Let's Take Over The World

Lest anyone though from my last post that I was loosing the run of myself and becoming a celebrator rather than a complainer, fear not. I have a bee in my bonnet and I want to let it out.

My gripe is with huge industrial breweries who, not content with a massive market share, seem to want to control all the beer in the world without consideration for anyone who may suffer in the process. In this instance, I'm talking about the Dutch Giant Heineken and their drive to sell Paulaner in Ireland.

Anyone who knows me will know that, when out, I like nothing more than a nice cold Weissbier. I have written about such things. The first Weissbier commonly available in Ireland was Erdinger. A small company called Noreast Beers started importing it and distributing it about 10 or 12 years ago. Erdinger was the first Weissbier that may Irish people tasted. Over the years, through dogged persistence, Noreast Beers fostered a taste for and created a market for Weissbier in Ireland. It is no mean feat for a small company to successfully introduce a new beer style into a competitive market. And while I personally find Erdinger rather bland, I admire what Noreast have done with it in the Irish market and will, if stuck, willingly drink it. I am, on the other hand, very partial to their Dunkel (a dark weissbier).

It seems Heineken weren't happy with their massive share in the Irish beer market. Big breweries buy littler breweries - that's what they do. Heineken own scores of brands across the world. In Ireland they have: Heieken, Amstel, Coors Lite, and Murphy's and , not to be out done in the specialist markets they now push Heineken owned brands Affligem (Belgian Abbey style beer), Zyweic (popular Polish lager), Sol (tasteless Corona type lager) and Moretti (Italian Lager) in Ireland too.

Now they've gone after Erdinger in the Irish market with their Munich weissbier Paulaner. Now, Erdinger is no small little company but they seem to have put very little effort into the Irish market, leaving all the hard work and marketing to its importers and distributors - Noreast Beers. Heineken seem intent on capitalising on the decade or so of grooming that has been done by Noreast and blowing Erdinger out of the water with deep pockets. They are throwing everything at getting Paulaner to stick in the Irish market: promotions giving away free pints, sponsoring bars at events and making publicans offers they can't refuse to take out Erdinger. Heineken can afford this and, no doubt, will persist at this until Erdinger is squashed out and Noreast Beers are out of business.

My first encounter with Paulaner was about a year ago in The Oval Bar in Cork. A promotions person offered me a free pint of draught Paulaner. Who was I to refuse? It was awful. Like soggy bread. Didn't even finish it. I've since had bottled Paulaner and while hardly a classic of the style, it is very drinkable. I've tasted the draught on two other occasions and one was awful, the other fine. There seems to be a serious consistency issue with the draught product.

More recently I, like many other people, became a victim of their attempted world dominance while visiting The Spigieltent during The Cork Midsummer Festival. There was a Paulaner bar. Available were: draught Paulaner, bottled Paulaner, Sol, Murphy's and wine. Heineken are so serious about Paulaner that they didn't even sell Heineken in their own bar! Faced with that choice, I drank Paulaner. I felt terrible the next day!

Some days later, finding myself in The Spigieltent again, in the interest of research, I drank Paulaner again. Oh no, not again! Yes. Again! Awful headache the next day. Now, good beer does not do that to me. I can drink a moderate amount of Weihenstephaner, Schneiderweiss, Erdinger or any good beer like Galway Hooker and not suffer the next day but not so with Paulaner. I met friends who were with me in The Spigieltent who declared that they "would never drink Paulaner again" for the same reasons. This is not a good thing. I can't say why Paulaner has this effect on me and others but the outcome is that I will not drink it again and cannot recommend it to anyone else.

There is a delicious irony here. Left to my own devices, I probably would have drunk one or two bottles of Paulaner on the odd occasion and been quite indifferent to it. However, due to their expensive push on the product, I got to taste how bad the draught can be and only because of lack of choice due to their exclusive bar arrangement, I discovered the adverse effect of drinking more than two of them has. If they hadn't forced on me I wouldn't have formulated the opinion of how bad it is.

So, what weissbiers would I recommend? I really like Weihenstephaner (especially their rather light coloured dunkel) and Schneiderweiss. Franziskaner is a good beer and Erdinger is not a bad beer at all (some of us are just rather tired of it). And do try, and ask for - because they are available - the dunkel versions of these beers.

The Beer Revolution wants diversity not dominance.

My last drink was; Whihenstephaner Heffeweissbier Dunkel, 50cl, 5.3%abv