Scotland-based whisky discovery app, Bevvy, has successfully closed a seed funding round to the tune of £1.2 million ($1.5 million). The funding has been predominantly sourced from Scottish angel investors, current shareholders, and a family office based in Denver.
Laurie Black, co-founder and head of whiskey at Bevvy, expressed her excitement about the company’s growth. The new capital will enable Bevvy to consolidate its market share and expand its customer base into new territories, including a planned expansion into the US market in 2024.
Founded in 2021 by whisky expert Black, medtech entrepreneur Lucas Heron, and mathematician Atanas Tonchev, Bevvy offers a tech-driven platform that operates through Android and Apple mobile applications. Users can use the app and their phone’s camera to scan the label of any whisky bottle, revealing tasting notes and estimated valuations for their collection.
Bevvy’s core feature is its proprietary image capturing software, backed by the world’s largest database of whiskies, with over 200,000 catalogued from the past 120 years of releases. The database not only includes 150,000 images but also tracks retail and auction pricing while monitoring market sentiment.
In the past year, Bevvy has started to incorporate whisky bar and pub data into its platform. Bar operators can now scan the bottles they have available and publish a live menu. The company is also working to expand its catalogue of Bourbon bottles as part of its growth strategy in the US market.
Confidence in the Market
Bevvy’s finance director, Greg Gormley, spoke about the successful funding round as a testament to the app’s growing prominence as a vital tool among whisky consumers and collectors. He noted that interest and demand in whisky are increasing at an unprecedented rate.
Black sees an extraordinarily exciting time ahead for Bevvy. With thousands of bottle scans every week, the company is gaining valuable insights into user taste preferences, price trends, and industry strengths and weaknesses. 2024 is set to be a year of significant development and innovation for the whisky discovery app.
