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The Farnsburg brewery in Sissach is in crisis: the business is nearing completion. The civil district court of Basel-Landschaft Ost has granted the joint-stock company a provisional moratorium on debt restructuring until mid-March 2021. Urs Baumann & Partner in Reinach was appointed by the court as trustee, as the “bz Basel “.
Baumann will now attempt to negotiate a partial waiver with all creditors. For the business to continue to exist through debt relief, at least half of the creditors must consent. One hurdle is that creditors together must account for two-thirds of the amount owed. Farnsburg’s 860 shareholders couldn’t wait for more money.
Various changes of direction
According to co-founder and former board member Matthias Manz, the problems arose because the company only lost money while searching for the right location and then failed to break even due to lack of sales. During his time as a member of the board of directors, this was not successful, “and certainly not with the various strategies that followed,” as the newspaper cites.
In 2018, for example, the brewery abandoned the previous philosophy of “from the region to the region” and began producing large quantities of canned beer in Germany, which ultimately failed. Markus Haubensak later became a sponsor. Today he is the only director left.
Those responsible repositioned Farnsburger beer “in the premium segment” and increased prices in some cases more than double, according to a report by the “Volksstimme”. With that too, the company failed. After almost four years, beer production came to a halt in Sissach last March. Now the production facilities have been dismantled and the rented premises in the center of Sissach have been emptied.
There was no money
“It is a vicious circle. The brewery business is capital intensive from a certain size and needs large sales to become self-sufficient. But we didn’t have the money to grow the market, “Matthias Manz told” bz Basel “about the failure of the brewery. In the beer industry, sales can be achieved mainly through gastronomy.
In order to win over the owners for their products, the breweries grant them operating loans and finance installations and advertising measures. ‘These fringe benefits are, so to speak, the entry threshold. But we don’t generate enough sales to pay for them. We thought it would be easier to get the taps, ”says Manz. For many brewers, these are the main source of income, the bottle business is secondary.
