Brewdog abandons living wage for employees

[matchmaker]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-67932569

BBC said:

Craft beer giant Brewdog will no longer pay its employees the real living wage.

Workers will receive the UK government's national minimum wage of £11.44 an hour from April - below the £12 cost of living-based rate.

The Aberdeenshire-based firm said the move was "necessary" as part of an effort to return to profitability after making a £24m operating loss last year.

But former staff have accused the company of "abandoning its principles" over the move.

A letter to employees, seen by BBC Scotland News, said "hard decisions" had to be taken in order to maintain financial stability despite a "bumper" festive period.

Any comments?

[Gecko1978]

matchmaker said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-67932569

BBC said:

Craft beer giant Brewdog will no longer pay its employees the real living wage.

Workers will receive the UK government's national minimum wage of £11.44 an hour from April - below the £12 cost of living-based rate.

The Aberdeenshire-based firm said the move was "necessary" as part of an effort to return to profitability after making a £24m operating loss last year.

But former staff have accused the company of "abandoning its principles" over the move.

A letter to employees, seen by BBC Scotland News, said "hard decisions" had to be taken in order to maintain financial stability despite a "bumper" festive period.

Any comments?

So they made a loss and need to cut costs.....better than redundancies

[hidetheelephants]

Grifters gonna grift.

[Biggy Stardust]

Gecko1978 said:

So they made a loss and need to cut costs.....better than redundancies

This. It's fine wanting high wages when the firm makes a big profit but they have to accept that hard times mean hard decisions are made.

Unions want the workers to take a share of profitable times, they must accept what happens in other times.

[sugerbear]

Are the owners / board taking a pay and bonus cut or just those at the bottom.

[Terminator X]

They lost £10m the year before too tbf to them.

TX.

[okgo]

That sthole they’ve opened in Waterloo probably accounts for at least that figure. Utter vanity.

[E63eeeeee...]

Biggy Stardust said:

Gecko1978 said:

So they made a loss and need to cut costs.....better than redundancies

This. It's fine wanting high wages when the firm makes a big profit but they have to accept that hard times mean hard decisions are made.

Unions want the workers to take a share of profitable times, they must accept what happens in other times.

By definition, the real living wage isn't high wages.

https://www.livingwage.org.uk/what-real-living-wag...

[dudleybloke]

With losses like that it sounds like the management need putting on minimum wage.

[Dingu]

E63eeeeee... said:

Biggy Stardust said:

Gecko1978 said:

So they made a loss and need to cut costs.....better than redundancies

This. It's fine wanting high wages when the firm makes a big profit but they have to accept that hard times mean hard decisions are made.

Unions want the workers to take a share of profitable times, they must accept what happens in other times.

By definition, the real living wage isn't high wages.

https://www.livingwage.org.uk/what-real-living-wag...

I don’t think Biggy is particularly in touch with such things tbh.

[valiant]

Biggy Stardust said:

This. It's fine wanting high wages when the firm makes a big profit but they have to accept that hard times mean hard decisions are made.

Unions want the workers to take a share of profitable times, they must accept what happens in other times.

Did Brewdog workers take a share in profitable times?

Living wage is hardly extravagant.

[Wills2]

Dingu said:

E63eeeeee... said:

Biggy Stardust said:

Gecko1978 said:

So they made a loss and need to cut costs.....better than redundancies

This. It's fine wanting high wages when the firm makes a big profit but they have to accept that hard times mean hard decisions are made.

Unions want the workers to take a share of profitable times, they must accept what happens in other times.

By definition, the real living wage isn't high wages.

https://www.livingwage.org.uk/what-real-living-wag...

I don’t think Biggy is particularly in touch with such things tbh.

He must very paid very little if he thinks £12 an hour equates to high wages, poor guy.

[gotoPzero]

I think we will see some more of this over the next 12 months. Businesses being "busy" but not making money. Cost cuts probably wont work. Its just a nudge to cut the head count in the right direction without redundancies.

If momentum builds it wont be good.

[MarkJS]

Dingu said:

E63eeeeee... said:

Biggy Stardust said:

Gecko1978 said:

So they made a loss and need to cut costs.....better than redundancies

This. It's fine wanting high wages when the firm makes a big profit but they have to accept that hard times mean hard decisions are made.

Unions want the workers to take a share of profitable times, they must accept what happens in other times.

By definition, the real living wage isn't high wages.

https://www.livingwage.org.uk/what-real-living-wag...

I don’t think Biggy is particularly in touch with such things tbh.

Biggy doesn't really need to be 'in touch'. Apart from using the word "high", the point being made is generally correct.

If the money isn't there, it isn't there and anyone who runs a business would feel the same.

[ecsrobin]

okgo said:

That sthole they’ve opened in Waterloo probably accounts for at least that figure. Utter vanity.

And yet is always full up.

[borcy]

I wonder how much 56p an hour wage drop will make to the company's profits.

[Ian Geary]

The key issue with this article is the equity, or fairness, being exercised within brewdog so that the "pain" doesn't just fall at the bottom of the tree.

Given brewdog have not made any noise about how the owners/senior managers are seeing real terms pay cuts, I suspect they are not.


I am not naive to the realities of capitalism, and rich people don't get rich by giving money away etc, but this case is a bit different because of how brewdog traded so heavily on its fair deal for staf and it's business dealings.

[FNG]

Gecko1978 said:

matchmaker said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-67932569

BBC said:

Craft beer giant Brewdog will no longer pay its employees the real living wage.

Workers will receive the UK government's national minimum wage of £11.44 an hour from April - below the £12 cost of living-based rate.

The Aberdeenshire-based firm said the move was "necessary" as part of an effort to return to profitability after making a £24m operating loss last year.

But former staff have accused the company of "abandoning its principles" over the move.

A letter to employees, seen by BBC Scotland News, said "hard decisions" had to be taken in order to maintain financial stability despite a "bumper" festive period.

Any comments?

So they made a loss and need to cut costs.....better than redundancies

Fair enough if you're in a professional services arena. But if you're making heavy losses year on year, and you rely on minimum wage workers at the coalface, last thing you ought to be doing is pissing them off with a small pay cut that will barely move the needle in terms of the losses you're seeing.

Congrats Brewdog, you now have a disenchanted workforce who can see through the bullst claims about their people-first principles (which they've evidenced by paying less than a quid an hour extra - wow - cynically they get more positive PR value out of that than it costs them in pounds money).

Have the owners taken a pay cut and foregone their bonus the last 2 years? Management been streamlined and restructured? Weak areas of the business model identified and a plan put in place? Tell the world about it, quick, because at the moment all the publicity is negative and the workforce engagement and productivity is about to go through the floor.

[Rough101]

Correct if I’m wrong, but they aren't cutting anyone’s wage, are they? They just aren’t offering the same rate to new starters as they are losing more money than last year.

The labour market will dictate if that pay is enough.

The BBC constantly do negative press on Brewdog, I’ve no real idea why.

Meantime Wetherspoons are making redundancies as they close pubs and Tim Martin gets into the House of Lords, having campaigned heavily to take us out of the EU which has damaged many businesses.

[Type R Tom]

It's strange; on the surface, you would think things are going well, there doesn't seem to be a week that goes by where there isn't a new beer from them on the shelves.

I guess that isn't reflected in sales etc.