Brand Autopsy : Brewdog

Valued at £2 billion. Sold for £33 million.

I listen to a great podcast Uncensored CMO and James Watt was a guest, I really enjoyed listening to him - the origin story of the brand is brilliant and you could hear the passion in his voice.
They built everything on being 'punk'. Anti-corporate. Anti-establishment. The beer for people who hate big beer companies.

Then they took private equity money. Expanded too fast. Opened too many bars. Diversified into spirits, hotels, and forests. And when over 100 former employees signed an open letter about a culture of fear, the punk costume fell off.

🖤 Here is the brand lesson:

When your underdog strategy works so well people start seeing you as the establishment, that strategy breaks. James Watt admitted this himself. Too late.

Brewdog did not fail because of bad beer or a bad product. The beer was fine. They failed because they forgot who they were pretending to be.

If your brand story and your business behaviour are telling two different stories, your customers will believe the ugly one.