Image: Rawpixel.com
By Keith Flett
BrewDog has been much in the news and as often in recent times not for good reasons.
There are three parts to the story. Firstly, where things are now. Secondly ,how they ended up like that and thirdly – and most importantly – how things could have been done very differently from a socialist perspective.
The US firm Tilray bought BrewDog’s brewery, brand name and 11 pubs on 2nd March. 484 people were sacked on the spot and Unite the Union is on the case. The acquisition cost Tilray £33m which the Financial Times described as a cut-price deal. Not so long ago the brewer had been valued at £1bn+.
The first issue Tilray has is that the sackings and shotgun closures of 38 bars will mean a significant amount of reputational damage to BrewDog, which has already suffered a large amount in the last five years.
Tilray’s CEO Dwight Simon did a video call for investors after the sale. He noted that while the Ellon brewery has capacity to brew 2.4m hectolitres, it’s currently producing a third of that, 800,000 hectolitres.
That means there is plenty of space for the US craft brands that Tilray has hoovered up over the last few years to be brewed in Ellon for the European market.
In phrases that trip off the tongue of pretty much every CEO Simon noted that there was ‘lots of cost to be taken out’ of BrewDog, and Tilray would be looking for ‘efficiencies’.
This means primarily job cuts. 733 workers were TUPE’d (transfer of undertakings, protection of engagements) to Tilray. That protects their jobs, terms and conditions on day one, but not thereafter. At that point a variety of reasons can be given for job cuts known as ETO (economic, technical, organisational).
Given that Simon said Tilray did not know they had been successful until March 1st they won’t have had time to work out what level of workforce they need at Ellon. Any brewery worker who is not yet a member of Unite would be well advised to join.
Boom, bust and Capital
As one financial analyst noted it will be interesting to see how Tilray get on with a ‘damaged brand and downtrodden workforce’. Their core business in the US is medical cannabis and CEO Simon shows little sign of understanding much about beer. What he does understand is that he now owns the BrewDog brand and the Ellon brewery could be a base for European expansion.
The story of boom and bust and recomposition is almost a textbook example of the analysis Marx laid out in Capital. Understanding how BrewDog, founded in 2007, got to where it ended up in 2026 not only further vindicates Marx but provides some important pointers as to how it could have gone very differently.
Martin Dickie and James Watt were schoolmates. Dickie trained to be a brewer and started work in that capacity at Thornbridge in Derbyshire. Watt, whose father was a significant figure in the north-east Scotland fishing fleet worked on fishing boats.
Much of the early story of BrewDog is embroidered. However, Dickie was a talented brewer and Watt had some flair for business. That in itself would not have launched BrewDog on the road to being the UK’s largest craft beer brewer, but Tesco, sensing a gap in the market, launched a craft beer competition which BrewDog won.
Getting on the shelves in a major supermarket did lead to early success. The beers were often standout, appearing on cask or in bottle. Kegs and cans came later. The early Punk IPA was notably hoppy, stronger than its current version, while beers like Alice Porter and Hardcore IPA also made their mark.
While Watt may have business sense, he was not the innovator. The branding and styling came largely from the US brewer Stone, whose beer Arrogant Bastard seems to have been a Watt favourite.
The branding was designed to make waves and at least in the early period it did not backfire, as it often did later. Alongside that came a series of commitments to the environment, fairness and equality and so on, although never, ever, a commitment to workplace rights and trade unions.
Initially, while BrewDog beers were available in free houses around the UK, the operation was based entirely in Scotland with the brewery and a handful of pubs. In late 2011 horizons were raised when the first BrewDog pub in London was opened in Camden Town. I was there on that December Saturday when a tank plus James Watt turned up. It was a stunt that caught media attention. Significantly while BrewDog were still producing cask beer at this point, the pub did not sell it.
BrewDog, which had already been sparring with the Campaign for Real Ale, turned away from that market and launched its own support group, under the banner Equity for Punks. Attracting many thousands, it offered mainly discounts on beer but also an unsecured small stake in the brewer. The implication being that if as often mooted BrewDog floated on the Stock Exchange there would be a decent return. As we now know it didn’t happen, but it allowed BrewDog to raise millions in several crowdfunding exercises.
By its tenth anniversary in 2017 the logic of expansion had taken hold. Private equity outfit TSG bought a 20% plus stake. That made Dickie and Watt millions, but it also left Brewdog with an 18% compound interest financial hangover. By 2026 it is estimated that the brewer owed TSG around £800m, far more than annual profits, when they were made.
Expansion continued and BrewDog ended up with 90 bars around the globe and breweries in Scotland, Germany, the US and Australia. It now operated as just another corporate brewer, but its management infrastructure, despite some input from TSG, did not.
James Watt remained CEO until 2024, despite the Punks with Purpose expose in 2021 which covered issues of bullying and harassment. BrewDog, which had started as an alternative to big beer, was now acting as a bad example of it and the beer, once great, was now a mass-market product. Gone were the imperial stouts and sours, replaced by humdrum lagers and stouts.
A socialist approach
A socialist approach to food and drink seeks to transform the current capitalist system—which prioritizes profit, causes environmental damage, and results in food insecurity—into a system based on social, ecological, and human needs. It treats food and drink not merely as a commodity, but as a fundamental human right and a social necessity, produced through the combined efforts of human labour and nature.
So could BrewDog’s craft beer project have been done differently? That is the question any socialist like myself, impressed with the early BrewDog and then increasingly dismayed by it until I swerved the beers and bars nearly altogether, needs to consider.
The answer is an unequivocal yes. Firstly, Martin Dickie and James Watt (or those who might be tempted to do something similar in future) should have recognised their limitations. Dickie was a great brewer, while Watt could do publicity stunts that wound up Big Beer. Neither had any experience of running a business, or of managing a workforce. Professional assistance should have been sought.
Secondly, BrewDog should have recognised a trade union, in this case Unite the Union. Of course, Dickie and Watt were not used to dealing with a union, but again getting advice would have told them why it was important. A recognised union is not just about pay and conditions (and occasional strikes) although these are important. It can make sure that grievances are professionally handled and that issues with the business are raised. It may be that this is uncomfortable, but an independent voice would have saved BrewDog a serious amount of the trouble it stumbled into.
Thirdly, it should have resisted the siren call of capital to accumulate and expand. It’s not easy as Camden, Beavertown and other once independent craft brewers, now just another part of Big Beer, demonstrate, but it can be done. Kernel in London is an excellent example.
Fourthly, it should have understood that it needed a business model that was not the same as Big Beer but distinct from it. It was a Scottish-based brewer and provenance and community focus are a key part of independent beer. Expansion first to the UK and the across the globe was not only a mistake, but against what made craft beer different.
Fifthly, while its crowdfunding Equity for Punks schemes were not in most ways different to many other brewers, the idea that a stock market float would lead to financial gain for EFP holders should not have happened. Craft beer was meant to be focused on the beer, not the business. Of course, making sure the business was run properly and indeed profitably was important. Endless attempts to expand and in particular the private equity TSG deal were not, as became clear in 2026, the way forward.
Finally, BrewDog could have been run as a co-operative with both workers and Equity For Punks shareholders having a say. That might have fitted the original BrewDog culture of 2007, and it’s a model that might work for others in future. It would not have worked in 2026 however, since BrewDog was effectively bankrupt when sold to Tilray.
BrewDog is a cautionary tale of how in a capitalist economy the ability to avoid being swallowed up in a process of accumulation and expansion and ultimately failure is difficult. But it can be done, and if BrewDog serves as a caution as to how not to do it, perhaps it will have served some purpose.
