Craft brewer Wolf of the Willows is a symbol of the shifting sands in the alcoholic beverages market, withproduct rocketing in less than a year to the point where it makes up 18 per cent of the company’s sales.
Wolf of the Willows was established by Scott and Renae McKinnon in 2014 and shifted to its current site at Mordialloc in bayside Melbourne in 2019. Mr McKinnon said inflation had triggered a 17 per cent jump in input costs and freight in the past year which had made the going tough. Freight and transport hikes have been one of the biggest extra imposts, along with energy bills.“Staff shortages in the transport industry have been quite large,” he said. Those absenteeism rates combined with higher fuel prices have resulted in big rises in freight charges.