Hop Law

The Recent Founders Brewing Discrimination Lawsuit Highlights the Need For Change in the Craft Brewing Industry

Founders Brewing Co., Michigan’s largest brewery, is once again facing criticism after its Detroit taproom general manager refused to acknowledge a former employee’s race in a deposition relating to a discrimination lawsuit against the brewery.

About The Founders Brewing Company Discrimination Lawsuit:

A former Founders Brewing Co. employee, Tracy Evans, filed a racial discrimination and retaliation lawsuit against the brewery in August 2018 after being terminated from his position as the brewery’s events and promotions manager. The transcript of the deposition, which was leaked to MLive, is just the most recent example of long-standing diversity issues in the craft brewing industry.

The deposition between Founders’ general manager Dominic Ryan and Evans’ attorney contains a frustratingly ridiculous exchange where Ryan asserts that he was unaware that Evans was black. Ryan makes the same unfathomable claim with regards to Barack Obama, Michael Jordan, and Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. The transcript of the exchange (see below) shows just how ludicrous the entire exchange was.

Evan’s Employment Discrimination Case:

In the lawsuit that sparked this deposition, Evans alleges that Founders has “a racist internal corporate culture.” In the complaint, he claims that several white coworkers were “blatantly racist,” using multiple racial slurs around him and with other employees. He also asserts that his complaints to HR fell on “deaf ears,” with the employees receiving only minor, if any, disciplinary action. Evans also alleges that he was passed over for a promotion in favor of two white employees who Evans not only trained, but who had both committed terminable offenses shortly before their promotions.

According to the complaint, “one employee crashed his vehicle into a parked car while intoxicated and their (sic) other exposed his genitalia to the partygoers.” The brewery, according to Evans, also electronically named the printer used by management the “white guy printer” and the general employee printer the “black guy printer.”

Merited Claims Get Dismissed

On April 4, 2019, the court hearing the case dismissed several of Evans’ claims, not because it found that the claims did not have any merit, but because Founders invoked a clause in the Confidentiality Agreement Evans had to sign before he started working at Founders.

The clause limited when Evans could bring a lawsuit alleging racial discrimination to the earliest of 90 days from the time the EEOC issued a notice of an employee’s right to sue under certain discrimination statutes, 180 days from the events giving rise to the claim, or any statute of limitations period set by statute.

Founders asserted that Evans could not bring certain claims for failure to promote and discriminatory or retaliatory conduct because the alleged incidents had occurred more than 180 days before, and the court agreed.

The Positive Backlash

News of the lawsuit and deposition have, predictably, resulted in significant backlash directed at Founders, which responded via a statement on its website that expressly denies many of Evans’ allegations.

Beyond the sweeping condemnation Founders received on social media, bars, restaurants, and liquor stores have also started pulling its beers from their shelves. In explaining one bar’s decision to stop offering the products, Brent Foster, the manager of Standby, a Detroit bar, told the Detroit Free Press that “We understand that our vote is with our dollar and we want to spend that dollar with companies who operate with integrity and champion their community and their employees.”

Founders also pulled out of Detroit’s largest annual beer festival, the Fall Beer Festival, after other breweries said that they would not participate in the festival if Founders attended.

Longstanding Diversity Issues in the Craft Brewing Industry

This lawsuit is just the most recent example of the longstanding diversity issues in the craft brewing industry. In August 2019, the Brewers Association released the results of a survey that showed that the majority of people who work in breweries are white men.

Underrepresentation

Only 1% of brewery owners, 0.6% of brewers, and 0.4% of production management staff identify as black or African American. Non-production staff, service staff and managers see a slightly higher percentage of black or African American identifying employees, but the highest percentage in those categories clocks in at 4.2% for non-management service staff.

The Rippling Effects of the Industry

Beyond issues of underrepresentation, the brewing industry is regularly jolted when news breaks of discriminatory conduct at one brewery or another.
For example: Reckless Brewing made light of both Martin Luther King Jr.’s iconic “I Have A Dream” speech and the Black Lives Matter movement in a March 5 Facebook post promoting its beer, “Black Lagers Matter.”

Backlash from the post resulted in owner Dave Hundman’s decision to close the brewery three days later.

A 2018 Heineken ad with the slogan “Sometimes, lighter is better” also sparked backlash. In the ad, the bartender slides a bottle of Heineken Light down a bar to a woman drinking a glass of wine. On its way, the bottle passes several darker-skinned people before landing in front of a white woman and displaying the slogan. Many online criticized the advertisement before Heineken pulled it, including Chance the Rapper who described the ad as “terribly racist.”

How You Can Protect Yourself and Your Brewery

Issues like these highlight the need for breweries of any size to be aware of how their actions will be perceived by their communities, and take meaningful steps to enact change in the industry. Luckily, there are several concrete steps we can all take right now to make the craft brewing industry more inclusive.

