Brewdog culture issues may be bad for business
Its something that if they recognised a trade union Brewdog might already have known. Publicity stunts are one thing but when things are seen to go publicly wrong, reputational damage to a Company’s standing can occur. Companies can have a tin ear about the public impact of things they do but unions representing those that work for them rarely do
Obviously for small companies it will be little noticed (even though it should be). Brewdog is not a huge company but it has a big brand name in craft beer.
This week it has been rocked by complaints about workplace culture. It initially refuted them but then decided it was best to agree that they had substance.
It was perhaps a bit late. The Daily Telegraph, which does cover beer, but is hardly the paper for punks has put on-line (unusually not paywalled) an analysis of the matter that underlines how damaging the matter is:
A public float was expected to value the company at up to £2bn, handing a windfall to Watt and Dickie, who hold around 44pc of the business.
Yet the allegations that emerged this week may have cast a shadow on those plans. Other recent high-profile flops on the stock market had already given bosses pause; takeaway app Deliveroo struggled earlier this year amid concern over the working conditions of its delivery drivers. “I don’t think Deliveroo helped anyone looking to list,” Watt told the Telegraph earlier this year, adding that the company was also looking at options to float in the US. Watt said there remained a “strong preference” for it to become public in the UK.
For BrewDog, the workplace allegations may have brought a moment of reckoning. Watt insists it will be a “catalyst to be the best employer we can be”. He will have to hope so, or his list of BrewDog’s 10 biggest mistakes will soon need updating.
The ball as it were is firmly in Brewdog’s half
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2021/06/11/brewdog-loses-bark-toxic-claims-come-home-bite/
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