Update, Feb. 8: BrewDog declined an interview request for this story. A company spokesperson said via email that “BrewDog is committed to being a great employer. There is work to be done but we are listening and taking action.” The spokesperson highlighted BrewDog’s Workplace Code and its action plan following an internal culture review completed in December 2021 by the consulting firm Wiser.
THE GIST
A group of former employees from global brewer BrewDog has taken a step toward legal action against the company that also furthers their goal of joining a labor union. It’s the latest effort to combat a work environment some staff have said is steeped in intimidating, hostile, and misogynistic behaviors.
The collective, known as Punks With Purpose, in partnership with hospitality consultancy Hand & Heart, has launched the Affected Workers Registration Platform. The online portal will collect stories of alleged workplace misconduct from former and current employees at the global beer company, which has operations in at least 15 countries. Claims of a toxic workplace at BrewDog first surfaced in May 2021, when brewer Brienne Allan solicited stories of sexism in the beer industry on her Instagram page, @ratmagnet. According to Hand & Heart records, 103 stories shared there mentioned sexism at BrewDog.
This movement comes two weeks after current and former BrewDog employees shared negative experiences in a BBC One documentary. That investigation featured stories from staffers who say BrewDog CEO and co-founder James Watt gave women employees unwanted romantic attention, resulting in managers changing schedules to keep women from working near Watt and advising women employees not to wear makeup when he was in town. The documentary has been viewed at least 450,000 times.
“It is our hope, that if the current response and rhetoric continue from the company, we would be able to then point people in the direction of unions, lawyers, and other helpful resources depending on the circumstances,” the Affected Workers Registration Platform website states.
A BrewDog spokesperson replied to questions about the announcement, but did not answer questions as of press time. The spokesperson said the company would offer more information at an undetermined time.
WHY IT MATTERS
The announcement by Punks With Purpose is the latest and most serious collective action to date from former employees of BrewDog. The group originally formed in summer 2020 to demand change at the company, but it gained more attention in the wake of allegations shared with Brienne Allan. Punks With Purpose says BrewDog leadership still has a long way to go to fix the company’s toxic culture. From its beginning, the group has said that its work could lead to joining a labor union. The goal would be to protect employees and create a more equitable working environment.
Watt has denied claims aired in the BBC investigation as “totally false” and, in a tweet, said he would pursue legal action against the broadcaster. The Guardian reported that Watt appeared to intimidate sources who spoke to the BBC, urging them to back out of the documentary.
With the creation of the portal, it’s clear those alleged threats may not stop more employees from coming forward. On the website, the group states its purpose is “to unite and empower contributors to be able to negotiate, mediate and/or take action in the future.” Hand & Heart will not investigate any claims lodged through the website, but will use collected information to share anonymized summaries with the public and/or Punks With Purpose. The website does ask claimants to give consent for Hand & Heart to make contact for the purposes of further organizing.
“All the data and aggregation is certainly the first part of [a class-action lawsuit],” says Ashley Brandt, a partner at the U.S-based law firm Tucker Ellis which serves alcoholic beverage clients. “Why would you create this website and try to get all that stuff going if you’re not at least conscious of the possibility of a lawsuit?”
Rob MacKay, a member of Punks With Purpose, says the portal’s goal is not to gather cases for a lawsuit, though he acknowledges it’s a rational way to view its creation. Rather, Punks With Purpose has four main goals for the Affected Workers Registration Platform:
Allow a third party, Hand & Heart, to collect and organize disparate stories across many geographies into a central database, something Punks With Purpose hasn’t itself tried to do.
Demonstrate to BrewDog the extent and nature of the claims.
Move the method for sharing these claims to a platform that allows complainants to keep their identities private, if they wish.
Provide contact information about complainants to Hand & Heart to potentially facilitate further collective action.
