James Watt and BrewDog represent the worst excesses of millennial hustle culture and performative rebellion. Their ambition-over-ethics approach would never fly today, writes Herald columnist Marissa MacWhirter.

This week, Brewdog has been suffering from a hangover so bad you would think the company had been glugging down its own acrid pints for the last few years.

On Monday, hundreds of employees were made redundant over a 15-minute video call by the disembodied voice of chief executive James Taylor. The Ellon-based beer company went into administration and was scooped up in a fire sale by beverage and cannabis firm Tilray for £33 million. Dozens of bars would shut immediately, and anyone who bought into the company via its Equity for Punks scheme would be getting a big fat zero returned on their investment.

With cameras switched off and no time for questions, Taylor reportedly explained that the workers' fate was now in the hands of the insolvency firm.

Brewdog co-founder James Watt chose his favourite social media platform, LinkedIn, to express how “heartbroken” he was about the sale, lamenting the 484 jobs that were destroyed, the 38 bars to be boarded up, and the hundreds of thousands of people who bought into his narrative that would be left empty-handed.

“I am heartbroken for all of the hardworking and passionate team members who have lost their jobs,” he wrote. “I am heartbroken for all of our brilliant equity punks who did not get the return on their investment they wanted.”

In his statement, Watt positions himself as a victim and neglects to acknowledge how his decision-making put people's livelihoods at risk. “Heartbreak” is not accountability.

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“I put my heart, my soul and every ounce of energy into building Brewdog as CEO from inception until early 2024 as we grew from a garage to the world’s leading independent beer brand,” he added. “We employed thousands and challenged an entire industry.”

Trying to get sympathy for whining about building your company in your garage (so did Jeff Bezos) earns the same tune on the world’s smallest violin as a supermodel complaining about how traumatic school was because they were too tall and skinny.

James Watt, a multi-millionaire, has betrayed hundreds of thousands of ordinary people, upon whose backs he built his fortune. In his statement, he talks about his “many mistakes” during his 17 years at the helm of the business. Is he referring to the toxic workplace culture, aggressive leadership, or brand hypocrisy? Perhaps all three?

In 2021 an open letter from Punks With Purpose signed by hundreds of current and former employees accused the company of a “culture of fear”, bullying, and unrealistic targets. It was followed up a year later by a BBC investigation that aired allegations James Watt’s behaviour made female staff and customers feel “uncomfortable” and “powerless”, all of which he denies.

The business was later stripped of its coveted B Corp status after concerns about its ethics, faced accusations of greenwashing over its failed “Lost Forest” carbon-offsetting scheme, and was forced to pay out after a misleading “solid gold” beer-can promotion, while separate reports claimed it used “fake” job interviews to harvest marketing ideas and allegedly unfairly sacked an Asian worker who challenged far-right EDL patrons.

Watt says there is “much more to say about the final chapter” and promises one day he will “tell that story” but his actions have already said enough. This is someone who proudly penned the lines “be a selfish bastard and ignore advice”, “learning from mistakes is for losers”, and “advice is for freaks and clowns” in his 2015 book Business for Punks.

Equity for Punks (EFP) operated like a glorified beer membership. It was sold as a way to “own the revolution” against big beer by a company that desperately wanted to be big beer. The scheme was based off Watt and fellow co-founder Martin Dickie’s first crowdfunding round in 2009. That campaign became the template for EFP, which raised roughly £75 million from around 200,000 small investors across seven crowdfunding rounds. The average person dropped around £500 on the scheme, which ended in 2021.

Back in 2017, a few years before the scheme ended, Brewdog had brought in US private equity firm, TSG Consumer Partners, which paid about £213 million for 22% of the company. In a secondary sale Watt and Dickie sold stock to the firm for around £50 million each. Watt is now claiming that his equity punks could have, in theory, sold some or all of their shares when he did. But the crowdfunding shares were heavily restricted in reality so it doesn’t seem like ordinary investors had access to the same TSG payday that the founders did.

TSG’s preferred shares came with a compound return that had to be settled first in any exit, which is why when BrewDog sold this week for a paltry £33 million, there was nothing left for the average joes that built the company.

The entire Brewdog story operates like an Aesop Fable about hustle culture and the founder myth. It emerged in the wake of the 2008 financial crash which saw a broad anti-establishment current sweep across the UK. Watt and Dickie marketed themselves as loud and juvenile “punks” out to change a stale system that people were already suspicious of. No more old man pubs, this was the era of exposed lightbulbs and ventilation, corrugated metal and drinking beer on long uncomfortable benches that made you feel like you were in some kind of workmen’s canteen. Forget lager, punks drink water-brash inducing IPAs now.

The flat-cap-wearing, bracelet-sporting bros were emblematic of millennial cringe. Today, it’s hard to understand how the pair and their branding were ever deemed “cool”, but they were, and a lot of well-meaning people wanted to support a small brand from Aberdeen. But though the pair were experts at marketing themselves as anti-establishment, they never really were. And they certainly were never anti-growth, if their actions were anything to go by. Equity for Punks was a capital-raising machine they used to become the system, even if their shares were sold on the idea of “smashing the system”. People wanted to believe the myth, and Watt has let them down.

James Watt and Brewdog represent the worst excesses of millennial hustle culture and performative rebellion. Their ambition-over-ethics approach would never fly today. The entire brand is dated and should be left in 2007, where it belongs.

There is only one redeemable way out of this situation. Watt’s net worth is estimated to be in the hundreds of millions; perhaps reimbursing the people who believed in him would help heal his broken heart. But alas, I fear his tears are of the alligator variety.

Marissa MacWhirter is a columnist and feature writer at The Herald, and the editor of The Glasgow Wrap. The newsletter is curated between 5-7am, bringing the best of local news to your inbox each morning without ads, clickbait, or hyperbole. Oh, and it’s free. She can be found on X @marissaamayy1

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