Cautious BrewDog delays plans for stock market listing

United Kingdom | Perhaps they were too keen and eager. The UK’s largest craft brewer, BrewDog, has indicated that it will delay a planned GBP 2.1 billion (USD 2.8 billion) flotation amid turbulence in the hospitality industry.

James Watt, BrewDog’s CEO and co-founder, said a listing might not take place until 2023, after advisers and banks recommended that a delay would be prudent given pandemic-related issues facing the hospitality industry.

Insiders think that the money types also want the whole scandal over BrewDog’s “toxic culture”, which erupted in June this year, when “Punks with a Purpose” posted an accusatory open letter on the web, to be truly dead and buried before approaching investors for their cash.

Although the appointment of Allan Leighton, the former boss of the supermarket chain Asda, as BrewDog’s new chairman, has heightened speculation that a flotation could be imminent, Mr Watt cooled these expectations. In an interview with the Daily Telegraph newspaper in October, he was rather enigmatic about the date of the listing: “Could it be sometime in 2022? Maybe. 2023? Maybe.”