Eleven years ago, BBAG acquired a minority interest in the Viennese Ottakringer brewery – which was five years before Heineken bought BBAG. Although Heineken professedly wanted out of Ottakringer immediately, it has taken Heineken and Ottakringer six years before they could go their separate ways. The final bone of contention was Ottakringer’s plan to integrate the mineral water brand Vöslauer into the company, which would have doubled Ottakringer’s turnover. It presently stands at EUR 80 million annually.

The operations will be renamed StarBev, AB-InBev said. As part of the deal, set to close in January 2010, AB-InBev will license CVC to brew and distribute brands like Stella Artois, Beck’s, Löwenbräu, Hoegaarden, Spaten and Leffe.

Dr Weber says that Mixery Blend will start a revolution on the German beer market, his brewery being the first to introduce such a novel brew into the market. Despite his highfalutin claims, Dr Weber is well aware that his “revolution” could just be some wishful thinking because his expectations as to how many hl of Mixery Blend he will be able to sell initially are “several thousand hl”. That’s not a great deal.

The Amsterdam-based company said profit before exceptional items and amortization of brands, or BEIA, a figure closely watched by the market, will grow by low double digits in 2009 when acquisitions, disposals and currency movements are excluded. Previously, the company forecasted growth by "at least high-single digits."

In May 2009 already, Heineken had felt compelled to snap up a big chunk of the Globe’s debt – Heineken bought back Globe’s shares at a face value of GBP 130 million, albeit at a discount – to become the group’s controlling creditor as this move freed the brewer from the onerous beer supply agreement it has with the Globe.

In the first nine months of 2009, order bookings dropped 24.4 percent to EUR 1.4 billion from EUR 1.9 billion a year ago. Order bookings from eastern Europe, the CIS countries and from North America remained well below the preceding year’s figures.

Guess what, Diageo even has a Chief Customer Officer, a post created two years ago. Ron Anderson, who was appointed to the job, is supposed to focus on take-home sales rather than on-premise consumption, reflecting the global trend toward drinking at home rather than in bars and clubs.

“The Swedish Presidency can be assured of our ongoing commitment towards fighting alcohol-related harm, in particular among young people and especially minors,” The Brewers of Europe Secretary General, Rodolphe de Looz-Corswarem stated ahead of the meeting. “The Brewers of Europe and its members’ leading role within the EU Alcohol and Health Forum is a strong proof of our commitment,” he pointed out.

The jury, a panel of beer experts consisting of Alastair Gilmour, beer-journalist writing for food-, beverage- and travel-journals, UK, Ryan Johnson, brewmaster International Brands Division, Miller Brewery, USA, and Václav Berka, senior brewmaster Pilsner Urquell, Plzeňský Prazdroj, Czech Republic awarded the second place to Ivan Simonovic from Slovakia. The third place and the People’s Choice Award went to Maria Abrams from Berlin.

Drinktec and CBB