Case Study: Brown-Forman achieves stronger security and simpler access with Okta

Brown-Forman delights employees with IT security that works for everyone

Brown-Forman, the 150‑year‑old spirits and wine company behind brands like Jack Daniel’s, Woodford Reserve and Finlandia, needed to shift IT from IT‑centric projects to business‑enabling technology. As cloud apps multiplied and legacy identity tools accumulated, the company lacked unified access controls, visibility, and a user‑friendly authentication experience for employees and external partners, so it sought a flexible, vendor‑agnostic identity solution that would improve security and usability.

Brown‑Forman deployed Okta (SSO, Universal Directory, Adaptive MFA, Lifecycle Management and B2B integrations) to centralize access, use prebuilt APIs, and simplify provisioning with a branded, low‑friction sign‑in experience. The rollout achieved high adoption, smoothed the move to remote work during COVID‑19, gave IT faster breach detection and mitigation (additional MFA enabled within 48 hours), accelerated the shift to Zero Trust, reduced partner management overhead, and measurably improved the company’s security posture.

Brown-Forman

Tim Nall

Chief Information Officer