Gurugram: Covid a huge hiccup for breweries

Over the past three years, microbreweries have made a mark in various parts of the state.

- Lopamudra Ganguly.

These entrepreneur-driven enterprises, which rely heavily on labour, brew their own beer and sell it in their own premises. Industry estimates say investment worth ₹100 crore has been pumped into the sector over the past three years, with the sector paying annual excise revenue of over ₹10 crore.

Opening a microbrewery after the lockdown will need a minimum working capital of ₹50 lakh. Distillery-cum-bar in Gurugram, of which the city has nearly 50.

This doesn’t factor in investment that has gone down the drain, literally. In the third week of April, a month into the lockdown, these microbreweries had to discard their brew — around 1 lakh litres between the 50 establishments.

In the third month of the current fiscal, none of these establishments have applied for the annual renewal of license, which lapsed on March 31. The excise department says this is due to the lockdown and the renewal process will begin once bars and microbreweries receive permission to reopen.

But many microbrewery owners told that given the prevailing business conditions, they would simply not reopen as the concept was built around higher footfalls, the city’s large corporate clientele, and buzzing nightlife, none of which is possible when social distancing is the norm.