Conor McGregor has turned Willy Wonka with his Forged Irish Stout. Well, he’s not giving away any golden tickets for his factory tour. Instead, he collaborated with Maksud Agadjani, popularly known as TraxNYC. ‘The Notorious’ and the New York City jeweler came up with a solution to boost the sales of the Forged Irish Stout and revive it from heavy losses. Needless to say, it’s the Irishman’s strategy to tackle the $2.59B competitor Guinness Stout. 

On 7 March 2025, the former UFC double champion took to Instagram and shared a post on his Story. Therein, he captioned, “OUR FORGED BREWERY IS SO INCREDIBLY WELCOMING! WE ARE THE PEOPLES STOUT ❤️🍀.” But what exactly is the gameplan for McGregor? If you’ve been active on social media, you must have come across TraxNYC at one time or the other. The jeweler is infamous for handing out precious metals for simple challenges. 

This time, the duo pasted an ounce of gold in the form of a coin to the back of one of the cans of McGregor’s stout. To make things more exciting, fair, and unpredictable, Agadjani shuffled every single can and every single box. This meant that no one knew exactly where that one ounce of gold was. In the caption of the video, TraxNYC wrote, “An ounce and a pint 🍺 out here in Dublin with @forgedirishstout @thenotoriousmma @coachowenroddy . Thanks for an amazing business adventure 🤝.” And all ‘Mystic Mac’ did was hope that the stint would reel in more customers to his Irish stout. 

Well, Conor McGregor’s business faced a huge loss. Back in 2023, the business fell into a loss of $5.6 million. An additional $3.3 million went by in production costs. With the local supermarkets like Tesco and ASDA cutting ties with McGregor after he lost the civil case against Nikita Hand, the business plummeted even faster. Meanwhile, his competition boomed to become a multibillion-dollar business. That’s probably the reason why McGregor couldn’t handle it and dissed Guinness openly. Well, he did call them greedy. 

Conor McGregor lashes out at Guinness Stout

Earlier in March 2025, ‘The Notorious’ put the global Irish stout titan in his crosshairs. And the reason lined up with the price hikes. On top of that, Guinness somehow managed to steal customers from McGregor’s local pubs. Well, Guinness has become a brand. When one thinks of Irish beer, it’s oftentimes Guinness on his mind. That’s the reason why Guinness Draught made $60 million in sales in 2017. And Guinness Extra Stout reeled in around $32 million. With the hints of coffee and chocolate, mixed with the subtle bitterness from the hops, Guinness managed to become a fan favorite stout. 

No doubt, this infuriated the Irishman. He went to Instagram and shared a rant. He wrote, “How people tolerate greed in their lives, and from greedy multinational corporations of all things, is just beyond me. Guinness are just greedy, rip-off b—— at this stage. They do f— all for publicans and the public but hike prices unfoundedly and even actively and purposely take custom from publicans with their storehouse events on significant pub days on the calendar. It would be akin to me opening up mega gyms all around my coaches’ gyms who supported me and built me up. It’s wrong! It’s on the public to see this. Most are just asleep.”

With a mix of wheat, barley, and malt, McGregor’s dark-roasted nitro stout might just jump back into the markets with the ounce of gold in one of the boxes. With the promise of not being overly bitter, Forged Irish Stout isn’t too far behind Guinness in terms of taste. And with the Irishman’s marketing skills, things might change pretty quickly. 

What are your thoughts on McGregor’s Willy Wonka act? Do you think Forged Irish Stout tastes better than Guinness? Will the stout ever make a true comeback? Let us know what you think in the comments down below.