BBC Documentary on BrewDog

BeerNut

BBC Scotland ran an hour-long exposé on BrewDog this evening. For anyone who's been following that particular binfire over the last few years there wasn't a whole lot of new information, though the allegations that James Watt is a sex pest was new to me.

The whole thing is up on Vimeo here:

https://vimeo.com/669591174

L1011

The rebuttal on the EFP forum primarily rebuts the unimportant noise and ignores the important bits. Bit like all the responses to the Punks with Purpose letters.

Dempo1

Saw a bit of this and the sex pest angle was new to me also, I'd heard of the Toxic work environment before but was a little taken aback at the new allegations. Whatever about Scotland, Europe etc, I've worked in the states and this behaviour, if true (and I don't think it has been proven) is taken very seriously.

Very, very strange , the entire story 🤔

Black Sheep

He's clearly massively unpopular with the staff. There was the letter last year, and now this.

I have no sympathy for him because staff disgruntlement on this level is rarely without foundation - if he was a good person to work for this wouldn't be happening to him... But I find the language in this a bit unclear. Did he lech and pester female staff inappropriately, are there any actual complainants of workplace harassment? It's implied here, in that there is someone talking about providing advice to new staff to dress down and avoid catching his eye. But the actually basis of people saying they feel "uncomfortable" seems to be limited to him taking good looking younger women on brewery tours, and they were drunk. Older rich guys trying to pick up younger women can come across as sleazy, but equally does it make them sex pests? Unless there are lawsuits to come...?

This quite the story though-

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-60054053

If they cut corners on this it makes me wonder what else they lied about with regard to their products, when they felt it was necessary for them to do so. Boring paperwork and regulations aren't just red tape to inconvenience good old James and his pals, they're essential to protecting the food chain and consumer confidence in what we're eating and drinking :(

Muahahaha

Just saw this the other night when it was repeated on BBC2. Was an eye opener as I only heard some mention of the companies troubles and hadnt followed the ins and outs of it. It seems the Equity for Punks scheme is basically financial trickery to get money from their followers but then devalue their shares by giving the investment company better preferenced shares for cheaper. Felt sorry for the guy who had sunk £4k into in, not a massive amount of money but he didnt strike me as your typical investor or someone who could afford it. He was only in becasue he fell for the slick marketing of the company.

Also the revelation on James Watt investing in Heineken despite spending years going on about the evils of big macro brewers shows he is really just a marketer and promoter who says anything he thinks his audience wants to hear. The program said he sold his Heineken shares but the fact he bought them in the first place speaks volumes

Are they still planning an IPO? Think they have to hit circa 2 billion valuation for the small investors to stand a chance of getting their money back

BeerNut

I think they have to do the IPO. It's all about getting the venture capitalists their money back, and they're not going to go "Ah, yizz're grand, keep it". James is an economics graduate so it's always been a money play from day one. But money plays don't always work out.

hynesie08

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/mar/14/brewdog-boss-hired-private-investigators-to-gather-evidence-of-alleged-smear-campaign?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

What a normal bloke.....

Effects

What else can you expect from such a titan of the brewing industry 😂