BrewDog is a brand built on attitude, and co-founder James Watt has a lot to say about the value of advertising: ‘I would rather take my money and set fire to it … It’s the antithesis of everything we stand for and everything we believe in. It’s a medium that is shallow, it’s fake and we want nothing to do with it.’ His punk attitude suggests the firm’s values are anticorporate, anti-mainstream and anti-advertising, and when it comes to marketing, not having a budget is not a problem (Warc 2019). This led BrewDog to find a new approach to communicate with its consumers and the media. 

James Watt and Martin Dickie were school friends who grew up together in the fishing village of Fraserburgh in the north-east of Scotland. They took different paths at the University of Edinburgh: Dickie studied distilling after he found a passion for brewing as a 12 year old after finding a brewing kit in his parents’ attic, while Watt studied law. However, after graduating he was too much of a rebel to stay in the legal profession and soon left. They both shared one passion: to brew beer. Not just any beer but beer they loved and that was different from the mainstream. While Dickie was working for Thornbridge Brewery in Derbyshire as a brewer, Watt was catching lobster and haddock as a fisherman and brewed beers with Dickie when ashore......

Questions 

1. To what extent did BrewDog follow IMC principles in the early years of the brand’s development?

2. Why do you think BrewDog reconsidered its decision not to use advertising? 

3. Carry out desk research on BrewDog around its latest campaigns linked to its drive to become carbon neutral. Evaluate the extent to which the brand is applying traditional ‘mass’ advertising methods.