Former Stone & Wood national sales lead to drive growth at Beerfarm 

Western Australian craft brewery Beerfarm has announced Viren Goundrie as its new Head of Sales. Goundrie is joining Beerfarm after a stint as the sales lead at Cape Byron Distillery, prior to which he worked in various sales positions at Stone & Wood over the course of 11 years. This includes his final four years and three months at the company as Stone & Wood's National Sales Manager. 

Beerfarm’s Founder and Director Ian Atkins told Drinks Trade that “the credentials he brings is great… and the conversations I've had with him have been super. He's really excited about what he can deliver, but also what we can deliver as a brand, and I guess the differences that we have between Beerfarm and Stone & Wood.

“He's come to us with a lot of credentials from his time at Stone & Wood where he was Head of Sales, so he was very instrumental in building that to a significant business.”

The news of Goundrie’s appointment comes at a time of growing momentum for Beerfarm, which recently saw it purchase Feral Brewing’s Bassendean production facilities from Coca Cola Europacific Partners. Atkins said that last month’s acquisition “was to obviously increase the capacity to enable us to take on a national play… as CCEP divested out of the beer industry. We couldn't actually make enough products here in Metricup anyway.”

Ian Atkins is hopeful that the appointment of Viren Goundrie will contribute to Beerfarm's target of tripling its production capacity over the next five years. Beerfarm is hoping to become a major national player as a direct result of this growth. 

“We're super stoked that he's actually sort of on the journey with us,” said Atkins. 

“We're really looking forward to have somebody take us into those national distribution chains; somebody who's trodden the path before.” 

In his new role, Viren Goundrie will continue to work from Australia's East Coast, a move that will likely contribute to Beerfarm’s growth goals. Beerfarm also has an existing Development Application for a NSW venue halfway between Sydney and Newcastle. 

“We're looking to continue to build a production and venue facility in New South Wales," said Atkins.

"The strategy has always been to have state-based and then obviously backed up with the production facility that we've just acquired. Really the motivation now is that national play, so working with distributors, people that want to take the brand out into the marketplace, so it is very much a growth strategy.” 

“We don't want to be known as just a West Australian brand. Obviously we're very strong here because it's our home state, but we believe we've got more to offer… The reality is we are going to be a national player and (one would hope) an international player as well.”