Dublin-based WineSpark founder Eamon FitzGerald is far from the first person to believe he can revolutionise the wine industry. But through a careful investment strategy, and refusing to compromise on his values, he is adamant change is possible.
Working as a management consultant for Accenture, FitzGerald could not help but let his mind wander towards his own Grape Escape. He began running a blog under that name, charting the journey “from the corporate world through to following my dream in the wine industry”.
His career took him to London. Passionate about wine, he became a customer of wine club and retailer Naked Wines. After posting a review of one of the company’s events online, he met its founder Rowan Gormley for a beer. Just four months later he was working at the company and, soon after, took on the mantle of managing director.
When he left the business in 2024, it had scaled to £100 million (€114 million) in annual revenue and boasted more than 250,000 subscribers.
RM Block
Coming back to Ireland, FitzGerald had a dream to create something new, a business which would deliver for customers and winemakers alike.
Other businesses have tried to do the same in the past, he says, but have ended up compromising and selling out the values they started with.
Online wine club WineSpark was the result of this ambition. He set up the business in 2021 after securing €300,000 from wine makers across the globe. Further funding rounds fuelled the company to reach annual revenues of €1 million this year.
In November, it was revealed the latest fundraising round valued the company at €8 million, following a €1.5 million investment as, once again, FitzGerald spurned traditional investors and venture capital.
He had initially expected it would be a “tall order” to fill the round, but FitzGerald quickly saw 77 of his customers and suppliers from across the world invest an average of €19,500. The funding is allowing the business to expand into the UK market.
He says the decision not to opt for institutional investors is a conscious one, based on prior experience in the sector and on keeping the business true to its mission.
“People dream of becoming an entrepreneur and of starting their own business. They want to have their own independence, and to be in charge of themselves. But the reality of it is, the minute you take someone else’s money, you’re now working for them.”
Entrepreneurs, he says, need to make sure their investors are aligned with the long-term outcome of their business.
“You should be prioritising long-term loyalty of your customers over short-term targets” as the company starts out, he believes.
“Far too many companies are stuck in a cycle of trying to hit next quarter sales to satisfy an investor or a share price, when it goes against the long-term interest of the customer.”
For this reason, having his customers as his fellow shareholders creates a perfect alignment for the company, but the lack of institutional investment is certainly not dampening FitzGerald’s ambition for growth.
He predicts the company will triple its employee headcount from five to 15 over the next three years and expects it to reach €50 million in turnover by 2030, driven by its new presence in the UK market.
The company is entering a critical phase in its growth, with the UK expected to account for more than 90 per cent of turnover in time, but it is not an elbows out approach.
The wine club industry is large enough that WineSpark does not “need to dominate it” or to “send anyone out of business” just to have a slice of the market.
“We just need to fit in and be an established player,” he says, “and it is a market where people generally buy from four or five different merchants at once anyway. So we just need to be one of their options.”
There is “not a hope” that the Irish market will be forgotten along the way, he says, intending to retain its headquarters in Dublin, alongside the bulk of its wine buying operations, customer service and marketing. Its UK presence on the ground – bolstered by newly appointed chief operating officer Henry Dardis – will focus on operations, aiming to establish in a market 12 times larger than Ireland, he says.
On top of his experience at Naked Wines, the growth of the business in Ireland gives him confidence it is replicable overseas. “Wine drinkers who care about quality are just as underserved as they are in Ireland,” he says.
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FitzGerald believes the company’s efficient business model and small fixed cost base, allows it to sell wine at a low price while still being a valued partner for suppliers.
WineSpark has benefited from timing, he says. Supply chain disruption, due to US import tariffs, created an opportunity for the company to land contracts with producers he “would never have dreamed of” amid a “buying spree” to secure product for its new market.
The biggest challenge now is developing a customer base, as well as acquiring and retaining quality customers.
Counter-intuitively, FitzGerald says his biggest learning in the wine industry so far is that the “most important metric you need to look at when acquiring customers online is their first order spend”.
In Ireland, FitzGerald says they found quality and consistent customers through targeted letter dropping as the company was finding its feet, having “very little resources, very little money; we had to get creative.”
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The customers they generated from this boots on the ground approach have been some of their most loyal so far, with his big learning from the experience being that: “In an age of TikTok, AI and these more ‘glamorous’ channels, for a certain demographic, good old fashioned snail mail and email marketing works better than ever.”
While the alcohol industry is threatened by lifestyle and cost-of-living pressures, the former Accenture man feels there are “encouraging trends” for his business hidden beneath the headline figures.
“Our main market is more mature drinkers consuming premium wine at home,” he says. “It is a niche in the wine industry which is growing, and we are targeting that niche.”
