A break from tempting you with our lovely wines, I thought a personal note might be in order to make our big announcement and give you an opportunity to become personally involved in the next exciting chapter of Curious Wines.
It’s five and a half years since we started the business from Bandon, and almost four years since we made the move to Kinsale Road, Cork. Now we’re expanding and we’d love your help.
(*drum roll*) In just two weeks we’re opening our second wine warehouse in Naas, Co. Kildare. (Yay!)
We’ve acquired and received the necessary licencing on a 6,000 square foot unit in Tougher Business Park, Newhall, between Naas and Newbridge, just 3km from the M7 Dublin-Cork motorway. Around half the space will be used for retail, with the other half supporting the growing warehousing and distribution requirements of our nationwide online and wholesale business.
We’re totally sorted for finance. Any profit in the last five years has been reinvested in the business and the bank has supported us again in terms of our investment and working capital needs to take the business to the next stage. However, put simply, more cash allows us to buy better – in bigger quantities, at better prices and with better transport economies. So, we’ve just signed up with Linked Finance to raise a further €30,000 in stocking capital, and you can be a part of it.
I’ve been a huge fan of crowd funding since I became aware of the concept a couple of years ago, and swore I’d try it when we were expanding. In essence, it’s ordinary people lending money to ordinary businesses, as an alternative, or in this case a complement, to traditional forms of borrowing from the banks. More on the ‘How it Works’ and Linked Finance at the bottom of this mail.
The loan is over 3 years and works on an auction basis, where the lowest rates offered to reach the target loan amount get accepted, and those above the threshold get rejected. Now, here’s where I told a little fib about tempting you…
As an incentive/reward/thank you to our greatest asset – you, the customer – we’re offering a 3-year VIP discount card on everything you buy from Curious Wines: an additional 10% off, after all pre-existing sale prices, case discounts, bin-ends and special offers, for the term of the loan. All you’ve got to do is commit to lending at least €500 at 6.5% or lower, and for your bid to be accepted as part of the final loan.
We get the loan of your cash to help us grow the business, you get a still very competitive deposit rate. Further, we get your continued support and patronage, you get to support your investment and get VIP prices for the duration of it.
The loan went live yesterday and we’re already 12% funded as of 12.00pm today. You don’t have to rush – the loan will be up for two weeks – and it is an auction, so rate takes precedence over when the bid was placed when it comes to taking the best offer at the end. But equally, get in early and help drive down our borrowing rate and we all benefit in the long run.
We have the business profile and loan proposal here, and you can sign up as a Linked Finance lender here.
If it’s not for you, perhaps you might know someone who’d be interested. It’s one of the very few times I’d ask you to share marketing material but you never know, they might buy you some wine with their discount as a thank you! If you do, please send them the link to this post.
Thanks for reading and, as ever, your enduring, wonderful support.
Best wishes,
Mike
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