Girls’ beer: Macuco will open second store in Porto Alegre to overcome pandemic

Entrepreneurship was not on the radar of Michelle Ferraz and Fernanda Nascimento. Until 2013, both followed the academic career and dedicated themselves to the master’s and doctorate. It was during a congress in Belém, Pará, that the gaúchas got to know fruity beers, decided to create their own brand and abandon academic life.

It seemed risky, but entrepreneurship has worked: after years of study, the Macuco Craft Beers was created in 2016, earned BRL 751,000 in 2019, went through the pandemic and is now preparing to open its second store in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul.

With an investment of R$ 50 thousand, the couple bet their chips on an adapted motorcycle with four taps and developed their first labels to participate in street fairs. They faced a mostly male environment and became the first women in the city to develop and sell their own beers.

“At the time, there were no women in charge of the beer business, even more women from the LGBT community. We gained space little by little and today we are a reference. Macuco was important to pave the way for women in this sector and in entrepreneurship”, says Michelle.

In the beginning everything was a challenge. Michelle says that it was difficult to find a partner factory that would accept to develop the labels they thought of. “We had a lot of persistence and resilience to create Macuco. In addition to everyone’s disbelief, we had to adapt to market seasonality and sales volatility,” she explains.

The entrepreneurs adapted a second motorcycle, but soon realized that they would need a physical store to make Macuco grow. In December 2017, they opened a bar in the historic center of Porto Alegre. The billing of the ‘beer of the girls’ began to take off. The events and the bar generated BRL 590,000 in 2018. The following year, the growth strategy included greater use of social networks and revenue reached its peak: BRL 751,000 in 2019. At that time, half of the sales took place in the social networks.

With the pandemic, the bar was closed for nine months in 2020. “As entrepreneurship is our life and our source of income, we don’t consider closing the store. We adapted and developed the delivery in a few days”, says Michelle.

With the increase in the production of canned beers, the development of larger packages and the sale of kits on social networks, Macuco earned R$ 470 thousand that year. “Digital marketing was essential for us to have an audience throughout the pandemic. Even after reopening, our communication is done entirely through social media, mainly through Instagram and WhatsApp”.

In 2021, two more months of closed bars. Invoicing stopped at R$ 488 thousand. With 30 labels available in 2022, the couple will deliver to other states and will open a second store in Porto Alegre in August. The expectation is to reach 2019 revenue and overcome the effects of the pandemic.

Source: Exam