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30th December 2007

Heineken gobbles up Belarus brewer Syabar

Heineken has made a number of acquisitions in Eastern Europe recently, the latest of which is Syabar, the number 2 brewer in Belarus.

International Herald Tribune: Heineken buys No 2 Belarus brewer Syabar

The move is part of Heineken’s strategy to obtain leading market positions and compensate for low growth rates in Western Europe and the United States, a group spokeswoman said.

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written by Al | posted in Beer, Megabreweries, News | tagged , | 0 Comments

7th July 2007

Heineken in Cute Keg Can

heineken.jpgI was at bar-b-cue on the Fourth of July and the hosts had Heineken that come in those cute cans that resemble a keg. We’ve discussed in length before about the drawbacks of packaging beer in clear or green bottles and the advantages of cans. Heineken has always been the poster child for skunky beer as they seemed to take the image of their packaging more seriously than the taste of their beer. So, I was actually eager to take a taste of Heineken from a can, hopefully sans skunks.

As expected, this beer didn’t taste like Pepé Le Pew. It was clean and crisp and very refreshing, much like a cold club soda. You could faintly taste the malt and hops. I would have to do a side-by-side comparison to determine if it was any better than Budweiser, or about the same. With that, I found it passable and without another choice of beer to have, I toughed it out. That lands it directly on a “two” of the unofficial Hop-Talk beer rating system.

Unofficial Hop Talk Rating: ★★☆☆☆

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written by Ron | posted in Beer, Reviews | tagged | 4 Comments

5th June 2007

Beer News Sampler

Baltika eyes Heineken’s No.1 spot in European beer
Baltika, Russia’s largest brewer, wants to dislodge Heineken from the top of the European beer market, despite a recent slowdown in the Russian domestic market.

Biofuel boom sparks beer price fight
As German barley farmers abandon their usual crops in favor of subsidized biofuel crops, like corn (maize), brewers scramble to keep costs in line to prevent alienating their consumers.

Brewery workers walk off job
More than 100 workers of the Canadian Autoworkers Union walked off the job early at Edmonton’s Molson Coors brewery the morning of May 30. While the company says it has plenty of supply, union leaders think beer drinkers in Western Canada may have a bit of a time of it this summer.

Quick Tip: Leftover Beer
Not that this would ever happen to any of us, but leftover beer can be used to give some extra nutrients to your plants.

Teamsters brewing boycott of Yuengling beer
A typical “he said, he said” scenario. Yuengling workers vote to leave the union. Teamsters strike. Marketplace yawns. The Teamsters claim management threatened to shut down the company and want lawmakers to intervene. The company says that workers decided to decertify on their own.

Anheuser-Busch Brewing Drinking Water
A-B is canning potable water to have available in the event of a major hurricane or other large disaster.

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written by Al | posted in Beer, News | tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

30th April 2007

Beer News Sampler

Call for weak Euro beer
Austrian officials are pushing for a special “Euro 2008″ beer (read: low alcohol) and branded plastic “Euro 2008″ mugs (read: that can’t be used as projectiles) to be served when Austria and Switzerland host the 2008 European Championship. All in an effort to cut down on hooliganism.

Ale’s Well with the World
This article in Scientific American describes the findings of Charlie Bamforth, Anheuser-Busch Endowed Professor of Brewing Science at the University of California, Davis. Specifically, it was the discovery of how to store and ferment grain is what caused people to live together. Thus was born civilization, villages became cities, and technology advanced in leaps and bounds.

Workers Threaten Heineken
Workers at Heineken’s plant in St. Petersburg, Russia, have threatened a “slowdown” unless they get a 30 percent raise, a year-end bonus, extra pay for hazardous conditions and other concessions. It is unclear whether they’ll still be required to drink the beer.

Expert offers tips for pouring a perfect glass of beer
“Though it seems easiest to drink beer straight from the bottle or can, experts recommend pouring it into a clear glass for maximum enjoyment. Different varieties of beer should be served in different types of glasses.” Well, duh! It’s nice to see traditional media with a positive article about beer, however.

Thief betrays himself for beer
A German phone thief led police right to his front door when they called the stolen mobile to say he had won some free beer and he willingly gave his address. Stupid thief or entrapment? You be the judge. (Sorry.)

Go figure: Use math to get the perfect head of beer
U.S. researchers have found a mathematical formula that predicts how beer bubbles change over time. OK, maybe it won’t change the taste of beer that much—but, it has other valuable applications.

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written by Al | posted in Beer, News | tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

25th July 2006

Beer bottles as building material

We here at Hop Talk don’t talk much about Heineken. It’s primarily one of those “if you don’t have something nice to say” situations.

Oh, we’ve nothing personally against Heineken. It’s just that millions of gallons of it are imported to the U.S. every year and it is overpriced. Further, it doesn’t make that long transatlantic jouney very well, because every single bottle of it we’ve ever had has been skunked. Every. Single. One.

Recently I was at a function at a business conference where the open bar offered Budweiser, Coors Light, and Heineken. I considered just having water, but opted for the Bud. At least I knew it would be fairly fresh. Someone nearby had a Heineken and, from five feet away, I could smell that it had turned.

It was with some interest that we noticed the following item: Heineken Beer Bottle Bricks.

Apparently, Freddy Heineken, whose family lost and regained control of the brewery and who was at its helm while it became a worldwide brand, had a brainstorm while strolling on a garbage-strewn beach in the Caribbean. Heineken world bottles(Jamaica, Curaçao, or some other island. There seems to be some contention as to which it was.) As the story goes, the islanders would simply discard the bottles after they were finished with them. At the time this is supposed to have happened, somewhere around 1960 or so, the usual practice was to return the bottles for refilling. But, considering how far away the island was from the Netherlands, it wasn’t worth it and so they were discarded.

Something of a philanthropist, Freddy was weighing the need for affordable building materials and apparently put two-and-two together. The idea was to make squared bottles that, after the contents were consumed, could be used as cheap bricks. Glass and air make excellent insulators, and the neck of the bottle fit into an indentation in the bottom. They were dubbed “world bottles”, or “WOBOs” for short.Heineken world bottle

The idea, though, never took off. Except for a little shack built on the Heineken estate, nothing was ever built of them. The board of directors apparently rejected the idea of the "World Beer" bottle.

A shame, really. It's probably not the best idea for a building material, although if you filled them with dirt it might not be bad. It would certainly make shipping and storage more efficient, though. Take a look in a case of beer. See all that empty space between the round bottles? How much less space could 24 beers take up—or, better, how many more bottles could you fit in the same space—if they were square?

Why do you think square watermelons are so popular in Japan? They take up less space and they can do it. Think of how much easier it would be to stack bottles in your refrigerator.

Okay, so, granted, I wouldn't want the bottles with any actual Heineken in them.

(See also: BBC obituary, Wikipedia)

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written by Al | posted in Beer, History | tagged , | 1 Comment

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