Ah, the shifting sands of Brewdog’s strongly held convictions. Not for the first time, he proves himself to be all about his bank balance.
[deleted]
Beer for punks….until we will sell out
This guy is always making a big song and dance about what other companies do and how he would never follow suit only to do it anyway 😂 I’ve tried most their products and can honestly say I’ve not enjoyed one.
The same guy who turned out to have stocks in Heineken after he removed beer brands from his pubs which had been bought by Heineken?
I’m shocked!
James Watt, CEO of Brewdog has gone from small cask brewer to megakegary and needs distribution.
I believe the words of Frank Booth (Dennis Hopper) in Blue Velvet sum up my feeling best here:
HEINEKEN? FUCK THAT SHIT!
BrewDog has really gone down hill. 5 years ago the beer was great, now it is just mass produced junk mostly. A wonderful opportunity to get a beer with the name of a beer that was great 5 years ago with a random fruit in it. Food is still alright but the beer is now at best ‘cold with bubbles in it’ which leads to a quick trip to a good pub.
There is a surprise, not.
Grifters gonna grift.
That’s not very “punk”
My local brewdog bars are brilliant, really good guest beers, staff are spot on, they’re all clean and well fitted out, good music and atmosphere. I’d love to see some of them bought out by an independent company and ran as independent bars, a big stumbling block is they’re in too prime of locations for smaller breweries to take them on and they aren’t big enough to brew out of so it makes more sense to go somewhere more industrial.
You lie down with dogs – you get up with fleas.
BrewDog is Wetherspoons for the middle class
> [Brewdog] has trailblazed a crowdfunding model since it was launched in Fraserburgh in 2007 by Mr Watt and co-founder Martin Dickie. More than £100m has been raised by around 200,000 “equity punks”, or shareholders.
> A source close to the discussions in 2018 told the BBC that Heineken walked away before negotiations properly got under way because the valuation BrewDog had put on the company was “outrageous”.
> The source said: “It was so outrageous, in his price idea, that we said well this is going nowhere. The guy [James Watt] doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”
> US private equity giant TSG bought a 22% stake in the company in 2017, with Mr Watt and his co-founder Mr Dickie making nearly £100m between them in the deal. TSG took two seats on the Brewdog board as a result.
> Documents from around late 2018 show that TSG seemed to be unhappy with aspects of how the company was being run. TSG appeared to suggest a recent board meeting had been a “low point” and was “sloppy, free ranging” with “no discussion on real business topics”.
> TSG appeared to be worried about a shortfall of earnings. The documents also suggest TSG believed Mr Watt was “spending aggressively”, that he was “desperately trying to create growth stories in order to reach an unattainable valuation”, and that his valuation goal was “not realistic”.
The story that interests me here is that the crowdfunding “shareholders” are never going to get their money back – he’s used them to raise capital and appears to squandered the money, instead of growing the company to a point at which the early shareholders would see a return upon IPO.
This was probably very easily done by giving the company a ridiculous valuation during the crowdfunding round – shareholders might have paid £1 a share thinking they were buying into a £100 million company, but their shares are worth only 10p each because it’s really only a £10 million company.
15 comments
Ah, the shifting sands of Brewdog’s strongly held convictions. Not for the first time, he proves himself to be all about his bank balance.
[deleted]
Beer for punks….until we will sell out
This guy is always making a big song and dance about what other companies do and how he would never follow suit only to do it anyway 😂 I’ve tried most their products and can honestly say I’ve not enjoyed one.
The same guy who turned out to have stocks in Heineken after he removed beer brands from his pubs which had been bought by Heineken?
I’m shocked!
James Watt, CEO of Brewdog has gone from small cask brewer to megakegary and needs distribution.
I believe the words of Frank Booth (Dennis Hopper) in Blue Velvet sum up my feeling best here:
HEINEKEN? FUCK THAT SHIT!
BrewDog has really gone down hill. 5 years ago the beer was great, now it is just mass produced junk mostly. A wonderful opportunity to get a beer with the name of a beer that was great 5 years ago with a random fruit in it. Food is still alright but the beer is now at best ‘cold with bubbles in it’ which leads to a quick trip to a good pub.
There is a surprise, not.
Grifters gonna grift.
That’s not very “punk”
My local brewdog bars are brilliant, really good guest beers, staff are spot on, they’re all clean and well fitted out, good music and atmosphere. I’d love to see some of them bought out by an independent company and ran as independent bars, a big stumbling block is they’re in too prime of locations for smaller breweries to take them on and they aren’t big enough to brew out of so it makes more sense to go somewhere more industrial.
You lie down with dogs – you get up with fleas.
BrewDog is Wetherspoons for the middle class
> [Brewdog] has trailblazed a crowdfunding model since it was launched in Fraserburgh in 2007 by Mr Watt and co-founder Martin Dickie. More than £100m has been raised by around 200,000 “equity punks”, or shareholders.
> A source close to the discussions in 2018 told the BBC that Heineken walked away before negotiations properly got under way because the valuation BrewDog had put on the company was “outrageous”.
> The source said: “It was so outrageous, in his price idea, that we said well this is going nowhere. The guy [James Watt] doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”
> US private equity giant TSG bought a 22% stake in the company in 2017, with Mr Watt and his co-founder Mr Dickie making nearly £100m between them in the deal. TSG took two seats on the Brewdog board as a result.
> Documents from around late 2018 show that TSG seemed to be unhappy with aspects of how the company was being run. TSG appeared to suggest a recent board meeting had been a “low point” and was “sloppy, free ranging” with “no discussion on real business topics”.
> TSG appeared to be worried about a shortfall of earnings. The documents also suggest TSG believed Mr Watt was “spending aggressively”, that he was “desperately trying to create growth stories in order to reach an unattainable valuation”, and that his valuation goal was “not realistic”.
The story that interests me here is that the crowdfunding “shareholders” are never going to get their money back – he’s used them to raise capital and appears to squandered the money, instead of growing the company to a point at which the early shareholders would see a return upon IPO.
This was probably very easily done by giving the company a ridiculous valuation during the crowdfunding round – shareholders might have paid £1 a share thinking they were buying into a £100 million company, but their shares are worth only 10p each because it’s really only a £10 million company.