Kmflett's Blog

After Brewdog the declining value of Big Craft Beer

In the summer of 2015 in the old Beavertown Brewery in Tottenham Hale an event to launch the United Craft Brewers was launched.

Four brewery owners were present

James Watt, Brewdog

Logan Plant, Beavertown

Jason Cuppaidge Camden Town

Richard Burhouse, Magic Rock

Underlining Karl Marx’s point that capitalists are a band of warring brothers the unity did not last very long.

Camden Town sold out to ABInBev at the end of 2015 for a reported £85m

In 2018 Heineken brought a 49% stake in Beavertown for £40m (they now own it 100%)

In 2026 Brewdog sold to US based Tilray for £33m

I’m not sure if Magic Rock beers are still a going concern but if they are they’re being produced at the Black Sheep brewery in Masham by whoever currently owns it.

As an historian I’m wary of comparisons. You can never be really sure that you are comparing like with like.

So the money paid for Camden and Beavertown can be seen arguably as during the peak (what was known as) craft beer period.

The £33m paid for Brewdog (cut price, Financial Times 3^rd March 2026) was a fire sale because it was essentially insolvent. Even so Brewdog is a far bigger concern than either Camden or Beavertown were in 2015 and 2018.

The in principle answer to this decline in value can be found not in a study of James Watt but in a book he has certainly never read, Marx’s Capital. Capitalism operates as a system of boom and bust.  Companies, grow, profits are made but to continue doing so becomes increasingly problematic. Profits (the rate of profit specifically) gets less and eventually some companies fail. The failure creates a space in the market for new companies to appear.

Brewdog is currently the biggest UK craft brewer with most of the top 5 brands. This is mostly in supermarket sales but 800 or so Wetherspoons pubs still currently sell Punk IPA plus cans of Hazy Jane and Elvis Juice. While readers of this post may not be keen (like myself) a glance at the Wetherspoons fan page on FB (a fascinating record of our times btw-seriously) reveals that lots of Spoons drinkers are.

Even so I suspect that the sale of Brewdog and particularly the latest bit of reputational damage- firing 484 workers on the spot via a video call- will mean that the medium term prospects for Brewdog are not great. ABInBev and Heineken will be happy. Capitalism is working just as described by Marx. However there could also be space in the market for what are now called Indy Brewers. Just don’t hire James Watt as an advisor.