Bralirwa in Rwanda
wins Primus Gold
A. Pat develops strong ale for Italian market
Campaign
At the Dreher brewery in Pedavena they are proud of their
new beer Golden Fire, which is marketed under the McFar
land label. This strong ale (alcohol percentage at least 6.5%)
was devised and developed by A. Pat, head of Dreher's cen
tral technology department, in co-operation with many of his
colleagues in Pedavena. And they are quite right to be proud.
Pat and his colleagues have brewed a beer that is simply
magnificent.
Yeast bank
Mini-brewery
At the end of February the
Primus Awards were pre
sented for the third time.
These prizes were in
troduced by Heineken to rec
ognise the achievements of
African breweries producing
a consistently high quality of
Primus, the local beer brand
in Zaïre, Burundi, Rwanda
and Congo Brazzaville. The
gold Primus Award went to
Bralirwa, the brewery in
Gisenyi, Rwanda. Mr. Siert-
sema, Ibecor general man
ager, presented the award to
Mr. M. Boreel, general man
ager of Bralirwa.
HEINEKEN INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE NO. 19
PAGE 6
Brewers enthusiastic about
been made Mr. Pat and his col
leagues sat down to sample a glass
of the new beer. After only a
couple of swallows they knew: a
special beer had been born! The
only thing not quite perfect was
the bitterness, which was slightly
too low. That problem was soon
solved by adding some more hops.
At a later stage independent taste
tests proved that the brewers were
right: Golden Fire scored higher
marks than its direct rival.
Golden Fire
paign. Product manager Jambelli
explains: "We've devised an adver
tising campaign in which the em
phasis is on both McFarland Red
Beer and Golden Fire. You should
look on Red Beer as the 'father'
and Golden Fire as the son. That's
why we want to give prominence
to both beers together. For televi
sion two 30-second commercials
have been produced and Red Beer
and Golden Fire adverts will be
published in the trade magazines."
In addition, promotional articles,
such as ashtrays, shirts, glasses
and mirrors, have been developed
for the new product.
We shouldn't see Golden Fire as
an enormous volume seller. It's
not that type of product, says Jam
belli. "Golden Fire fits into a
small, speciality segment of the
beer market. That segment is in
deed growing each year, but Gold
en Fire will certainly not become a
high volume seller like Dreher or
Heineken. We want to keep the
product small."
Golden Fire on draught and in
bottles (two-packs) will be obtain
able exclusively in the trendy, up
market catering establishment and
will definitely not be sold via
supermarkets. Sales via the home
consumption outlet do not fit in
with the product philosophy of this
beer, believe the Dreher marketing
experts.
had (and still have) to be taken to
ensure that the yeast used for Gold
en Fire can never come into con
tact with, say, the Heineken 'A'
yeast. This would inevitably lead
to contamination of the 'A' yeast
and cause all sorts of problems.
The first brew was then ready
for fermentation in the open vats.
About a month after the brew had
Golden Fire is the brainchild of brewer A. Pat, seen here with an outer
carton of the new beer.
By the time this magazine is pub
lished the first brews of Golden
Fire will have been bottled and
Dreher's marketing people will be
in the midst of the launch cam-
For Mr. Pat it all started in Au
gust last year when he was given
the assignment of developing a
new beer which would have to
compete with an increasingly big
ger rival brand in the (growing) ale
segment. For every true brewer
such an assignment is an enor
mous challenge. In fact, during a
lifetime of brewing you often only
get one chance to develop a new
beer.
Mr. Pat started his work by
studying the competing brand. He
bought several bottles in a bar and
began to analyse the beer's charac
teristics. The product was investi
gated both microbiologically and
as to its taste and colour. Then Mr.
Pat picked up pen and paper and
within half an hour he'd written
down the entire brewing process
for the new beer straight from the
top of his head. Ultimately, 95%
of his ideas were also actually
used in the definitive brewing pro
cess!
After analysing the rival brew
and noting down his ideas, Mr. Pat
set out to find of the best raw mate
rials. Finding the right types of
barley and hops was no problem.
The difficult job would be getting
hold of the right kind of yeast. He
set off for Copenhagen, the city
where the Jörgensen Laboratory is
based. This laboratory has the
world's biggest yeast bank and
specialises in brewer's yeasts. Mr.
Pat spoke to the director and
explained the list of conditions
which the yeast would have to
meet.
The laboratory happened to
have a yeast cell 'in stock' which
met Mr. Pat's wishes entirely. Over
the next six weeks the Danish ex
perts cultivated the yeast cell until
they had a quantity big enough for
a trial brew. Mr. Pat had the 53
grams of yeast sent to the brewery
in Aosta. That brewery in fact has
apparatus for the multiplication of
yeast.
During the weeks needed to
multiply the yeast Mr. Pat ordered
the other required raw materials.
In mid-October the first trial brew
was made. In an old, unused part
of the brewery a mini-brewery was
set up. The aim of this was
twofold: the production of the new
beer was not allowed to get in the
way of Dreher and Heineken pro
duction and, secondly, precautions
Fermentation takes place partly in open vats. In the foreground, two vats
in which the beer is still fermenting. The vats at the back are empty and
are being carefully cleaned.
This year's silver and bronze
Primus Awards were won by two
Bralima units, in Bukavu and
Kisangani, Zaïre. The award cere
mony took place in Nairobi,
Kenya, where the general man
agers of almost all our African af
filiate companies and the manage
ments of the breweries with which
Heineken has cooperation agree
ments were meeting for the Heine
ken Mission Scope Conference.
This was the third successive
year in which the Primus Awards
were presented. Mr. Siertsema
explained the award's underlying
aim: "It helps to boost the commit
ment of brewery personnel to
maintaining the Primus quality. In
recent years many investments
have been made in the various
breweries, and this has brought a
strong improvement in the quality
of Primus. The Primus Award pro
vides proof of this and also encour
ages the personnel to be really
quality conscious."
From left to right: Messrs. Kruidenier (Bralima, Zaïre), Coebergh
Board of Directors Heineken N.V.), Siertsema (Ibecor, Brussels) and
Den Hond (Heineken, Amsterdam)
