Powerscourt Distillery, the Co Wicklow-based company behind the Fercullen whiskey brand, has secured a €25 million debt deal with US lender PNC Bank that its managing director says will help further fuel its US expansion.
The company said on Wednesday that the asset-based debt facility will allow it refinance some of its current obligations and also provide the company with additional working capital.
Roger Duggan, general manager of Powerscourt Distillery, said the company would use the funding, which was secured through a process managed by Scottish corporate finance adviser HNH, to ramp up production at the Enniskerry-based facility. “There will be some expansion on the distillery side of things,” he said, while allowing the company to maximise the assets it has at its disposal “to build capacity”.
Powerscourt is one of a number of young Irish whiskey brands looking to compete with their more established Scottish rivals for their share of the all-important US spirits market.
Fercullen launched in the US earlier this year, and Mr Duggan said that by the end of 2023 it will account for one third of Powercourt’s sales along with Europe and Australasia.
What are the key challenges when attracting new investment here?
He said that the distillery generated revenues of between €4.5 million and €5 million in 2022, but that the expansion into the US, where its products are distributed by drinks group Zamora and its partner Southern Glazer’s Wine, is expected to push revenues to €6 million this year.
“It’s a crucial market,” Mr Duggan said. “But so far so good. We’ve exceeded our forecast for this year in the US. We’re doing as much learning as we can. So by the end of June I’d be very confident that we’ll certainly be above all the forecasts.”
He said that the PNC funding was a “vote of confidence” in the distillery and in Irish whiskey more generally.
“This deal is a great result for the Powerscourt Distillery and the outcome of a competitive process led locally by the HNH team,” said Bruce Walker, HNH director. “We were delighted to work with such a high-quality asset with an outstanding management team with a crystal-clear strategic vision.”
Some 6.1 million cases of Irish whiskey were sold in the US last year, figures published by the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States earlier this year indicate.
