Gilde in Hannover has always been a regional brand whose fortunes have declined in sync with German beer consumption and InBev’s disdain for the lacklustre brand. At the end of the 1990s, Gilde sold more than 1 million hl. Today the volume of its namesake brand has declined to an estimated 250,000 hl. Unfortunately, the brewery has a capacity of a 1.8 million hl. Which means that it would have been heavily underutilised for years – had not InBev used the extra capacity to brew its other German brand Beck’s there plus 1.2 million hl of a white brand for the German discount supermarket chain Lidl.

Carlsberg proposed an annual dividend of DKK 3.50 for 2008, down from DKK 6 a share in 2007 and said it will cut capital expenditure in 2009 to DKK 3.75 billion from DKK 5.3 billion to improve cash flow and reduce debt.

Baltika Breweries, the leader on the Russian beer market, on 19 February reported that its net profit edged up 11 percent to RUB 15.5 billion (USD 425 million) in 2008 year-on-year.

Pernod Ricard said that the average cost of debt should be less than 5 percent for the full year 2008/09 and close to 4 percent for 2009/10, based on current interest rates and current hedging.

Global drinks giant Diageo cut its full-year profit guidance and launched a new cost-cutting plan after both sales and profit growth slowed sharply in its second quarter and it warned of a further slide in consumer confidence.

The notes are expected to be listed on Euronext Amsterdam by NYSE Euronext, the regulated market of Euronext Amsterdam N.V. and on the London Stock Exchange’s Regulated Market.

Interbrew’s top brass must have known that there was a snag to their purchase of Munich’s Spaten brewery or they would have told the press in 2003 that the small print of the sales contract read: “Brewery real estate not included”.

Sometimes small things are an indication of greater things to come. Last year, during hop harvest in the Hallertau, Anheuser-Busch was filming a commercial for its Michelob internet site which featured Dr Willy Buholzer, Anheuser-Busch’s hop expert and buyer.

Will history repeat itself? In 1805, a French woman, widowed at the age of 27, takes over her late husband’s wine business in the wake of the French Revolution. She guides it through the turbulent times of the Napoleonic Wars, pioneers efficiencies in champagne production and becomes filthy rich and famous in the process. Who is she? Step forward, Barbe-Nicole Clicquot Ponsardin, better know as La Veuve Clicquot. The widow Clicquot to this day has a luxury champagne label named after her.

Diageo, the world’s biggest drinks company, will review a EUR 650 million scheme to build a new state-of-the-art Guinness brewery in Ireland because of the economic downturn. Ireland’s GDP is expected to contract by 5 percent and the unemployment rate is to rise to over 9 percent this year.