The life of a UK wine producer is never a dull one. Between supply chain issues and cost of living pressures on consumers, plus the day-to-day work of simply growing vines and making and selling wine, often the bigger picture falls by the wayside, as busy producers struggle to act on challenges, opportunities, and ambitions to grow their business.
But it can be done. Fiona and Stephen Duckett’s Hundred Hills vineyard and winery provide a great example of how to manage core business operations without losing focus on long-term goals. The couple founded their business in 2012, with a promise to bring a new era of world-class, single estate sparkling wines grown and produced in England’s beautiful dry chalk valleys. They are a well-capitalised and profitable family business, but they wanted to accelerate plans for longer-term growth into export markets.
This is where their partnership with Ferovinum came in. As Stephen explains:
"Hundred Hills is a long-term, inter-generational business, and we are excited to be bringing forward our plans to build an international brand that will thrive for many years to come in our family. Wine businesses are subject to all sorts of volatility, and we age our wines for many years before releasing them. The Ferovinum platform allows us to respond to emerging opportunities in international markets, dialling our access to working capital up or down as we need it."
The Ferovinum platform is helping Hundred Hills access additional capital from their wine stocks to expand into international markets over the next ten years and enable the laying down of wine for the future, all without compromising the current UK business.
It’s a familiar pattern for Ferovinum’s co-founder Mitchell Fowler, who explains: ‘Hundred Hills is one of the English wine industry’s most premium and dynamic businesses with exciting plans for the future. Ferovinum exists to support businesses such as this, allowing wine producers to put their stock to work, helping them use finance in a new, better, transformative way. Whether it’s managing short-term projects and challenges or supporting long-term growth plans, our platform is always on the side of funding, operational support, and the expertise and advice of our experienced team, whenever it’s needed.’
Founded in 2018, Ferovinum is the only platform dedicated to wine and spirits enterprises, designed to transform the way they access capital from stock and fund growth. Led by an experienced global team of finance, wine, and spirits experts, the Ferovinum platform helps businesses stay agile and adapt to market changes and challenges, not just with funding but with operational support and benefits right across the business pipeline. That’s why it is fast becoming a trusted, essential partner for a wide variety of producers – Hundred Hills included.
Stephen added: "Ferovinum is a great product with a lot of useful applications. We view their team as good partners for us as we grow, bringing financial flexibility and an easy, supportive relationship to our business."
If you’d like to talk to Ferovinum about how they can support your business, please get in touch with our Head of Growth Max.noble@ferovinum.com
