BREWDOG is a Scottish brewery and pub chain based in Ellon, having first been founded in 2007 by James Watt and Martin Dickie.
According to the brand’s website, the pair were “fed up of the stuffy UK beer market” and so, aged 24, decided to start up their own business.
BrewDog has more than 100 bars across the UK, including in Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow.
Read on for all the latest BrewDog news, interviews and updates.
Latest BrewDog news
As reported by The National, here is a selection of the latest BrewDog news stories.
Brewdog's James Watt slams Labour and complains of high taxes
Is James Watt going to be Scotland's answer to Elon Musk?
BrewDog's James Watt launches 'Shadow Doge' to take on UK Government
BrewDog history
Watt and Dickie first started making their own beers in Fraserburgh in 2007, filling bottles by hand and selling beers at local markets.
In 2008, the group created the “UK’s strongest ever beer” – Tokyo – which was banned by the Portman Group – who set the rules for alcohol producers.
The first BrewDog bar opened in Aberdeen, Watt and Dickie’s (below) hometown, in 2010 while the city also hosted the company’s first AGM.
More bars opened in Edinburgh, Glasgow and London in 2011. The business continued to grow from there, releasing 36 different beers in 2014 and shipping to 55 different countries.
It also opened “the world’s first craft beer hotel” in 2018.
Last year, we told how Watt announced he was stepping down from his role as chief executive.
He’s handed over the reins to chief operating officer James Arrow, but said that he would remain with the group as a non-executive director on the board and continue to advise the group on strategy.
Promotional gaffes
The company has become known down the years for creating cans based on current affairs or sporting events.
For example, in June of 2024, it released limited editions cans of its Punk IPA – one called Three Lions for England, and another called Tartan Army for Scotland.
Sticking with the football theme, BrewDog also named itself the “anti-sponsor” of the 2022 Qatar World Cup.
In a statement, the company criticised the decision to hold the tournament in Qatar, where male homosexuality is illegal and thousands of migrant workers died since the country was given the responsibility of hosting the event.
“This isn’t a World Cup. It’s a World F*Cup. Football’s been dragged through the mud, before a single ball’s been kicked,” the statement said.
Back in 2020, meanwhile, the company started selling a Barnard Castle eye test beer following controversy around senior government adviser Dominic Cummings (below).
He was accused of breaking lockdown rules after it was reported he had driven 260 miles to his father’s home in Durham to self-isolate with his wife and their four-year-old child.
Cummings also confirmed he completed a second journey to local attraction Barnard Castle as part of a bid to see if he could “drive safely” back to London as his eyesight had supposedly been damaged when he contracted Covid-19.
BrewDog controversy
BrewDog was accused by former employees in an open letter in 2021 of its "culture of fear" within the business, with “toxic attitudes” towards junior staff.
A total of 61 former staff members from 11 venues claimed workers experienced a “residual feeling of fear” during their time at the company.
The letter further alleged that a “significant number of people have admitted they have suffered mental illness as a result of working at BrewDog”.
Watt responded to the letter with a statement on X (formerly known as Twitter), stating: "We are committed to doing better, not just as a reaction to this, but always; and we are going to reach out to our entire team past and present to learn more. But most of all, right now, we are sorry.”
Last year, a spokesperson for Unite, the trade union, told The Press and Journal: “The way in which our members across BrewDog have been treated is morally reprehensible and almost certainly illegal.
“We have been shown evidence of shocking health-and-safety breaches, which have put workers and customers at serious risk of harm.
“It is one of the worst examples of systemic bullying and toxic culture from management we have ever come across."
This came following the sacking of a BrewDog staff member, who is Asian, at the company’s flagship bar in Waterloo, London, for raising concerns about members of the far-right English Defence League (EDL) using the bar to hold a meeting on St George’s Day in April 2024.
In January 2024, the company faced a separate backlash after it announced it would not pay the Real Living Wage to new hires.
The letter posted by Unite the Union on social media revealed that current workers were told that all new employees will be paid the minimum wage (which is also known as the National Living Wage).
BrewDog’s lost forest
In May 2024, the Sunday National revealed that BrewDog’s “lost forest” risked turning into a lost cause by replacing dead trees too late in the season.
The company had promised to create the “biggest-ever” woodland in the Highlands to help the regeneration of Kinrara, near Aviemore.
The former sporting estate was bought by the company for £8.8 million in 2020.
However, criticism began when tree planting did not begin until 2022 after a funding grant from Scottish Forestry. The total grant for the Lost Forest’s phase one is £1.2m. To date, £690,000 has been paid as part of the Forestry Grant Scheme contract.
BrewDog had boasted that 500,000 trees had been planted but the Sunday National revealed in February that more than half of the newly planted Scots pine were dead – with the smaller mixed native broadleaf area suffering a “very high mortality” of 95%
In February last year, BrewDog told the Sunday National that the dead trees would be replaced but replanting is still going on.
Asked if Watt stepping down would have an effect on the “Lost Forest,” a spokesperson told the Sunday National: "They are currently re-planting all those saplings that sadly didn’t make it through the very hot and dry summer. So that process goes on.”
Living Wage Row
In January 2024, the Scottish brewer announced it would stop paying the Real Living Wage, with founder Watt issuing a statement on the “incredibly difficult decision”.
The statement came after reports broke that he had enjoyed a luxury holiday in the Maldives the month before announcing the wage changes.
He commented: “The controversy was because we have only increased our national bar team wages 20.4% since March 2022 and not the 26% that would have been required to retain a Real Living Wage status.
“I would love nothing more than to give everyone in our business a further huge pay increase, but we simply have to balance our books, offer fair value to our customers and ensure the long-term viability of our business. And ultimately, protect jobs.”
More than 20,000 people signed a petition calling for BrewDog to reverse its decision.
James Watt
James Watt married Made in Chelsea star Georgia Toffolo in March.
Watt, whose net-worth is £262 million, previously posted on his LinkedIn in 2024 that he may delay his marriage for three years as he is investing into Toffolo's raw dog food business and by marrying her, he could lose out on tax relief.
The couple eventually wed in a Scottish coastal village where Watt grew up in Aberdeenshire.
In February, Watt launched an unofficial government watchdog, 'Shadow Doge', described as the “unofficial, underground cousin” of Elon Musk’s Department for Government Efficiency (Doge).
He said in a LinkedIn post that it would assess UK Government spending using Freedom of Information (FOI) requests and a hotline for whistleblowers to highlight waste.
Watt had pledged that he will identify similar cuts to that of Musk’s Doge, which included the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Department of Education, adding that the Labour Government had made the UK economy worse.
He wrote: “It’s time to actually do something.
“I’m sick of talking about how broken our government is. And I'm sure you're sick of hearing about it. So, I am introducing Shadow Doge.
“You can think of it as the unofficial, underground cousin of America’s Department Of Government Efficiency.”
Watt has also complained about paying high taxes for weak public services.
Speaking to The Sunday Times, he said: “The last Conservative government was a complete shambles and Labour inherited a mess and their biggest task was not to make it worse and they’ve somehow done that.
“We’re being taxed more than we’ve ever been taxed for a level of service that has never been weaker at the same time that the economy is really, really struggling as well. I want to try and see if we could show an alternative to austerity or further raising taxes."
