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.

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Heineken International Magazine | 1984 | | pagina 2