BrewDog left £20m in unpaid bills to UK businesses when it went under - as new owners reveal plans to make it worth $1BILLION

By ROBERT FOLKER, NEWS REPORTER Published: 21:19, 17 April 2026 | Updated: 21:24, 17 April 2026 BrewDog has left £20m in unpaid bills to hundreds of UK businesses after its collapse last month.  The Scottish beer giant owes almost 500 firms, ranging from football clubs, universities, coffee shops, bakeries and laundry services, to lawyers, councils and holiday parks, according to a report by administrators Alixpartners. The once high-flying craft beer firm owed creditors £553.8million at the point of its sale in March to US drinks firm Tilray in a £33m deal, leaving an estimated £480million black hole after its pre-pack rescue deal.  Most of the debts are to firms in the UK, with many near the firm's base in the north-east of Scotland, while others are abroad.   Aberdeenshire coffee roaster Coffee Apothecary is owed £8,000, Edinburgh caterer A Crolla & Son is owed £7,000 and Edinburgh laundry firm Suds R Us has a £900 bill, the BBC reports. Marylebone Cricket Club, which owns Lord's Cricket Ground, is owed £420,000, while West Ham United football club has a £7,000 unpaid bill.  UK holiday resort firm Centre Parcs is owed £7,000, and the University of Manchester is owed £14,000. Aberdeen City Council has an unpaid bill of £11,400, North Lanarkshire Council £87,000, while Aberdeenshire Council, the location of BrewDog's Ellon headquarters, is owed £238,000.  The Scottish beer giant owes almost 500 firms, ranging from football clubs, universities, coffee shops, bakeries and laundry services, to lawyers, councils and holiday parks, according to a report by administrators Alixpartners  The company was co-founded by James Watt, who married Made In Chelsea star and socialite Georgia Toffolo last March Dozens of businesses in the local area, including local printer Langstane Press, transport provider RS Taxis and the Ythan Bakery in Ellon, have also been affected. Drinks companies, Heineken, Coors, Tennent Caledonian, alongside some smaller independent breweries, are also owed money. Ardagh Metal Packaging is owed the mos tmoney with a £3m unpaid bill, followed by ARR Craib Transport, who are owed £1.6m and then Ball Beverage Packaging  at £1.2m.   Event and marketing firms Rock Soup Media, Design My Night, GigPig are also owed money.   Alixpartners also confirmed that investors in BrewDog's much-hyped 'Equity for Punks' crowdfunding scheme are not expected to receive any return. The crowdfunding scheme launched in 2009 saw around 200,000 people put in money for a stake in the company, discounts and perks. Even major lenders have not escaped the fallout, with secured creditors such as HSBC facing an estimated £85million shortfall. The bank is expected to be repaid much of this debt as the senior secured creditor, but Alixpartners warned it could face a "material shortfall". US private‑equity group TSG Consumer Partners, a major BrewDog investor, is owed £27.6m, but it is not expected to retrieve its money.   While other unsecured creditors will only see returns of less than 1p in the pound on nearly £190m of debt. It is expected that HM Revenue & Customs will be paid back in full for more than £4m owed. The Scottish brewery, which was speculatively valued at £2billion just a few years ago, was sold to US cannabis and drinks firm Tilray for a fraction of that last month. A total of 38 UK bars were closed, when CEO James Taylor told 484 staff in an all-hands conference call that they were no longer employed. Mr Watt - who stepped back from the role of CEO in 2024 amid allegations of a toxic culture within BrewDog - said he would have 'loved to save every single job and every single equity punk investment' but 'couldn't', adding: 'That will stay with me.' No comments have so far been submitted. Why not be the first to send us your thoughts, or debate this issue live on our message boards. By posting your comment you agree to our house rules. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook. You can choose on each post whether you would like it to be posted to Facebook. Your details from Facebook will be used to provide you with tailored content, marketing and ads in line with our Privacy Policy.