Just hours before Founders Brewing Co. announced. Suddenly shutting down her Detroit dining room, she’s hit with a new racial discrimination lawsuit—this one brought by a black employee who says she was promoted for “purely visual reasons” and subjected to “egregious racial harassment.”
In her lawsuit, which she filed Monday, Naima Dillard claims that after nearly two years working at the Detroit brewery, “the work environment had become so objectively racially hostile that she had no choice but to quit” last week. She alleges the harassment included co-workers who intentionally misspelled her name, warned her to be careful that her child “didn’t steal any money” from the brewery, and told her she “didn’t struggle enough to be black”.
The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court at 4:36 p.m. About two and a half hours later, the founders announced they would be closing the Detroit taproom, citing the “ever-changing craft beer market, along with the struggle to regain foot traffic after the COVID-19 temporary . Closure “.
The founders issued a statement on Tuesday saying the company was “extremely saddened” to learn of the accusations and said it was unaware of the filing when it decided to close the Detroit dining room.
Founders: ‘We gave it as much time as possible’
Dillard’s attorney, Jack Schulz — who in 2019 settled another racial discrimination lawsuit with the founders that sparked a firestorm of controversy — questioned the timing of the announcement.
“Ms. Dillard spoke openly about her racially hostile treatment of the founders during her exit interview just last week,” Schulz said. “It is difficult for me to objectively accept the founders’ sudden announcement to permanently close the Detroit dining room just hours after Dillard’s complaint was filed as due to COVID-19.”
He added, “My immediate thoughts are with the large number of employees who have just been terminated without any notice or time to prepare.”
The Detroit Taproom had 38 employees out of more than 400 working at the brewery in Grand Rapids.
Announcing the closure, CEO Elton Andres Knight said in a statement: “This decision involved a lot of careful consideration… We explored every possible avenue to get the business right and gave it as much time as possible. We are now working hard to find new positions within the company for employees who were let go at This closure.
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This is the second lawsuit of its kind to hit the brewery in five years. The latest plaintiff was Tracy Evans, the director of events and promotions for the Detroit Taproom, who alleged that the founders tolerated an “internal corporate culture” and that the founders fired him in retaliation for complaints from human resources about racism on employees.
Evans settled the case for a confidential sum. The founders shut down the Detroit site for three months amid the controversy.
Promises of a Changing Culture ‘Never Realised’
Now comes Dillard’s lawsuit, just weeks after the resignation of another manager who said he couldn’t stand brewery culture any longer.
“I was one of the two directors who came back after the Tracy Evans lawsuit. I did it because founders’ leadership at the highest level told me explicitly there would be changes in culture,” Justin Barnett, former director of Founders taproom, wrote in a court filing. “The truth is, it never happened and I feel like it was taken advantage of. In the end, I quit because I didn’t want to be a part of that discrimination.”
In an affidavit, Wald, who resigned on April 17, confirms several claims Dillard made about her experience working at Michigan’s largest brewery. According to the lawsuit, the guardian’s affidavit, and attorney for Dillard, here’s what happened:
Dillard started working as a server at Founders in Detroit in June 2021.
Manager without administrative duties and valet pay
About a year later, I applied for a part-time sitting room management job. It interviewed two of the managers, including Parent, who said the general manager commented to him that it would be “a great visual” to hire someone of color to be the dining room manager.
“I was shocked by the suspension,” the guardian stated in his affidavit, noting: “I was hired throughout the founders’ previous racial discrimination lawsuit.”
Meanwhile, Dillard was given a part-time manager job on July 1, 2021. She was the only non-white principal, although she was not given any actual managerial responsibilities, and was treated “very differently” from her peers. She was also the only manager still required to work as a servant – and was paid a servant’s wages despite her managerial title.
The founders also allowed white-signed servers and tankers at a higher pay rate to perform various administrative duties that were denied to Dillard. And when Dillard complained about not doing things like training staff or supervising the juvenile room, which were part of her supposed duties, her hours were cut.
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The same thing happened when she complained about harassing behavior from co-workers, such as warning her 6-year-old didn’t “steal money” when she brought her to work one day over taking care of a conflict child.
“Objectively, Mrs. Dillard’s treatment was appalling,” Schulz said. “Even worse, when I reported it to management, their hours were cut in half or complaints were dismissed entirely.”
Dillard was also overlooked for promotions, unlike previous white part-time managers, who were “promoted quickly when additional areas of focus and/or assignments emerged,” the suit states. When a beer and merchandise supply role opened, Dillard expressed interest – but the duties were instead given to a recently hired coach boy who was white.
The suit states that “(Dillard) was a part-time manager for nearly a year with no end in sight while her Caucasian counterparts were promoted within a few months,” claiming that the brewery had “countless opportunities” to give her a full-time job, “but Instead I shifted those management duties to Caucasian non-management employees – even giving them the keys to the manager’s office.”
Dillard claims she faced several incidents of harassment and discrimination — but when she reported it, nothing happened. For example:
In January 2022, she reported being sexually harassed by an employee who continued to work with the founders without issue. The suit says nothing was done.
On February 2 of this year, Dillard complained to the Human Rights Division alleging retaliation against complaints of harassment and discrimination. Her working hours were decreasing. But one of the managers brushed off her complaints, instead using baseball analogies to inform Dillard that she was being “sued” and that she would serve as relief director. The manager assured her that she had no problems performing.
March and April got worse.
The work environment has become objectively hostile towards Dillard. On top of that, there was a sense of complete vulnerability,” the suit says.
During this time, the parent, another director of the dining room, gave his notice two weeks in advance. Dillard went into management and expressed interest in his job and a full-time job.
Two managers told her that such a position would not be available to her.
Around the same time, a white woman filed a sexual harassment complaint against the same man to whom Dillard had reported the same issue over a year earlier. When Dillard informed him, nothing happened, and when the white employee did, the man was fired on April 9.
About a week later, Dillard told a new white employee that he had applied for a management position, and that he was excited “he was being considered for management so quickly.” Dillard, who had been there for nearly two years, had not been notified or thought of about the job.
The lawsuit states that “in light of the racially hostile and objectively hopeless work environment, she (Dillard) has served her notice to resign.”
Her last day was April 23rd.
The next day, she filed a racial discrimination and retaliation complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Eight days later, she filed a lawsuit.
What the founders say about the closing and the lawsuit
Within a few hours, the founders posted on Facebook: “It is with great sadness that we announce that the Founders Detroit Taproom will be permanently closing its doors today.”
The decision to close the Detroit storage room is separate from the filing, the founders said in a statement on Tuesday.
“Since 2019, we have instituted mandatory bias, discrimination and harassment training across our organization,” the founders said in the statement. “We have reexamined our policies and enacted new policies, along with implementing new procedures for reporting workplace concerns. Closing a business is a difficult decision, and this decision was made following a multi-year evaluation of Detroit Taproom’s financial performance that began prior to COVID-19. And exacerbated by the epidemic.
“While our Detroit facility was closed on Monday, we were unaware of the filing. We announced the closure in front of all of our Detroit employees on Monday morning, and did not learn of the lawsuit against the founders until that evening when we were contacted by a reporter. As with any closure, it was There is a lot of work to be done to prepare for the loss of this extension, including reallocation of internal assets, conversations with the landlord and putting together a comprehensive termination plan, all of which take time.
“With respect to the pending lawsuit, we regret that this person did not have a good experience with us, and to the extent it was our actions or inactions that contributed to this, we are deeply sorry.”
Posted by Teresa Baldas, tbaldas@freepress.com