Big Shed Brewing placed into voluntary administration

A popular Aussie brewing company formed by two mates more than two decades ago has gone into administration.

Big Shed Brewing, an independent craft brewery based at Royal Park, in Adelaide, went into administration on Tuesday.

The company which produces craft beers, ciders, spirits and hard beverages will continue to trade as a solution is worked out with creditors.

Its founders were in their twenties, with no experience in brewing or hospitality, when they established the brewer in 2002. 

Insolvency and restructuring firm Heard Phillips Lieberenz has been appointed as administrator, with director Mark Lieberenz promising to do his best to keep the brewer trading.

‘We are open for business and look forward to continue brewing the full range of Big Shed beers…’ he said in a statement. 

Craig Basford and Jason Harris, now both 47, began brewing beer in Mr Harris’s shed for their friends in Adelaide in 2002.

‘We got half decent at brewing beer and a lot of our mates were saying we should start a brewery,’ Mr Basford told Daily Mail Australia in 2019.

‘Then we’d wake up the next day with a hangover and think it was a stupid idea, but we couldn’t get it out of our heads that we should do it.

‘I didn’t want to be 70 wondering what would have happened if I didn’t have a crack at it.’

They then branched out into pubs, opening  their first venue, Big Shed Brewing Concern, in 2012 and in 2019 launching a second $2.5million project in Royal Park.

Neither had any experience in hospitality, breweries or sales.

Craig Basford (right) and Jason Harris (left), now both 47, began brewing beer in Mr Harris’s shed for their friends in Adelaide in 2002

They found a small warehouse, built a brewery and opened up a tap room.

Five years later, they opened up their second brewery in Royal Park, which also had a capacity to cater for 250 people in a beer garden, serving lunch and dinner seven days a week.

‘It became a local hangout for a lot of people. We didn’t want to be the guys who got big and then got out,’ Mr Basford said.

But even before the Covid pandemic, Mr Basford said it was stressful. 

‘It was really stressful,’ he said.

‘We have moments when it’s fantastic, moments when it’s terrible.

‘At the end of the day we get to have a beer and that’s pretty good.’

Big Shed Brewing had deals with liquor stores in South Australia, Victoria and New South Wales.