Steinlager tops poll

Press, 11 June 1977, Page 4

Steinlager tops poll

NZPA Washington Mark one up for Kiwi beer. In a blind tasting session in Washington, 320 members of the Friends of Wine Society chose New Zealand Steinlager as the top beer against a stack of leading European and other imports. Steinlager got twice as many first-preference votes as the runner-up, Dutchbrewed Heineken, the most popular foreign beer on sale in the United States. In 1975 Americans drank 132 M litres of the Dutch beer. In the beer-tasting ses-

sion, in which the drinkers were faced with unlabelled beer samples, the New Zealand brew faced competition from 16 other beers from the Netherlands, Canada, England, Denmark, Mexico, the Philippines, Japan, Poland, and Switzerland. Mr Don Walker, New Zealand’s senior trade commissioner in North America, was smiling yesterday — for he was responsible for getting Steinlager on the programme. When Mr Walker, a member of the society, got his invitation to the session there was no mention of New Zealand beer, and he wanted to know why.

The society agreed to put the New Zealand beer in as a contender, and Mr Walker was able to round up a few cases of Steinlager at the last moment. The beer, brewed by New Zealand Breweries, Ltd, is newly on the United States market and so far sells only on the west coast and in Nevada and Florida. “Encouraging,” Mr Walker said. “Pretty good against all those other brands.” Friends of Wine, as its name implies, has more interest in wine than beer but stages an annual beer binge.