With a business name that translates to ‘wine motherf**ker’, it’s very clear that Justin Dry and Andre Eikmeier are passionate about wine.
The company turns over about $50 million and delivers nearly 500,000 customers (or ‘Mofos’) Australian boutique wine to their doorstep.
There’s a misconception that good wine should be exclusive to a certain type of people, and Vinomofo wanted to fight that. The guys are clad in T-shirts, jeans and sneakers, reflecting their ‘no bowties and bulls**t’ approach to good wine. 
The company is a product of 9 years in the wine business. Justin and Andre’s first venture was Qwoff, a platform that aimed to be Facebook for wines. They travelled around in a kombi filming wine stories and showcasing the best wineries. Wine enthusiasts and distributors were excited about the platform, but it didn't do as well as Justin and Andre hoped.
Justin and Andre are keeping it casual.
“It took us a fair while to realise that people just want to be drinking wine. They wanted to be drinking wine that they love. So finally when we started actually helping them get that - as in, to the point where the wine arrives on their doorstep - then it started working,” says Andre.
“This is why investors invest in founders not ideas, because good founders who are committed to ideas will find a way.”
Justin and Andre on the road for their first venture Qwoff. Source: Supplied
What’s in a name?
Justin and Andre originally wanted to call the business Vinomojo. “Literally 3 days out from launch, we get a legal letter – a cease and desist – around a trademark infringement saying that we were infringing on an existing trademark of ‘mojo’," says Justin.
“We did what we do when we have to make a tough decision in business – we opened a couple of bottles of wine.”
“After one or two bottles of wine maybe, I think I said, ‘why don’t we call it Vinomofo for the motherf**kers who are trying to steal our mojo?’” Justin laughs.
And the name stuck.
With Vinomofo gaining traction, it fell on the radar of Coles and Woolworths, which cornered half of the Australian wine market. The retail giants pressured the smaller wine producers to stop using Vinomofo, which they reluctantly agreed to, fearing they would lose their contracts.
“That was the make-or-break early on. That happened 3 months into launching Vinomofo. We sold a big share of it to Catch of the Day, and that was in response to needing to grow fast,” Andre says.
“It wasn’t quite what we pictured, so we bought it back 15 months later. It was all us from then.”
The brothers-in-law preferred their independence to the deal they struck with Catch of the Day. Source: Supplied
With Andre marrying into Justin’s family, the brothers-in-law admit they didn’t like each other very much at the beginning.
“It took a lot of work, but I think if you can get there and you get that trust and respect.”
They say that working with family is one of the most important elements in driving their success. “Ultimately, family comes first. You can’t buy that, you can’t replace that.”
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