result of lengthy research Good flavour prime consideration in developing non-alcoholic beer "*"3553 32 Buckler Last year* a number* of countries in Europe got to know a new Heineken product. It's called Buckler and contains a negligible percentage of alcohol. The underlying aim in the development of Buckler was that the new product had tó possess all the charac teristics that the consumer expects of a beer - except, of course, for the alcohol. Heineken's brewers have succeeded in their mission: Buckler is a thirst-quenching beer with a superb taste, and a beer that can be drunk any time of the day. The prod uct - made hy a special brewing process - does contain a tiny quantity of alcohol. The idea of marketing a non-al coholic beer did not come out of the blue. At Heineken's head of fice the development of beers without alcohol had been closely monitored for some years before a working group was first set up in February 1987 to get down to work on developing our own beer with no alcohol - but with 100% flavour. Mr. A.J.M. Hakkaart is the man in Corporate Marketing who is responsi ble for product development and, as a member of the working group, he was closely involved in the birth of Buckler. Heineken Technical Services (HTB) were also represented in this working group. Heineken's Spanish operating company El Aguila was designated as 'lead country' for the development pro ject. El Aguila also had the biggest in terest in the development of the new product, as the non-alcohol beer market in Spain is already quite sizable. In that market segment El Aguila was selling the Aguila Sin brand, and with a fair amount of success. But the quality of Aguila Sin was not considered optimal. And that was why El Aguila was en thusiastic in helping to develop a non alcoholic beer, together with Heineken Technisch Beheer and Corporate Mar keting. 150 names Whilst HTB researched the techni cal aspects, other working group mem bers studied possible names and pack aging designs for the new product. It was deliberately decided not to intro duce the new product under the Amstel or Heineken banner. It's important that a non-alcoholic beer has an identity of its own. The British bureau Interbrand in London was commissioned to develop a new brand name which could be used internationally. Not an easy task, since some 40,000 beer names are currently registered throughout the world. From THE WORLD OF HEINEKEN

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World of Heineken | 1989 | | pagina 32