Good and Bad PR: James Watt's second act, Patagonia drags artist, Ferrari and Metallica

No time for small talk, it’s been a manic week in the media, let’s just crack on.

James Watt launches Second Best beer and the muggles are not sure

For a while, maybe only in this column, James Watt was written about negatively so often, that only Elon Musk got more Bad PR gongs than him. That, in itself, is a feat.

After the spectacular rise and fall of BrewDog, that left many of his "equity punk" investors out of pocket, Watt is back with a new beer – and new opportunity. The positive? He has said that everyone who lost money from the BrewDog equity punk scheme will get free shares from a pot of 20% of the equity in his new beer company. The negative? The muggles are cynical. As one said, 20% of zero is still zero. 

I have been pondering this one. Is it a good PR story or a bad one? Looking at the significant amount of coverage the launch has earned, I am going to say it is, right now, a Good PR hit. Watt needs to be under no illusion though, his old antics (staff welfare and working conditions accusations etc.) won’t be tolerated, and everyone will be keeping a close eye on what/Watt happens next. 

Don’t let me down!

Woke Patagonia sues one of its own

To be clear from the outset, I am not a Patagonia brand ambassador. I don’t like their preachy style and, except for PR superhero John Brown, I don’t much care for people who wear the brand. They all tend to drink stupidly named real ale and talk non-stop about hiking. Nope.

So, I was really surprised this week to read that the brand is suing a climate change activist drag artist named Pattie Gonia. The clothing brand’s wishy washy PR statement includes the line “we wish we didn’t have to do this”, but yet they still did. Dare I suggest they have brought more attention to the whole saga by taking such drastic action.

I had never heard of Pattie Gonia. The drag artist appears to be crusading for the same things as Patagonia, albeit in a slightly less boring way than the brand prefers to do things. This all stems from Pattie trying to get a trademark on their showbiz name. This seemingly tipped the clothing brand over the edge.

Bad PR for Patagonia!

BP’s sacked chairman comes out fighting

When I think of oil companies, (and yes – I have worked in this sector), I don’t conjure up an image in my head of a playful workforce skipping through fields of sunflowers. The image is more aligned with sea creatures covered in oil and remote villages being trampled for new pipelines.

So is anyone other than, it would appear, the wider board of BP, surprised to hear that its former chairperson Albert Manifold is, allegedly, a bit of a tough old boot. Is this not what oil companies need to get their oily goodness out to the people? BP is in the middle of a massive turnaround, back to focussing on fossil fuels and stepping away from renewables.

I don’t know the ins and outs of the allegations, but the now-dismissed chair has come out firing and is not having any of it. This looks like it is going to be a corporate battle that rumbles on, and it's already starting to sound like the real-life version of the TV show Landman. 

Bad PR for BP.

Even the Pope can’t save Ferrari’s first all-electric car launch

When Ferrari launched its first all-electric car, you could be forgiven for thinking this was going to be anything other than a massive media hit. It is a globally desired brand, launching a car in a sector that muggles love, and it even had the Pope's backing.

Despite all of this, the share price dropped by 8% in Milan and 5% in USA after the launch. Apparently, it is because demand for luxury brand EV’s is not that high, and because people buy Ferraris for the engine and not the chassis. Jaguar faced a similar issue in 2024 and came through it, and I would be amazed if Ferrari did not turn this around too.

Although the coverage was great, it didn’t land as they would have wanted, so it is a very unusual Bad PR for Ferrari.

Nothing else matters for Metallica other than blood donations

This has got a PR award win written all over it. Metallica has used its pre-UK tour publicity slots to call on fans to donate blood and plasma. The band partnered with UK Blood Services to shout about the important message and they truly delivered on getting the message out there.

A strong PR partnership and great PR for both.

Hinba coffee confirms what we already knew – no one likes decaf coffee

In this AI media world, it is all about creating noise. Social platforms are just as important and influential as the traditional media we all used to sit and read.

With this in mind, I have branched out to a social-first story that I happened across on Instagram. Scottish coffee brand Hinba suffered a break in at one of its coffee shops that saw the window being smashed and needing to be temporarily covered with a wooden board.

The brand didn’t want to miss a marketing opportunity, so it put a notice on the board explaining that there had been a burglary. The footnote is what got it lots of social shares. “They didn’t touch the decaf, even criminals have standards”. It really made me smile and got a social share from me and several million others.

Great PR from a bad situation for Hinba!