Virgin Wines confirms £110 million AIM float

Virgin Wines has confirmed an £110 million float on London’s junior AIM market.

The direct-to-consumer online wine retailer, which has around 147,000 paying subscribers and delivered more than 1 million cases in 2020, is joining a host of digital companies executing listings after seeing demand soar during the pandemic - including online card retailer Moonpig.

Virgin Wines said on Thursday that it expects its IPO on March 2 to see it place 6.6 million new ordinary shares and 17.7 million existing shares at an offer price of 197p per share, in a listing set to value the firm at £110 million and make selling shareholders nearly £35 million.

The company, set to start trading under the ticker VINO, expects to raise £13 million for the business.

Following the IPO, four venture capital trusts will own just over 36% of the company, with senior management holding just over 20%.

Chief executive, Jay Wright, said listing “will provide us with the platform to execute our ambitious growth plans”.

He said: “We are delighted by the strong support we have received from blue-chip institutional investors and that the placing was significantly over-subscribed.”

The firm, which licenses the brand name from Richard Branson, has hired Liberum to see it through the IPO.

Virgin Wines was previously owned by Direct Wines, and in 2014 went through a private-equity backed management buyout by its current team, including former Warehouse Wines founder Wright, and CFO Graeme Weir.

The company mostly acquires a wine-producer’s whole supply and provides their wines exclusively -a method that removes price comparisons on bottles.

It estimates the addressable, off-trade market for wine specialists such as Virgin Wines was in 2020 estimated to be around £2.4 billion a year.