Member Article

Lyre’s secures £9m investment to lead global non-alcoholic spirit growth

The world’s most awarded non-alcoholic spirits company, Lyre’s Non-Alcoholic Spirit Co. has announced the successful closure of seed round funding, securing a total of £9m in growth capital, the most material investment on record to date for the category.

This significant business injection accelerates Lyre’s vision of changing the way the world drinks and provides ongoing investment for core product growth, category innovation and new market expansion.

18 months since its launch, Lyre’s has moved into a global leadership position in non-alcoholic spirits, pre-empting and responding to changing consumer demand and drinking behaviour.

The non-alcoholic category is rapidly emerging with huge growth experienced globally and in the UK in the last 12 months driven by health, lifestyle and responsibility factors across all age groups.

Despite a challenging 2020, Lyre’s has focused on the direct-to-consumer segment and delivered over 400% monthly recurring revenue growth since January 2020, exceeding all forecasts the company had previously set.

The fast-growing category is being matched by fast-paced innovation with Lyre’s creating 13 products since launch and many more slated for the next six months.

Mark Livings, Lyre’s CEO and Co-founder said: “This growth positions the Lyre’s brand for continued success and leadership with high quality non-alcoholic alternatives in one of the fastest-growth consumer brand categories in the world”.

“Our business anticipates and matches the trends of the consumer and culture and our current product innovation is being developed to match alcohol spirit flavours and styles. Lyre’s was created to shake up the drinks category and put the choice back into the consumer’s social occasion to drink freely. The recognition from the multiple, respected, international award competitions shows we clearly have something that is resonating,” says Livings.

“The next year demarcates our business evolution from a start-up to a true multi-national beverage company, with manufacturing in multiple, global locations, compliance for new markets and continued recruitment firmly at the top of our task list. We’ll need all aspects of our plan to come together, delivered by a great team of people with the Lyre’s esprit de corps to grow our leadership position in the non-alcoholic spirits category.”

The seed round was structured to be completed in three tranches over the course of an initial twelve-month trading period, a necessary process to ensure the business was sufficiently capitalised to support what Livings describes as ‘planned, lightning- fast growth with controlled capital consumption’.

Major participants in the seed round include VRD Investment, Doehler Ventures, DLF Venture and Maropost Ventures with a number of European, American and Australasian family offices and HNWI also participating.

Fellow Co-founder Carl Hartmann builds on this: “The investors we’ve brought into this business see value well beyond the short to medium-term impacts of the pandemic and will bring significantly more value beyond their participation from a capital perspective. Good companies with strong fundamentals and a truly unique market offering can always raise money, even in challenging times.”

An Australian-developed brand, Lyre’s is arguably the most widely distributed non-alcoholic spirit in the world available in more than 30 markets, with increased presence in both on and off-prem venues.

The brand is heading for a strong 2021of non-alcohol spirits innovation with the launch of a Ready-To-Drink range to expand the opportunity for people to enjoy a Lyre’s with increased convenience.

“Lyre’s is a black swan emergence of an entirely new consumer products category,” Livings adds. “I can’t wait to see what we can do in our next 12 months.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Lyre's .