BrewDog Reports Record Profits And Painful Setbacks

Scottish punk brewing giant BrewDog has announced its Q2 results, revealing both record revenue and painful setbacks in the first half of 2018.

First the good news…

BrewDog’s announced a total revenue gain of £78 million, up an amazing 55% over last year!

The brewer’s bar division (BrewDog owns 50 bars around the world including 12 in London) did particularly well, with revenue up 92% and £10 million in profits.

BrewDog’s UK retail sales growth rose by 83% which the company attributes to “heavy investment” in the off-trade, bar openings and its acquisition of The Draft House , an enormously successful Independent craft beer bar chain that operates 14 venues across London and in England’s southeast.

This year alone BrewDog has opened nine international venues, most recently its 32-room beer hotel in in Columbus, Ohio.

And despite having a new brewery in the US and another in Australia which is projected to open in early 2019, export volumes continue to increase, up 35% with revenues totaling to £11 million.

The US division of the company brought in revenue of £5 million in the first half of 2018 which the company expects to build upon in 2018.

In this week’s announcement Co-founder James Watt said the brewer was establishing “a solid and rapidly growing presence in the UK” while the company’s work in Asia and Australia “will begin to bear fruit in 2019”.

He added that the “US business is expanding at breakneck speed with new distribution points added every week”.

Now the bad news…

BrewDog also announced that their newly-opened OverWorks sour facility had  had experienced a “painful setback” when it was discovered  that around one in ten specially designed  500ml Champagne-style bottles had “a catastrophic manufacturing defect” which led to numerous breakages even after the most routine handling.

Upon further analysis, the bottle manufacturer said that the bottles were not fit to be released and BrewDog had to scrap all bottles that have been filled with OverWorks’ first sours.

According to the company that decision not only cost them ” hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of stock and six months’ worth of production time, but also caused heartbreak and genuine disappointment in those who have worked so hard to get these beers ready.”

In addition to this setback, BrewDog has been criticized over its handling of a former employee who was eventually awarded £12,000 after a deteriorating eyesight condition led to his permanent suspension.

And BrewDog recently felt the sting of an industry regulating body after a complaint about its special edition Pink IPA was upheld by the Independent Complaints Panel

All image credits: BrewDog