In a year where some independent brewers are buckling under the weight of rising costs, Hawke’s Brewing Co. has landed a deal with Aldi for a six-pack of its multi–award-winning XPA. And despite the economic climate, the ‘Tropicaldi’ is on the shelves for under $14.
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“It’s $13.999 for a six-pack… that’s outrageous,” co-founder Nathan Lennon said on a call with SmartCompany.
“This particular beer might cost you over 20 bucks in any other bottle shop in Australia,” Lennon said.
It’s a price that Lennon says simply “doesn’t exist” elsewhere in the craft beer market – one that Aldi’s scale makes possible.
It also marks the first time the XPA has ever been available in a can. Despite years of demand from customers at the Bob Hawke Beer and Leisure Centre, Hawke’s Brewing had deliberately held off packaging the beer to avoid competing with its existing portfolio in major chains.
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“We’ve been absolutely harassed by consumers to get that product into a can,” Lennon says.
“But for us, building that into our portfolio felt like a risk… we’ve already got a really strong pale ale. This gives us a way to release it without treading on the toes of our other partners.”
Aldi’s exclusivity solves that. The supermarket becomes the only retail outlet where customers can buy the XPA in packaged form, allowing Hawke’s to protect its relationships with other big names like Coles.
According to Lennon, the collaboration is also about a deeper alignment between the two brands.
Lennon says both Hawke’s and Aldi have built identities around being “for the people”, offering premium products at prices the average consumer can actually afford.
“Bob Hawke was an incredibly approachable, man-of-the-people kind of guy, and that’s the brand we built,” Lennon said.
He went on to say that Aldi’s “Good Different” positioning mirrors Hawke’s own “good honest beer” ethos, and that both companies lean into doing things a bit differently, with a sense of humour.
That approach also extends to sustainability and community impact, which Lennon says was important to Aldi’s internal assessment. Hawke’s has a long-standing partnership with Landcare Australia and supports the local Mudcrabs environmental group.
These are efforts that sit alongside more creative initiatives like the King of the Climate machine at the Bob Hawke Beer and Leisure Centre, a gambling-free ‘pokie’ that donates its proceeds to environmental projects.
The partnership itself has been developing over the past year, and the ‘Tropicaldi’ project is a strategic commercial play.
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Aldi’s purchasing model gives suppliers something many independent brewers can’t get at scale: guaranteed volume and operational efficiency.
“It’s done by what’s called a job lot,” Lennon says. “There’s an agreement of volume that Aldi is going to draw down from us, and I think that’s around 90,000 litres, which is fairly meaningful out of one SKU.”
Because the release is exclusive, Hawke’s also avoids the resource-heavy task of selling into hundreds of independent stores.
Even with Aldi’s efficiencies, the low price is a deliberate decision. Lennon says Hawke’s is choosing to trade some margin now for scale later.
“We’ve probably always surrendered a little bit of margin to ensure we can hit really good prices… but we think we can build scale out of that approach,” he says. “It’s a bit of an investment ahead, but that’s where our brand works.”
If the launch performs well, Aldi may bring the XPA back beyond summer.
“If all goes well, it could be put up into the Special Buys category and become a permanent fixture. The instinct around here is that we’ve got something that could be a legacy product for the partnership.”
The Aldi collaboration also lands as Hawke’s prepares to open its long-planned beer garden behind the pool room at its Marrickville location. After some delays, Lennon says it may open as early as mid-December.
“We wanted to open it mid-year to iron out the kinks… now we’re opening into the two busiest weeks of the year,” he laughed.
