Brewdog CEO James Watt has admitted to paying out up to £500,000 to the winners of the brand’s ‘solid gold’ beer can promotion for originally misleading customers.

In 2021, the beer brand’s promotion offered people the chance to find a solid gold can hidden in cases of beer.

However, winners of the can soon discovered that the cans were in fact gold-plated and worth much less than originally believed. These winners then complained to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) which then branded three social media adverts for the gold can promotion as ‘misleading’.

According to the BBC, in October 2021 Brewdog told the ad authority that a single 330ml can, made with the equivalent 330ml of pure gold, would have a gold value of around £363,000 ($500,000).

Watt has since admitted that he “falsely thought” the cans were made from solid gold, adding that he “misunderstood the process of how they were made” and made a “silly mistake” in original promotions when he told customers they were made from solid gold.

Subscribe to Marketing Beat for free

Sign up here to get the latest marketing news sent straight to your inbox each morning

“Those were 3 very expensive mistaken tweets that I sent out in my enthusiasm for our new campaign,” Watt added in a LinkedIn post.

“The Gold Can saga was headline news. We were made to look dishonest and disingenuous and we took a real hammering online and in the press. Deservedly so. My initial tweets had been misleading and we deserved the flak.”

The CEO contacted all 50 gold can winners to offer them the “full cash amount” as an alternative to the prize if they were unhappy”.

“All in all, it ended up costing me around £470,000 – well over 2 and a half years’ salary,” Watt added.

Watt has claimed that the Brewdog’s past claims that the cans are valued at £15,000 “was accurate”.