BrewDog: Business Growth for Punks!

Abstract

This case study tells an atypical entrepreneurship story about two men and a dog. It explores the rapid growth of the phenomenon that is BrewDog plc – a company situated in the remote north-east of Scotland. What makes this case special is that the business, set up in 2007 by two university graduates in their early twenties with limited experience of the brewing industry, is now trading as a plc. From the outset they deliberately chose a strategy that flew in the face of accepted orthodoxy in the brewing industry. To industry experts, it made little sense because the remote Aberdeenshire town of Fraserburgh, with its peripheral location, would surely be the last place any rational individual would seek to start a new brewery. The story of how James Watt and Martin Dickie did so is uplifting and inspirational.