Big is beaut at Woolies, so long as it’s kept in the company. The country’s leading retailer has started restructuring its grog business, rationalising the number of underperforming First Estate outlets into more downmarket BWS operations.

First Estate was originally started as competition to Coles Myer’s Vintage Cellars, its upmarket chain of grog shops. Coles’s main chain is Liquorland.

The first First Estate in Sydney was at Elanora Heights and that’s been the first to be changed into a BWS outlet, with more mass market ranges.

Woolies is concentrating on its new Dan Murphy’s grog barns with much bigger ranges of alcohol and their claimed lower prices. Five Dan Murphy’s have opened in and around Sydney in the past three or four years and a number will be opened in Queensland.

Now Woolies will have Dan Murphy’s with a large range (perhaps 4,000 SKUs) then Woolies Liquor and then BWS. Dan Murphy’s will straddle the market with all price points.