Andre Eikmeier raised millions in capital to fund buying back the company’s equity.
