BrewDog co-founder James Watt has revealed that he has paid out almost £500,000 to winners of the company's misleading "solid gold" beer can promotion.
The craft beer entrepreneur said he made "some costly mistakes" in a promotion which offered people the chance to find a solid gold can hidden in cases in 2021.
Some winners questioned the worth of the cans and complained after discovering they were gold-plated.
Mr Watt said he mistakenly thought the cans were made from solid gold.
The co-founder and chief executive of the Scottish Brewer said he "misunderstood the process of how they were made" and made a "silly mistake" by telling customers in initial promotional tweets that the cans were "solid gold cans".
After some winners complained to the Advertising Standards Authority, the watchdog in October 2021 upheld the complaints and said three adverts were misleading.
"Those were 3 very expensive mistaken tweets that I sent out in my enthusiasm for our new campaign," Mr Watt said in a post on LinkedIn on Saturday.
"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," he added.
Mr Watt said that because it was his error, he had 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," he added.