A Heineken woman
READERS'LETTERS
WHAT IS MALT?
YOUR EDITOR
Emancipation
Hobbies
The world
ANNA MARIA VINCI
Anna Maria Vinci,
management secretary at the
Dreher Brewery in Pedavena,
radiates friendliness and calm. As you
watch her efficient method of working,
you know she must be a good right
hand to her boss. One of the many
women who work with Heineken
throughout the world. One of the six
female employees in Pedavena. A
village that stands next to Feltre - a
typical North Italian provincial town.
She joined the company in 1958, and
from 1961 onwards she spent about ten
years as secretary to the commercial
director. A job in which she was able to
take a look at many activities ranging
from advertising materials for
customers to future sales projections.
In her present job she is working for
her third director since 1971.
What's her view of the increased
emancipation of women? "I'm pleased
that the woman no longer has the
secondary role she used to have", she
explains. "But I still cannot imagine a
woman as an infantry officer, or as a
ship's captain. I believe that women
must continue to play a role in the
family. And yet I'm pleased that at
Heineken women are also being given
an increasingly important share in the
work."
She keeps her eight nephews and
nieces supplied with crocheted
clothing, as crocheting is one of her
favourite hobbies. She often crochets
with one eye on the television, though
she's by no means a TV addict. But
there are certain programmes she
watches regularly. Particularly
documentaries about drugs. That's a
subject she's very much concerned
about.
She loves going to the theatre, but live
theatre performances in Feltre or
Pedavena are few and far between.
She hopes that this will change some
day. And then there's travelling. Her
five sisters live in all parts of Italy,
which is one of the reasons why she
knows her homeland so well. She has
been on holiday to France, Jugoslavia
and Germany. As a child she lived with
her parents in Libya. Where would she
most like to go to? To Thailand, for
that country has long fascinated her.
She's often dreamt of Alaska. "I
always see fields full of yellow
flowers", she laughs. "I simply want to
go there and see those masses of
yellow. But,of course,Iwouldn't mind
seeing the rest of Alaska as wellI don't
know how I'll get there as I'm scared of
flying. But not so scared that I'd refuse
to go up in a plane"In a few years, like
all other Italian women, she'll be
retiring at the age of 55. Still young
enough to set out on big journeys.
She thinks that the situation in the
world is terrifying. "Often I can't help
but think about a nuclear war and its
aftermath", she says earnestly. "But,
then again, I have faith in young
people. Young people today are more
honest and more ambitious than they
were when I was young. They want to
build up a career for themselves. They
have a great deal of freedom and that's
a good thing. I am opposed to a
dictatorship, but I do feel that people
have to realise for themselves that they
don't just have rights, but duties as
well."
She is the youngest daughter of a
Sicilian father and a North Italian
mother. She has never married and has
been living with her mother for many
years. In Feltre she does not feel cut off
from the world. But the town does
sometimes seem rather small when she
goes out shopping. That's something
she likes doing, for Anna Maria Vinci
loves expensive things. She has a great
passion for jewelry and beautiful
clothes. With a twinkle in her eyes she
admits it, looking at you as only a
woman can when she talks about such
exclusive articles. But often she can
gaze at you seriously through those
selfsame eyes, saddish-looking eyes
that seem to conceal a large share of
worldly wisdom.
Anna Maria Vinci, a Heineken management secretary.
The intention is that this column will
contain letters with questions from our
readers, followed by our replies.
You can write to us in your own
language. Our address is:
The Editor, Heineken
International Magazine,
P.O. Box28,
1000AA AMSTERDAM
(HOLLAND).
This being our first issue,
we've obviously not received any readers' letters yet! So we
decided to go out and ask various people if they had anything
they wanted to ask. They did. So here goes!
Q: What position does Heineken hold
in the world breweries league table?
Or: how many breweries are bigger
than Heineken?
A: We're high in the charts. If you
take beer production as the
yardstick, Heineken is the world's
fourth biggest brewery group - only
Anheuser and Miller (both
American) and the Japanese Kirin
group are bigger. When the figures
for 1984 are published, Heineken
will very probably have moved into
number three position in the world.
Q: Does Heineken brew other beers
for third parties who then sell these
under their own brand names?
A: No, we don't. Heineken solely
produces its own brands in its own
breweries.
Q: How long has beer been known as
a drink and what was the first evidence
of beer's existence?
A: Beer is one of the oldest
beverages in the world. We can't tell
you exactly when it was first drunk,
as those bygone beer drinkers
couldn't write. But the Sumerians
were one of the first civilisations to
mention beer in their writings on
clay or stone tablets. And they lived
about 6,000 years ago.
Q: Is it true that in historical times
brewers were put to death, for messing
about with the quality of their beer?
A: Yes. There may be some other
examples, but it's a historical fact
that the Babylonians, who lived a
few thousand years BC.did indeed
condemn brewers to death for
supplying bad beer.
Malt comes from a type of grain - in our case barley -
which is allowed to grow for about a week and is then
dried to prevent further germination.
Why? The inside of barley grains will not dissolve in water, but that is exactly what the brewer wants them to do. The
only way to make the flour - i.e. the kernel of the grain - soluble is to let the barley grain grow. The grain will then
produce roots and a shoot. These need food to grow, and this food is locked up in the flour inside each grain. The
growth process helps to release this food and thus makes it soluble in water.
How? The grains are first steeped in water. Then they are tipped into long, shallow tanks where a moist atmosphere
is maintainedThere they start to germinateAs soon as the plantlet shows on the tip of the grain, the growing process
has to be stopped. Otherwise, no food would be left over. This 'nipping in the bud', as it were, is done by blowing
hot air through the grains. In other words, a desert climate is created. After the rootlets have been cut off the grains,
the resultant product is malt.
Heineken has its own brewery in
Hamilton (Canada). Hamilton is
situated close to the border with the
United States. One of the latest brands
ofAmstel Brewery Canada is Grizzly,
which is also exported to the U.S.A.
It is a success. Expectations are that
one million cases of Grizzly will be
sold in 1984.
Marcel Eyck started working with
the brewery some 25 years ago.
He is a Dutchman, aged 53,
married with a grown-up son and
daughter. For the past twenty years he
has worked in one of the company's
Public Relations departments. Now he's
with the Concern Staff Department
Public Relations at Heineken N.V., i.e.
the parent company. In this post he's in
charge of general public relations
activities. These cover a wide range of
different responsibilities: compiling P.R.
programmes for the firms affiliated to
Heineken, providing those firms with
specialist advice, writing articles and
speeches, supervising the production of
films, slide presentations and photos,
issuing various publications, and looking
after the large collection of historical
items destined for a future Heineken
museumThere's more to it than thisbut
the above should give you the general
picture.
He's currently also the editor in charge of
the new magazine for Heineken
employees that you're now looking at.
It's a magazine about you and for you.
Which is why he'd be pleased to hear
from youAbout what sort of articles you
like reading and what you think of this
new magazine. You can phone Marcel
Eyck on 20/702268 in Amsterdam
(Holland) or write to him at the following
address:
Heineken N. V.
P.O. BOX 28,
1000 AA Amsterdam (Holland).
You can write to him or phone him in
your own language. Of course, you can
also get in touch with the magazine's
correspondent in your own company. A
list of correspondents can be found
elsewhere in this issue.