A pub owner who invested £1,000 in BrewDog has blasted its former owners after thousands of shareholders were left with nothing from its collapse, saying: ‘Full bellies don’t feel for empty ones.’
Alan Wilcockson, 63, shelled out for 25 shares in the brewer’s last round of ‘Equity for Punks’ (EfP) funding in 2020, hoping it would prove to be a solid investment.
Instead, like 220,000 other ‘equity punks’, he is now squarely out of pocket after the company was sold off for £33million to an American cannabis firm, Tilray Brands – a hefty fall for a firm that once claimed to be worth almost £2billion.
The sale saw nearly 40 bars close and some 500 jobs lost. AlixPartners, administrators, have confirmed that the equity punks who sank up to £95million of their own hard-earned money into BrewDog got nothing.
But in 2017, co-founders James Watt and Martin Dickie – who pioneered the EfP scheme in 2010 – each made £50million after selling more than a fifth of the firm to a private equity investor.
Mr Wilcockson, who runs the Boot and Shoe Inn in Scholes, West Yorkshire, feels he and other shareholders were mis-sold – and admits he invested despite openly admitting he doesn’t like craft beer.
He told the Daily Mail: ‘I’m not a fan of BrewDog – I can’t stand craft beer. But I thought, the younger crowd seem to like it so I’ll put a grand in and see how it goes.
‘The way they marketed it seemed to be to be like, ‘this is a great investment opportunity’. That one sentence is what made me invest.
‘And I’ve since found out they weren’t proper shares at all.’
Alan Wilcockson invested £1,000 in BrewDog’s Equity for Punks scheme hoping to make a profit when the firm went public
The Equity for Punks scheme was framed as a middle finger to corporate fat cats (pictured: BrewDog co-founders James Watt and Martin Dickie)
Founded by Watt and Dickie in 2007 in northern Scotland, BrewDog espoused to be a ‘punk’ brewer sticking it to corporate megaliths such as Heineken or Budweiser.
In 2010, the firm began crowdfunding through the EfP programme, asking fans to invest their own money in the company’s growth in exchange for discounts and the potential to make a return on their investment.
This, it said was an alternative to taking on private investment. ‘We do not want to go down the normal route of bank and private equity funding,’ the first prospectus read.
Its own in-house magazine, Hop Propaganda, told investors they would ‘literally become richer with every BrewDog beer you drink’.
This kind of language was tempered in the prospectus for Equity for Punks Tomorrow, the scheme in which Mr Wilcockson invested. He could expect a ‘potential increase in the value’ of his shareholding, it said.
But in the small print was an important fact: the shares he was buying were not like some of the other shares in the firm.
Despite what it had said in 2010, BrewDog sold a 22.3 per cent stake of itself to American private equity firm TSG Partners for £213million. This netted Watt and Dickie £50million each personally.
But it also gave TSG ‘preferential’ shares that put it first in line for any payout in the event that BrewDog was sold – at an interest rate of 18 per cent each year.
‘Equity punks’ were sold what are known as ‘ordinary’ shares, which do not have the same privileges, and could only be sold when BrewDog said so.
In the end, the firm was put into administration before it was sold off, meaning there will likely be no money at all left to pay shareholders once creditors are paid – and any cash there is will go straight to TSG as first in line.
Asked if this was communicated, Mr Wilcockson said: ‘Absolutely not. The impression I got was that they were going to go public and when it goes public… well, you don’t buy shares not to make money, do you?
‘I knew it was a risk but I didn’t realise just what a risk it was.’
Observers say many ‘equity punks’ did not invest in BrewDog expecting a return, but rather for the sense of belonging that came with it and benefits such as free beers and an invite to the ‘annual general mayhem’ parties thrown at its Aberdeenshire HQ.
‘They [BrewDog] really pushed the nonfinancial, community side… it blurred the line between investing and fandom,’ Professor Hadar Gafni, a researcher into crowdfunding at King’s College London, told the New York Times.
But Mr Wilcockson said he has never taken advantage of any of the benefits of his BrewDog investment – and had put money in expecting to make a return.
And as the news broke that the firm was sinking into administration, he admits feeling like an ‘idiot’ who was taken in by the firm’s so-called ‘punk’ trappings.
Early Equity for Punks marketing materials – from before Mr Wilcockson invested – said investors would ‘literally become richer with every BrewDog beer you drink’
Mr Wilcockson runs the Boot and Shoe Inn in Scholes, West Yorkshire – where drinkers are more likely to be served real ale than BrewDog’s Punk IPA
‘Look, I’m 63 – I was a punk,’ he says. ‘I think they’ve led me up the garden path. Is that ‘punk’, or is that making £75million out of stupid people?
‘It’s mis-marketing, isn’t it? All that £75million of investors, what they definitely didn’t do is benefit from the growth of the company.
‘The vibe they give to their customers, this Punk IPA, punk thing, ‘we’re against the man’?
‘I think they are the man, if they’re taking £75million off of people who probably believed they were going to make money, myself included.’
James Watt and Martin Dickie left BrewDog in 2024 and 2025 respectively.
Their departures came amid cumulative losses of £148million over five years and allegations of a toxic culture and, for Watt, of misconduct, which he denies.
It later emerged Watt had invested £500,000 in Heineken and invested £2million in an offshore hedge fund, undermining the firm’s ‘punk’ credentials.
The company also abandoned expansion plans, stopped paying staff the ‘real’ living wage, lost its coveted B Corporation status and sold off a forest it had purchased to offset carbon after half of the trees it planted died.
Since buying BrewDog’s UK operations – excluding 38 pubs – Tilray has also acquired some of the firm’s US and Australia operations, including its breweries in Columbus, Ohio and Brisbane. BrewDog’s German operations are likely to be liquidated.
Tilray has sought to placate ‘equity punks’ with the news that they can still enjoy their investor benefits, including free beers on their birthday and discounts in bars.
Chairman Irwin Simon said on the conference call announcing the acquisition that equity punks ‘helped build BrewDog into what it is today’.
And Watt – who now lives in a luxury penthouse apartment in London with wife Georgia Toffolo – said in a widely ridiculed social media post that he was ‘heartbroken’ for those who had lost jobs and their investments.
James Watt and Martin Dickie left BrewDog in 2024 and 2025 respectively – as the firm’s reputation came in for a battering
Mr Wilcockson remains cynical. ‘My mum used to say: ‘Full bellies don’t feel for empty ones,” he said.
He added of Watt: ‘He’s got a full belly, and he’s not feeling for the empty ones, is he?’
A spokesperson for Tilray BrewDog said: ‘We are excited about our investment in BrewDog and the opportunity to support its next chapter.
‘The outcome for Equity Punks relates to BrewDog’s position under previous ownership, prior to Tilray’s involvement. These matters are separate from Tilray, and we were not part of those decisions.
‘We are focused on stabilizing the business, investing in its future, and building a strong foundation for long-term, sustainable growth.
‘As the new stewards of the BrewDog business, we are committed to maintaining the spirit of the Equity Punk community, including continuing key perks at our brewpubs.’