Business

BrewDog expands in China after Budweiser merger

Scottish craft beer group BrewDog will start brewing Punk IPAs and other beers in China and will open more bars in the country after forming a joint venture with Budweiser China, the national brewer. largest economy in the market.

The UK’s privately owned craft brewer is looking for a fresh start after postponing a planned initial public offering and facing mounting pressure. statement about a toxic culture from employees, said they wanted to break into a new but growing craft beer market.

It is also diverting expansion away from its home market in the UK because of the impact of inflation on brewing sites and hotels there, said James Watt, chief executive of BrewDog.

“We don’t want to be owned by the ‘beer giant’ but we want to be a global beer business,” Watt said. “Most of our focus in getting our capital to work is international. The environment in the UK is very difficult.”

BrewDog’s Punk IPA, Hazy Jane and Elvis Juice will be brewed at Bud China’s newly opened Putian craft brewery in Fujian province under the agreement, while also aiming to open nine more BrewDog-branded bars to add into a restaurant that opened in Shanghai.

It follows a similar partnership in 2021 with Japan’s Asahi, under which BrewDog says it has doubled sales in the country. Bud China is an offshoot of Bud Apac, a listed Asian brewer majority owned by the world’s largest brewer AB InBev.

BrewDog previously had a smaller partnership in China with distributor Top Shelf and opened a bar in Shanghai in 2020. The new deal aims to capitalize on China’s emerging thirst for craft beer. , Watt said.

The group says craft beer production in China has reached 6.5 million hectares in 2020, although that is lower than the more than 341 million hectares of beer produced in China overall that year. according to hop supplier BarthHaas. Local craft brewers include Jing-A and Pandabrew.

BrewDog posted a pre-tax loss of £9.4m in 2021, the most recent year it has an account, on net sales of £219m

The brewer, in which private equity firm TSG owns shares, had planned to list in London in 2020 but has postponed its planned IPO due to Covid-19’s impact on its hotel locations and markets. vibrant school.

Watt said the company has no immediate plans to go public but will seek to give a timeline by the end of 2023.

BrewDog also faced criticism in 2021 when a group of former employees accused the brewer of having a “culture of fear”. It made a series of changes in the wake of the allegations, including appointing retail heavyweight Allan Leighton as chairman, but also said some of the claims were overblown.



Source by [author_name]

news7h

News7h: Update the world's latest breaking news online of the day, breaking news, politics, society today, international mainstream news .Updated news 24/7: Entertainment, Sports...at the World everyday world. Hot news, images, video clips that are updated quickly and reliably

Related Articles

Back to top button