Two brothers who are heirs to the Brown-Forman fortune, which owns Jack Daniel's, have publicly clashed with the rest of their family over the company's leadership and its rejection of a $15 billion (£11.8bn) takeover approach. WL Lyons Brown III and Stuart R Brown sent a scathing letter to relatives on 10 July accusing the board of "rewarding failure" and criticising falling sales, a slumping share price and a failed merger attempt with French drinks giant Pernod Ricard. The row matters because it exposes deep divisions within one of America's wealthiest whiskey dynasties over how a $11 billion family business should be run and who should control it.

The brothers, who are not currently active in the firm despite being sons of a former chairman, said Brown-Forman's shares had fallen from the mid-$70s to the mid-$20s over three years and singled out chief executive Lawson Whiting for "poor operating performance" and rising personal pay; Whiting has since announced he will step down. The company also rejected an unsolicited $15 billion bid from Kentucky rival Sazerac, laid off 12% of its workforce last year, and saw a blackberry-flavoured Jack Daniel's variant reportedly flop. Despite their outspoken stance, the pair hold limited voting power because they never joined Wolf Pen Branch, the family investment vehicle that controls about 60% of voting shares among the roughly 180 Brown family descendants.