‘Won’t help us out’: Owner of truck company claims Catawba Brewing owes him more than $100K

ASHEVILLE, N.C. — The owner of a trucking company claims he is owed hundreds of thousands of dollars from Catawba Brewing, according to our partners at WLOS in Asheville.

Rickey McKinney owns Topline Trucking and told WLOS he’s been fighting for his payment for months and isn’t sure a resolution with be in sight. He says after Catawba Brewing was bought out by Made by the Water, his company continued their contracts.

According to McKinney, his business is owed $103,274.45; he said as his company continued to work invoices were not getting paid.

“They kept promising to pay us, and then eventually, they walked into the Morganton location and just shut it down overnight,” McKinney told WLOS about Catawba Brewing’s Morganton location.

McKinney told WLOS, that he and his crew would show up at the site to do their normal hauls, but were met with people telling them the building was shutting down and they had to take their equipment and leave. He says they were given no notice of any kind before this happened in January.

After closing its Morganton location, Catawba Brewing closed its Charlotte and Wilmington locations, WLOS reports.

“It was promise after promise and never did get paid,” McKinney said.

With more locations joining the company’s shutdown, McKinney said Catawba Brewing told him they were going to audit their business, according to WLOS.

He says the company sent him an email explaining the audit went well and that the owners were aware of the outstanding balance, but were not able to pay it at the time, WLOS reports.

While the audit was going on, McKinney says he still had one of Catawba Brewing’s trucks.

“We did a bunch of work to it,” he told WLOS, “and they promised if I took the box truck back to their location in Asheville they would pay me the hundred-something thousand they owe me.”

Instead of payment, McKinney said he returned the truck and never heard from the company again. He says the company has been dodging him ever since-- it’s not only affecting his livelihood but his employees too, WLOS reports.

“We have all the documents stating we’ve got all the runs and all that they owe us, you know, on paper,” McKinney said. “They did the audit themselves and it’s 100% they owe me the money; they just won’t pay it.”

McKinney is still hopeful that he and his employees will be paid, but he is sharing his story as a warning to others to not do business with Catawba Brewing. He told WLOS he is optimistic that by spreading the word the company will realize they are hurting a small business.

“They won’t contact, won’t say nothing, help us out. With them keep going in, shutting other businesses down, makes me think, ‘Well, are they going to file bankruptcy? What are they going to do?’” he said.

WLOS reached out to the parent company of Catawba Brewing and got a statement from a company representative.

“On behalf of Catawba Brewing Company, I was told that there are disputes on the Topline bills that have not been resolved between the parties, which is why it remains outstanding,” the representative told WLOS.

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New 13 reached out to the parent company of Catawba Brewing, and a representative got back to us.

“On behalf of Catawba Brewing Company, I was told that there are disputes on the Topline bills that have not been resolved between the parties, which is why it remains outstanding,” the representative said.

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