Drinking Can Make You Lose Your Job

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RACINE, Wis. (AP) - Just sipping a brewski gave Isac Aguero a career hangover.



Aguero, 24, said he was fired from his job with a Miller Brewing distributor, the same day a picture appeared in the Journal Times of Racine of him drinking a Bud Light, which is brewed by rival Anheuser-Busch Co.


The photo, taken Feb. 5, was part of the newspaper's weekly "On the Town" feature, which depicts the city's night life.


Aguero, who had been a forklift operator at CJW Inc. for four years, told the newspaper he was informed by co-workers when he arrived at work last week that he was in trouble because of the picture.


He said he was called into the general manager's office and told he was fired. Aguero said he was not given a reason and claimed he never had problems with his bosses.


"It was a Saturday and I wasn't at work," he told The Journal Times. "They can't tell me what beverages I can drink. Bud Light's my beer of choice, I always drink that. Just because I work there, do I have to change what I drink?"


Thomas Bey, a CJW sales manager, read a statement to the Associated Press on Friday and would not answer any questions. He said the company does not publicly discuss past or present employees.


"We consistently remind our employees that drinking alcohol is entirely a personal decision," Bey said. "The image and reputation of any company is determined in large part by the way its employees are seen to behave. Our employees can and should be our best ambassadors."

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LONDON (AFP) - Regulars at a 15th century British pub said they had bought their drinking hole to save it from being converted into houses.


AFP/File Photo



A group of 21 customers raised 425,000 pounds (617,000 euros, 800,000 dollars) to buy the Swan Inn pub in Cheshire, northwest England, after landlord Ian Edmondson announced he planned to turn it into residential property.


"We were upset when we heard he wanted to close the pub because it is a viable business and we didn't want to lose our local," said Matthew Barnes, who helped to organise the purchase in the village of Kettleshulme.


"It is only a small village and the pub is the key feature where people can come together to chat and exchange stories," Barnes said, noting that the community had already lost its post office.


The pub was closed last October but the locals' offer was accepted earlier this year and it is due to re-open in March.