AB-InBev cancels sale of breweries Diebels and Hasseröder

Germany | A change of mind? AB-InBev has called off the sale of two of its breweries – Diebels and Hasseröder. All discussions with interested parties have been terminated, AB-InBev announced on 20 March 2019.

“Our strategy for Germany has evolved. Therefore, Hasseröder and Diebels will play a newly defined role in our portfolio in the future,” Florian Harms, AB-InBev’s German chief, said. However, details about the new strategy were not disclosed.

Two years ago, AB-InBev reported that it is looking for a buyer for the Diebels Brewery in Issum and the Hasseröder Brewery in Wernigerode, which produced about 2 million hl combined in 2018 after years of decline. Finally, in January 2018, AB-InBev announced it had clinched a deal with the investment firm CKCF from Kronberg near Frankfurt, but the transaction fell through in the summer of 2018. Allegedly, the buyer had been unable to come up with the necessary funds.

The search for a buyer continued, all the while the breweries were kept in limbo and employees worried about their future.

Observers think that AB-InBev’s change of mind only conceals that it has failed to find a buyer and that plenty of other German brewers could be sitting on assets that nobody wants.