Gambero Rosso – July-August 2019

STORIES

ments, and with different logics - continues

Leondini - our product portfolio stands as a

viable alternative for the consumer both with

regard to large industry and craft breweries».

While Manetti reinforces the concept: «In

Italy, the general public seems inclined to di-

vide the market in a Manichaean way by put-

ting artisan realities on one side and indus-

trial ones on the other. Unfortunately there

is no knowledge, perhaps it would be better to

say awareness, of a third way represented by

realities like ours with the features we men-

tioned earlier. There is a category of brewer-

ies that cannot be defined as artisanal, but at

the same time they do not have such volumes

that they are among the industrial ones, re-

alities like ours, independent and devoted to

the continuous search for improvement».

«I am sure that independence is an incred-

ible plus - concludes Fuchs von Mannstein

• because today in the food industry there is
  a growing sensitivity, there is attention to
  detail, to the history of the product, to its

origin, to the quality and to the authenticity

as well as its sustainability: and realities like

ours can offer all this».

PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE

OF ITALIAN ARTISAN BEER

If we take the aforementioned date of

1996, to sanction the birth of the Italian

craft movement, we realize that just over

twenty years have passed since the first

craft beers in Italy. Some of these are pro-

duced, even today, by companies that give

a strong boost to the sector. However, in

the 2000s many companies flourished in

our country, through brewers driven by

great passion and the desire to establish

themselves on the market. All aim at a

very high quality, one of the fundamen-

tal points to be able to find one’s own

space, but the results do not always ar-

rive: making beer is difficult, making it in

the traditional way is even more so and,

removed some model companies, not al-

1829 – in Brescia Franz

Xavier Wührer establishes

the first brewery in Italy

1846 – in Vigevano

(PV) Birra Peroni is born,

while in Biella Birrificio

Menabrea is born

1877 – in Induno Olona

(VA) Birrificio Angelo Poretti

is born

1912 – Birra Ichnusa

is born in Cagliari

1974 – Dreher is the first Italian

brewery to be acquired by a

multinational, Heineken

1988 – the Peroni

Group acquires Wührer

1859 – in Udine

Birra Moretti is born^1991 – Forst

acquires Menabrea

1897 – in Padavena (BL)

Birrificio Padavena is born

1857 – in Lagundo

(BZ) Birra Forst is born

1870 –Dreher brewery

opens in Trieste

1986 – Ichnusa

joins the Heineken

group

1995 – in Mentana (RM) one

of Italy’s first craft breweries is

born, Birrificio Turbacci

1830 1850 1870 1890 1910 1970 1980 1990

FROM PERONCINO TO MULTINATIONALS