The app, which launched in September 2017, offers users 150 free beer tours in 85 cities across the world. Drinkers can download the tours and explore bars, breweries and pubs in their chosen city, while following on-screen directions to take them between locations.
Since launching, the app has recorded more than 8,000 check-ins to pubs, bars, breweries around the globe, and will have an estimated 10,000 users by the time the crowdfunding campaign goes live on Crowdcube in mid-September.
The app’s founder Jonny Quirk hopes the campaign will raise an initial £150,000 with potential to overfund to £250,000. The money will be spend on hiring local ‘ambassadors’ in 10 to 15 world cities, developing the company’s marketing and community team, and improving the app’s features.
B2B platform to launch
The company is also working on developing a B2B pay-as-you-go advertising platform that will charge bars, pubs and breweries a flat fee for each unique ‘check-in’ at their venue, in return for being featured on the app’s bar crawls/beer tours in that city.
The idea is that this would drive additional footfall and revenue for venues from tourists who may not have otherwise visited these venues.
Speaking about the app and upcoming crowdfunding campaign, Beer Adventures founder Jonny Quirk said: “We created our app because we want people to visit the very best beer places a city has to offer wherever they are in the world, no matter their level of beer knowledge.
“Originally, we started doing 'real-life guide-led' tours but our ambition is to be in every major city across the world in the next few years, so we're using technology to bridge that gap and speed up our expansion.”
New features inbound
Quirk added: “We now offer 85 cities on our app and have tours in China, India and Russia. We want to double the amount of cities we're in next year. I’m immensely proud that with very little marketing budget, we’ve generated over 8,000 check-ins on our app since launch. With a full marketing budget post-investment, we’re going to hugely increase this.
“We’ve some new features we’ll be adding to our app soon based on our user feedback but the major investments will be in building our sales and marketing teams. We want to create more tours, launch in more cities and get more people visiting great beer spots on holiday or when looking for a fun day out close to home.
“Another major use for this investment will be the rollout of our global ambassador programme where we will be working with local beer experts to get the word out about us, as well as curating our content so our tours, venues and experiences are as fresh and authentic as possible.”
Those interested in the campaign can register their pre-interest on the Beer Adventures website.