BrewDog didn’t just launch a beer brand, they declared war on the big boys. While Heineken and Carlsberg were busy pumping out the same bland fizz with different labels, BrewDog rocked up in ripped jeans and started lobbing Molotov cocktails at the beer industry.
They weren’t selling beer. They were selling attitude. A cold can of defiance wrapped in skull-and-crossbones branding. It was punk. It was loud. It was exactly what a generation of fed-up, flavour-hungry drinkers had been waiting for.
From the get-go, they built a cult following by doing what every “safe” brand wouldn’t dare:
- Swearing in adverts.
- Naming beers after political meltdowns.
- Sticking two fingers up at authority and their own investors, if needed.
Then came Equity for Punks, a crowd-funding scheme that turned fans into shareholders and gave BrewDog its war chest to scale. It worked – brilliantly. Partly because people felt like they were buying into more than just a pint. They were buying into a mission: to kill off boring beer, one heady, hopped-up bottle at a time.
“They called themselves punks, told everyone else to jog on, and made beer cool again. Until they didn’t.”
At its peak, BrewDog didn’t feel like a company, it felt like a movement. But movements are fragile things. Especially when they’re built on rebellion and start raking in millions.
1. The Branding That Brewed a Movement
BrewDog didn’t just sell IPAs. They sold identity. And they did it with a voice louder than a Slipknot encore in a craft taproom.
Everything about the brand was designed to polarise – bold, stencil-style typography, stripped-back labels, beer names that read like protest signs, and a tone of voice that didn’t so much speak as shout. If traditional beer branding was all heritage fonts and pastoral fields, BrewDog was a spray-painted van skidding through a punk gig.
Their attitude oozed from every touchpoint:
- Ad campaigns that mocked competitors by name.
- Beer names like “Hello My Name is Vladimir”.
- Limited runs with edgy packaging and angry blurbs written like manifestos.
And the mad thing? It worked. Because it was more than attention-grabbing, it was aligned. Every choice, from product to poster, pulsed with the same heartbeat: don’t be boring.
BrewDog understood that people weren’t just buying a can. They were buying what the can meant. Drinking BrewDog was a signal – I’m not part of the system. I back the punks.
They made beer feel like rebellion in a bottle. And for a while, the brand and the belief matched perfectly.
The tone wasn’t part of the brand, it was the brand.
But tone without truth? That’s where things start to get shaky…
2. The Shift - Money, Growth, and Going Glossy
Success is a funny thing. One minute you’re slinging beers from the back of a van, the next you’re in duty-free next to a bottle of Hugo Boss cologne.
BrewDog’s meteoric rise was textbook start-up fantasy. Global taprooms. Supermarket shelves. Airport bars. TV appearances. Millions raised through Equity for Punks, their DIY investment scheme that made fans feel like founders. It all looked like a brand living the dream.
But somewhere in the noise, the punk started to fade.
As the company scaled, so did the polish. The once rebellious voice got PR’d to death. Campaigns that used to feel like passionate rants started sounding like they’d been signed off by seven people in HR and a risk manager in Slough.
Then came the cracks:
- Investor fatigue kicked in. Fans-turned-shareholders started asking awkward questions about returns and dilution.
- Workplace culture took a hit, with ex-staff alleging a “toxic atmosphere” and “cult-like” management style.
- Marketing stunts felt less mischievous and more manic, like a brand trying to out-punk its own legacy but forgetting why it started in the first place.
What once felt raw and real started to feel rehearsed. Like the loudest kid in class growing up, getting a job in fintech, and still trying to tell people he’s “not like the others.”
“The rebels got rich, bought suits, and started acting like the boardrooms they once flipped off.”
BrewDog didn’t just lose their edge – they polished it off.
3. Where It Went Flat - When Branding and Behaviour Clash
This is where it all started to taste off.
BrewDog still had the punk aesthetic – the angry font, the swear-adjacent copy, the big statements about “ripping up the rulebook”. But behind the scenes, it was all starting to look… well, a bit rulebooky.
The big blow came in 2021 when a group of former employees published an open letter accusing the company of fostering a “culture of fear.” The sign-off? Punks With Purpose, a stingingly ironic twist on BrewDog’s own slogan.
Suddenly, all the swagger and bravado looked a bit thin. The wild-child image didn’t hold up when the stories coming out were about burnout, gaslighting, and toxic leadership, not exactly the punk utopia they’d sold to staff, customers, and investors.
At the same time, the PR stunts (once sharp and subversive) started missing the mark:
- That “solid gold can” giveaway? Turns out the cans weren’t solid gold at all. Cue ASA complaints and legal trouble.
- The “anti-sponsorship” World Cup campaign? Aimed at slamming Qatar’s human rights record… while still selling BrewDog in Qatar.
- And let’s not forget the apology tour, videos, statements, blog post, none of which quite stuck the landing.
“You can’t sell anti-establishment cool while behaving like a Deloitte intern on Red Bull.”
What BrewDog forgot is that a brand isn’t what you say, it’s what you do. And when what you do starts to contradict your carefully cultivated image, the backlash is swift. People don’t just stop buying the beer. They stop believing in the story.
Once you’ve built your entire brand on being the outsider, there’s nowhere to hide when you start playing by the same old rules.
4. What Small Brands Can Learn
Look, most of us aren’t trying to become the next BrewDog. But that’s exactly why their story’s worth paying attention to, because it’s a cautionary tale dressed up in neon and foam.
Don’t build your brand on values you can’t live out.
If you say you’re rebellious, be rebellious in how you treat staff, write copy, and make decisions – not just in your fonts and slogans. If you sell transparency, don’t hide behind jargon when the heat’s on. Today’s customers are sharp. They’ve seen behind enough curtains to know when a brand’s full of it.
Growth isn’t the enemy. Forgetting your roots is.
Scaling up doesn’t have to mean selling out. It’s possible to grow, evolve, and professionalise without binning the thing that made people care in the first place. Whether that’s your tone, your ethos, or the way you interact with customers, guard that stuff like it’s your last cold can on a hot day.
You can polish the packaging, but don’t let your voice go corporate beige.
It’s tempting to smooth off the edges as you grow. To sound more “professional.” But professional doesn’t mean boring. It doesn’t mean safe. And it definitely doesn’t mean faceless. Keep the energy. Keep the humanity. Keep sounding like you.
Because…
People spot performative branding a mile off. And once they stop believing you, they don’t just leave, they laugh.
BrewDog’s fall from grace isn’t a reason to avoid bold branding. It’s a reason to back it up with behaviour. Consistency isn’t just a nice-to-have in branding – it’s the whole bloody point.
The Takeaway – Can You Be Punk at Scale?
Maybe. But it takes brutal self-awareness, consistency, and the kind of integrity that doesn’t flinch when things get messy.
BrewDog could’ve stayed punk. They had the voice, the visuals, the values and a tribe that genuinely wanted to believe. But punk can’t survive on slogans alone. If you scale fast and forget to carry the soul with you, all you’re left with is empty bravado in nice packaging.
You can grow. You can get big. You can even get profitable.
But if you lose what made people care in the first place, if you treat rebellion like a marketing asset instead of a mindset – don’t be surprised when the people who built your brand start walking away.
“Punk is a mindset, not a marketing asset. And once you turn your middle finger into a logo, the real punks have already moved on.”
BrewDog taught us that bold branding can change everything – until it starts contradicting itself.
