Whiskey-soaked Succession: Jack Daniels heirs in bitter family feud as $15B hostile bid looms
The billionaire heirs to the Jack Daniel’s fortune are reportedly embroiled in a bitter family feud — with a pair of rebel brothers blasting their relatives and company brass as a $15 billion hostile takeover bid looms over the storied whiskey maker.More than 130 members of the Brown clan received a seven-page broadside from W.L.Lyons Brown III and his brother Stuart Brown accusing the board of Brown-Forman, which owns Jack Daniel’s, of “rewarding failure” as the company’s shares have lost roughly 60% of their value in recent years.“The numbers are stark and undeniable,” the bourbon bros wrote in the July 10 missive, according to the Wall Street Journal.“Brown-Forman’s stock price has fallen from the mid-$70s per share to the mid-$20s per share over the past three years, eliminating billions of dollars of generational wealth for the Brown family and all other shareholders.”The family revolt has erupted as Louisville-based Brown-Forman — the 156-year-old company behind Jack Daniel’s and Woodford Reserve — fends off an unsolicited $15 billion cash offer from crosstown rival Sazerac, the family-owned maker of Buffalo Trace bourbon.CEO Lawson Whiting is also headed for the exits as sales have stalled and the Brown clan — whose collective fortune Forbes has put at $11 billion — squabbles over the future of the family empire.At the center of the drama is Lyons Brown, 66, a colorful fifth-generation heir who was pressured to leave Brown-Forman in 2002 following a clash with his uncle, then-CEO Owsley Brown II, according to the Journal.Lyons Brown once reportedly ruffled feathers by flipping an organizational chart upside down at a sales meeting and urging employees to challenge conventional wisdom.Lyons Brown later started his own booze business, competing against the family company, and co-founded a now-defunct honey venture that touted “low-disturbance” beekeeping.“The letter speaks for itself,” Lyons Brown told the Journal.Now he...