Yesterday, Modern Times Beer founder Jacob McKean announced that he is stepping down from his role as CEO. This organizational change was announced in a blog post on the company’s website, and comes on the heels of the Point Loma-based interest being called out on social media—along with numerous other brewing companies, beer-centric businesses and individuals—in connection with sexual harassment and assault allegations from women sharing personal stories with Notch Brewing Brewer and Production Manager Brienne Allan, who then shared those stories via her personal Instagram account (@ratmagnet) last weekend. Shared as Instagram stories and preserved as highlights on Allan’s Instagram page, these stories have been read by many, being met with widespread appall, sympathy and demands for change. McKean stepping away, as well as the termination of a longtime employee named in the aforementioned barrage of stories, represent Modern Times’ first steps in creating that change.
“I am stepping down from my role as CEO, and we will begin a formal search for new company leadership. In order to navigate us out of this extremely difficult moment, we need leadership with the skill and experience to handle it effectively. It’s time for a change,” said McKean in his blog post. “Today, we parted ways with an employee that was named in an online report last week. While this portion of that particular investigation process is closed, we are still continuing to work through the next steps in order to take additional action as needed.”
According to Brewbound, the terminated employee in question was Derek Freese, who joined the company in 2013, and has coordinated Modern Times’ events for the greater part of his time there.
[UPDATE:] Later in the day this article was published, Freese took to his personal social-media account to post the following:When I saw the first allegation about me, I was in denial of my own toxic behavior. I have always thought of myself as someone who wants to champion women and who want their voices heard, and instead of listening, the first thing I did was react. Over the next couple of days, through a lot of self-reflection and some very hard conversations, I had to admit my own toxic and disgusting behavior during my time in the beer industry.
I asked Modern Times to investigate me on Friday, and by Monday I asked them to believe my accusers. Because we need to believe women and I needed to hold myself accountable in that regard, I asked Modern Times to let me go. And they have. I will not be returning to the industry.
I have a lot of work to do to, but this should not be about me. I hope everyone continues to listen to these women. The industry on a whole puts people up on a pedestal, almost always men, and I think that behavior makes it easy to just feel invincible. It feeds egos, it builds up this cult of personality around the brewers and owners and public figures, and it makes you feel like you’re somehow better than others. Because of beer. And that needs to stop. I hope real change happens for everyone involved.
In his post, McKean also mentions an incident in which he was directly involved, saying he had an interaction with an employee via Slack that “badly missed the mark”, enough that several of his own employees took it upon themselves to inform him of his shortcoming. He says he later apologized “personally and profusely”. McKean was also personally named in Allan’s Instagram stories.
While many of the stories shared over the past several days detail instances of harassment and assault, others speak to the inaction of companies and the fostering of company cultures where such behavior is not only prohibited (albeit often in a blind-eye fashion) but far more likely to occur at such companies as a result of poor management, lack of employee accountability and a boys-will-be-boys ethos.
The 44th largest craft-brewing company in the country, Modern Times was one of the largest operations to be mentioned by the many hundreds of women who communicated their experiences via Allan’s Instagram stories, but far from the only large brewery to be named. Or the only San Diego brewery to be named, for that matter. Other local operations came under fire, prompting internal investigations within their organizations like those currently underway at Modern Times.
Understandably, many of the women who shared their stories did so anonymously. A number of women described communicating their experiences to company management, human resources or through other organizational avenues, only to have nothing—or nothing significant—done about it. Some further described retributive disciplinary actions, going as far as termination. Allan’s Instagram account has evolved into something of a “safe space” where people who share their stories are being heard. Over the past several days, this has expanded beyond beer industry circles and is resonating with the public in the same way it has with industry personnel.
Yesterday, employees at Modern Times’ Oakland taproom took to social media with a statement expressing their shared disappointment and saying: “We will not be pouring beer in Oakland until we feel that company leadership acts in a way that aligns with our personal values of inclusion and equality, and that appropriate actions and measures are put in place to prevent further discrimination and harassment. We hope that the company acts swiftly and we will be pouring beers for you all soon.”
Later in the day, Freese was terminated and McKean stepped down. In addition to this pair of personnel moves, Modern Times’ blog post says the company is changing its harassment reporting procedures from an internal process to an external, anonymous, third-party process due to the “obvious” failures of its existing process. Enhanced anti-harassment training and bystander training will be conducted for all staff in addition to current biennial sexual harassment training, as well. According to McKean, these are the steps that can be announced at present, but more changes are to come.