20 entrepreneurs


Legendary music man Jon Brewer on moving with the times


After a lifetime in the music industry, Jon Brewer is affectionately known as “Mr Rock and Roll”. Manager, video and DVD industry pioneer, award-winning publisher – he recently won yet more plaudits as director of the highly-acclaimed feature documentary film BB King: ‘The Life of Riley’, about the life and musical history of the blues legend. Brewer heads movie production company Emperor Media, while wife Laura is sales director of sister company Cardinal Releasing, responsible for sales and media deals. Here he takes time out from a busy schedule to talk with Alison Dewar about his career


Brewer was already rubbing shoulders with rock's elite in clubs like the Marquee Club and Speakeasy, watching legendary artists such as Jimi Hendrix by the time he was 16-years-old. By the late 1980s he was a Hollywood movie producer, living the “lifestyle of the rich and famous” in the hills above Beverly Hills. He later returned to England, where a love for the game of polo finally attracted him away from the bright city lights of London to the beauty of the English countryside. Today home is a 15th Century bolt-hole in the Cotswolds , where he lives with Laura and their five-year-old twins. The production offices and editing suites are run from a neighbouring structure on the river front property.


were taking over from more traditional theatres for gigs and I used my industry knowledge to link up the new arenas with agents and record companies and make it work.


You owned recording and publishing companies and then moved into video, tell us more about that.


I formed my own record label in 1980 and also set up my own publishing company. You couldn’t also be a band manager because there was a conflict of interest, so I wasn’t able to manage the bands as well. I did own the recordings though, including Gerry Rafferty’s 'Baker Street', which won the Ivor Novello Award for “Best Publisher” and another for “Best Song”.


Tell us how you began your career in the music industry


I originally worked in the family business as an insurance broker and started Frizzells Aviation insurance department, but I was passionate about what was happening in the music industry. Every night, I’d swap a three-piece suit for the hip and trendy gear, and was out until 4am with this crowd. Eventually I broke away to become a rock and roll manager. I tried to get investors on board but it was impossible, so I created my own management company, and that was my introduction to people like David Bowie and (members of) the Rolling Stones.


How did you “crack” America?


I was already known to the American record companies as we had some very successful acts.


www.businessmag.co.uk It was a time when stadiums and arenas


Around the same time, the video industry took off, every greengrocer suddenly became a video store. I decided to move into the video and distribution business, creating Avatar Film Company, which became the fourth largest independent in the UK.


What was the secret of your success?


I talked to all my old friends from the music industry, bought the films, worked out how much advertising and distribution was needed to get the videos out to the stores and the rental libraries, then I did deals with people like CBS/FOX, EMI and Universal/CIC. At the time, the videos would cost about £70 to sell to the public, but the secret was getting the rental side right, which took turnover up to about £12 million a year. When I got my first cheque from video sales I was going to send it back because I thought there had been a mistake, it was for over £100,000.


THE BUSINESS MAGAZINE – THAMES VALLEY – MARCH 2013 Was there one big movie for you?


It would have to be 'Screwballs', it was my biggest success right at the beginning. We brought Hollywood to Scunthorpe by bringing one of the starlets over and taking her around the country in a Daimler to promote the video. We made over £1m with 'Screwballs' and it started the whole ball rolling. I went to Cannes Film Festival and the US and was buying films for the UK, Netherlands and Australia markets and I also took video tape to Japan, which was the last country to move to video.


How did you end up in Hollywood?


It had got to the stage where, if I offered £100,000 for video rights to a film, the studios would offer £1m, so I decided one day that the


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