Brown-Forman CEO seeks ‘globalisation’ of business

Brown-Forman’s new CEO is encouraging his workforce to “take the gloves off and fight a little harder” as the firm seeks to expand its global reach.

Speaking to The Spirits Business, Lawson Whiting, who became CEO of the Jack Daniel’s maker at the start of this year, said competition from the likes of Beam Suntory has spurred Brown-Forman to “up [its] game”.

Whiting said: “We are the big competitor and everyone is coming after us, so we’re using it as a rallying cry right now to grow faster; to do better.

“I have been using terms like ‘agility’, ‘transparency’ and ‘empowerment’. These three words are very powerful in our company right now, letting folks ‘take the gloves off’ and fight a little harder, and we’re starting to see the results of that.”

A key focus for Brown-Forman will be international expansion, Whiting added.

“We’re still US- and western European-centric, but the international opportunity, particularly in emerging markets, is huge. We are so under-indexed in places where a lot of our competitors are, like China, India, Brazil, Africa and all over Asia.”

As such, over the next 20 years, Whiting is confident Brown-Forman’s brands will become increasingly “globalised”. But in order for this to happen, Whiting said bold decisions need to be taken.

“No-one has ever been fired for trying and failing at something at Brown-Forman. You’ve got to be agile; you’ve got to try new things. They have been fired for not trying and not trying new things.

“People want to feel empowered to drive the business and make decisions on their own, and when you do that you get the best out of them. This is a direction I am trying to pull every towards – to be a bit quicker.”

At the end of last month, Brown-Forman and Bacardi announced their plan to end their long-running distribution alliance in the UK. Following the break up next year, Brown-Forman will establish its own distribution company in the market. The firm recently reported a 2% net sales increase for its 2019 fiscal year.

To read Lawson Whiting’s full interview with The Spirits Business, see our July 2019 edition.