• Host events:
  In 2019, the Brewers Association began offering a Diversity and Inclusion Event grant. Events hosted using these grants can range from beer festivals to neighborhood and community celebrations and should be designed to promote and foster a more diverse and inclusive craft beer community. Interested? View the application for 2020 grant funds is available to get started.
• Re-evaluate hiring and promotion processes:
  Breweries should reevaluate their hiring and promotion procedures to ensure that they do not unintentionally discriminate against any groups.
• Foster a culture of inclusion:
  They should also strive to foster a culture of inclusion and acceptance among employees, and not tolerate discriminatory words or actions. A brewery struggling with implementing policies and procedures that promote diversity should consider hiring a diversity and inclusion officer, or contracting with a company that provides those services.
• Provide routine awareness training:
  Consider offering training to management and employees so that they have the tools and awareness to treat people within and outside of the company with respect. Many incidents could be avoided with increased awareness, better training, and compassion.
• Get involved with your community:
  Consider the community where your brewery is located, and try to celebrate the local culture and people instead of trying to force your own idea of what a craft brewery should be or look like. Engage with the community, and get involved.
• Practice the golden rule:
  Finally, it is important for everyone in the craft brewing industry to consider how their words, actions, or inactions are impacting others. If and when you do make a mistake, own up immediately, apologize, and take steps to make sure that you never make a similar mistake in the future.
• Incorporate safe reporting for your employees:
  Make sure that employees have a safe and convenient way to report discrimination issues without fear of retaliation, and do not put limitations periods in your employment contracts or otherwise adopt policies that restrict or prevent employees from raising discrimination claims.

These provisions are not fair to employees who deserve the fullest protection under law and do not really shield the brewery from these claims, as the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) can still bring claims and investigate discrimination on its own.

Want to make sure you and your employees always enjoy a safe workspace?

Contact our “Hop Law” experts to ensure your work environment is comfortable, safe and productive. Our legal team will help you make sure you have the proper and acceptable safeguards in place for all of your employees and your business. Contact us today to get started!

Transcript From the Founders Brewing Co. Discrimination Case

Evans’ Attorney, Jack Schulz: When did you first meet Tracy Evans?
Founders Manager Dominic Ryan: 2011, 2012. We had mutual friends before working there, so …
Schulz: OK, So you knew Tracy prior to his employment at Founders?
Ryan: We met a few times, yes.
Schulz: OK, are you aware Tracy is Black?
Ryan: What do you mean by that?
Schulz: Are you aware Tracy is African-American?
Ryan: I’m not sure of his lineage so I can’t answer that.
Schulz: Alright. Are you aware that Tracy is a man of color?
Ryan: What do you mean by that?
Schulz: No? Do you know … You don’t know what it means for someone to be a white person or a Black person?
Ryan: I’m asking for clarification.
Schulz: You don’t need any. I can promise you that. We’ll keep the record as is. Someone’s skin color. A white …
Ryan: So that’s what you’re referring to?
Schulz: Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah.
Ryan: OK. Yes, I know the difference in skin tone.
Schulz: Are you able to identify individuals by their skin tone?
Ryan: What do you mean “identify”?
Schulz: I mean have you ever looked at Tracy Evans in your entire life? Have you? That’s a … that’s a genuine question.
Founders Attorney: Objection. Argumentative.
Founders Attorney: You can answer.
Ryan: Yes.
Schulz: And did you ever realize that Tracy’s skin [is] Black?
Ryan: That’s not … I mean, is his skin different from mine? Yes.
Schulz: How?
Ryan: What do you mean “how”? It’s a different color.
Schulz: And what is the difference of that color?
Ryan: It’s darker.
Schulz: And that means?
Founders Attorney: Objection. Vague question.
Schulz: I mean, we could … This could be a one-sentence answer, you know. So by your … I guess your testimony is you have no idea if Tracy is a minority, if he’s African-American?
Ryan: I don’t know Tracy’s lineage, so I can’t speculate on whether he’s … if he’s from Africa or not.
Schulz: What do you mean lineage, from Africa?
Ryan: No. I mean, like, I don’t know his DNA.
Schulz: Have you ever met Black people who aren’t from Africa?
Ryan: Excuse me?
Schulz: Have you ever met a Black person born in America?
Ryan: Yes.
Schulz: And you were able … Have you ever met a Black person who didn’t tell you they were Black?
Ryan: Can you rephrase that?
Schulz: Is Barack Obama Black?
Founders Attorney: Objection.
Schulz: To your knowledge?
Ryan: I’ve never met Barack Obama so I don’t …
Schulz: So you don’t know if Barack Obama is Black? What about Michael Jordan? Do you know if Michael Jordan is Black?
Founders Attorney: Objection
Ryan: I’ve never met him.
Schulz: So you don’t know him? What about Kwame Kilpatrick?
Ryan: Never met him.
Schulz: To your knowledge, was Kwame Kilpatrick Black?
Ryan: I …
Schulz: You don’t know?
Ryan: I don’t know.