The portal asks those with potential claims to check boxes indicating the type of workplace misconduct they experienced or witnessed at BrewDog, with options including:
Sexual harassment
Racism
Wage theft
Pay issues/underpayment/illegal wages
Coercion
Threat of job loss
Hostile work environment
Regulatory body misconduct, and more
Though Punks With Purpose says it is not aiming to bring a lawsuit against BrewDog, all of the topics listed above would, if proven, be considered illegal labor practices. If these practices were found to be widespread enough at a company, Brandt says, it could become of interest to the U.S. government under the Fair Labor Standards Act or the purview of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). He uses the example of Wells Fargo, which the EEOC fined $7.8 million in 2020 after the bank was found to have discriminated against Black and women job applicants.
“A server having a shitty boss, the government doesn’t care,” Brandt says. “The illegal areas are what interest the government.”
Even before potential legal ramifications can be explored, the platform is intended to lend credence to the persistent complaints of former BrewDog employees.
“The ultimate goal is to demonstrate to the company that these aren’t just a handful of disgruntled employees,” says Kate Bailey, managing director at Hand & Heart. “The reality of the data that we have on social media suggests that there are over 100 stories; however, their presence on social media has constantly been a method for the company to dismiss their legitimacy.”
Hand & Heart is the same firm that is helping Mikkeller execute its reconciliation plan to make amends to former employees who allege they were harassed, bullied, or otherwise mistreated while employed by the Copenhagen-based global beer company. Bailey emphasizes that the BrewDog platform is “a completely new concept” and is not affiliated with the platform supporting Mikkeller’s plan.
While BrewDog’s company culture and the irreverent, sometimes confrontational behavior of its leadership has long generated headlines—for stunts like dropping taxidermied cats from a helicopter and blowing up bottles of mass-market Lagers—stories have centered squarely on the well-being of staff once Punks With Purpose started in earnest last summer. In June 2021, the group published an open letter, signed by hundreds of current and former employees, to the company validating women’s claims and alleging a “culture of fear” that originated with CEO James Watt. Since then, MacKay says the response from BrewDog has been “diabolically inept.” He says no one from BrewDog has ever contacted Punks With Purpose to discuss the group’s concerns, and that Watt has made comments on the BrewDog Equity For Punks forum—a discussion board the company maintains to communicate with investors who have bought a stake in its crowdfunding campaigns—that has criticized the group. What’s needed, MacKay says, is nothing less than a total change in perspective from BrewDog leadership, and an acknowledgment of the validity of claims former employees have made.
“The hope is that they fundamentally change their attitude of valuing growth and commercial success over human sustainability,” MacKay says. “That mindset has to be denounced as how they got to where they are, but not as how they’ll continue to succeed as a business.”
MacKay says the company’s efforts to correct their workplace culture so far are encouraging, but incomplete. For example, BrewDog hired consultancy firm Wiser to conduct a culture review at the company, which was completed in December 2021. Watt stated in a LinkedIn post that the review revealed efforts where “we have not met our crew members’ expectations,” but that “the vast majority of our people really enjoy working at BrewDog.” The review said BrewDog had committed to “a structure review to identify resourcing gaps,” an across-the-board 3% pay increase for employees, the creation of new Employee Representative Groups, the availability of an independent ethics hotline for employee complaints, and investment in career development programs. MacKay says the problems highlighted in the review were discussed only in broad and vague terms, and rejects the idea that a review overseen by BrewDog’s board of directors and led by the board’s deputy chair could be considered truly independent.
While Punks With Purpose acknowledges that BrewDog has implemented some positive changes, including a new Workplace Code, it still demands the company better engage with its critics. Hand & Heart’s Bailey hopes this platform will give these claims legitimacy that BrewDog can’t ignore.
Regardless of what next steps former BrewDog employees take after launching the portal, the baseline goal is to keep the company working towards bettering its workplace.
“What we really hope is that BrewDog will pay attention. We don’t want to be doing this forever,” MacKay says. “Ideally we’d see the evidence that things are changing, but we don’t feel like we’re seeing that yet.”
Words by Kate Bernot