The Mill Brewery Exits the Bendigo Hotel in Collingwood
Words by Nick Connellan · Published on 07 Aug 2026
“Don’t worry, the gigs aren’t going anywhere” we wrote when The Mill Brewery took over Collingwood pub The Bendigo Hotel at the end of 2024. And they didn’t. After upgrading the bandroom, The Mill founder Mirek Aldridge and his partner, Larissa Spijkerbosch, kept it pumping week after week – until they couldn’t.
Yesterday the brewery announced the Bendi has been sold to an unspecified new operator, who may or may not keep the music going.
“It was on the market for a little while,” Aldridge tells Broadsheet. “Everybody sort of knows that running a hospitality business and especially a live music business isn’t easy, especially in today’s climate.”
Despite this, he’s proud of the past two years and hopes this era of the pub can finish on a high: “We’ve got a really good month of shows coming up, just to close out The Mill Brewery at the Bendigo Hotel chapter, basically.”
From Thursday to Sunday throughout August, catch the likes of Melbourne doom metal bands Ghostsmoker and Carcinoid, local death metal quartet Escarion, cult one-man metal project Convulsing, heavy psych rock act Jack Harlon & The Dead Crows and chaotic Mexican ska band Out Of Control Army.
As for The Mill itself – it’s not going anywhere. The company has operated a large production brewery in Thomastown since 2021, which effectively replaced the modest Collingwood warehouse where it was founded. That will open to the public at some point.
“We’ve never had a need for that up in Thomastown because we’ve always had a venue,” Aldridge says. “But with this closure looming on us, we just thought, ‘Let’s open Thomastown as a cellar door. We’ll start small. You’ll be able to drink in, there’ll be a couple of taps pouring, and probably just open Friday and Saturday.
“Just always having somewhere for the punters to come buy our beers and have a chat – that’s something I’ve always thought was super important with running a brewery. We never wanted to just be a wholesale brewery. We always wanted to have somewhere where people can come. So that’s what we plan on doing.”
The Mill Brewery’s final night at the Bendigo Hotel is on August 29, 2026. Check the gig line-up and book tickets here.
The Bendigo Hotel
0401 717 614
Hours
Wed to Sun 4pm–midnight
Fri & Sat 3pm–3am
About the author
Nick Connellan is Broadsheet’s Australia editor and oversees all stories produced across the country. He’s been with the company since 2015.
