BrewDog's chief executive has responded to criticism of his company's latest marketing campaign, which earlier this week announced the brand as an 'anti-sponsor' of the 2022 Qatar World Cup.
Adverts sought to draw attention to the fact that homosexuality is illegal, floggings are an acceptable form of punishment and - a more disputed statement - that 6,500 migrant workers have died since the Middle Eastern country won the right to host the tournament.
BrewDog pledged that all net profits generated from Lost Lager sold in the UK during the tournament between 20 November 20 and 18 December will be donated to registered charities involved in fighting human rights abuse in Qatar.
Taking aim at governing body FIFA, the adverts also claimed that football had been "dragged through the mud" since Qatar won its bid for the tournament, which BrewDog stated was bought via "bribery on an industrial scale", adding: "we love football, we just don’t love corruption, abuse and death".
However, the Ellon-based brewery was accused of being "disingenuous" for continuing to screen matches in its pubs and selling its Punk IPA in Qatar.
Unite Hospitality called it "yet another disingenuous advertising campaign designed to distract customers from the fact BrewDog is one of the worst employers in the brewing industry when it comes to doing the right thing by its workers”.
The union added: “The treatment of workers in Qatar is an international scandal, but BrewDog have a cheek saying anything about workers’ rights when hundreds of their own workers - past and present - signed an open letter detailing a 'culture of fear', with workers demanding an apology for harassing, assaulting, belittling, insulting or gaslighting them.”
BrewDog co-founder James Watt responded on social media that there weren't many breweries of its size and scale who would take such a bold stance.
"There are even fewer businesses who would be prepared to attract attention - positive or negative - for taking a stance.
"If we are only prepared to accept ethical stances from businesses or individuals who have no conflicts, we’ll be waiting forever, and we’ll all be giving tacit approval for things that are just plainly wrong in the world."
Addressing the decision to still show matches, he said that fans should not be denied "the chance to enjoy them together just because FIFA bizarrely chose to award the world cup to Qatar in very questionable circumstances", while Watt also said he didn't want to lessen the charity-giving sales of Lost Lager.
"People are still going to watch the games - so giving them the opportunity to watch the games both to raise awareness and raise money to drive positive change at the same time is worthwhile."
Watt added: "We will never please all the people all the time - we are now very used to our critics piling in - but in the space of 24 hours we’ve massively raised awareness of this incredibly important issue and we will follow this up, we hope, with a sizeable donation to charity to further support the cause."
In response to questions about partnering with a Qatari government-owned distributor to sell BrewDog beers during the tournament, Watt stated: "We don’t sell direct to Qatar, but we do have a relationship with a distributor that sells into multiple middle eastern markets, primarily into Dubai, but including Qatar."
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