Heineken USA Establishes Five Points Trading Company To Import Global Beer Brands

Heineken USA will launch a new venture to incubate a range of global beer brands in the U.S..

The company announced that on January 1, 2017, it will begin operations of the new Five Points Trading Company, which will assume U.S. importer of record responsibility for a number of brands of beer from across the globe. These include Red Stripe, Tiger, Birra Moretti, Affligem (pictured atop), Murphy’s Stout, Prestige, Sagres and Mort Subite.

All these brands, which will be represented by Five Points, are established in the U.S market and currently imported and sold by other importing companies whose contracts are set to expire at the end of 2016.

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“With the development of Five Points Trading Company, Heineken USA is now able to bring these emerging premium brands back in-house, while taking them to new heights by utilizing the resources and expertise of the company’s established distribution network,” the company says in a press release.

five%20points%20logoFive Points Trading Company will be led by General Manager, Charles (Chas) Littlefield who, along with his team, will manage the new brands separately from Heineken USA’s current portfolio.

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“This portfolio of exceptional beers provides new opportunities to connect with millennial beer drinkers as they become more global and more adventurous with their taste,” Littlefield says in a press release. “We are excited for the transition and are already hard at work developing our 2017 go-to-market strategy.”

“Keeping the Five Point and Heineken USA portfolios separate will allow our current marketing and sales organization to maintain focus on our four core brands – Heineken, Dos Equis, Tecate and Strongbow – while enabling Five Points to direct its energy and resources to developing the potential of these new to the company acquisitions,” Littlefield adds.

The brands represented under the new Five Points Trading Company have diverse, historic backgrounds:

  • Red Stripe is a pale lager first brewed in Jamaica according to a recipe developed in 1938. Production of Red Stripe was moved from Jamaica to the U.S. and U.K. in 2012 but has now returned to Jamaica.
  • Tiger was introduced in 1932 as Singapore’s first locally brewed beer, Tiger quickly gained favor among Allied troops stationed in the Pacific during WWII.
  • Birra Moretti, an Italian beer, was first introduced for sale in 1860.
  • Affligem is a Belgian abbey beer, first brewed by monks in an abbey in Affligem, Belgium, in the 11th century as a means to raise money, avoid drinking contaminated water and provide nutrition. All Affligem beers undergo a double fermentation and production process. The second fermentation occurs in the bottle to impart more flavor as the beer rests for 14 days. While owned today by Heineken, the monks continue to oversee all aspects of brand production and packaging.
  • Murphy’s Stout is brewed in Cork, Ireland, and is an Irish stout introduced by the Murphy brothers in 1856. Every can of Murphy’s contains a widget containing nitrogen gas necessary to create the draught flow effect and distinctive head when opened.
  • Prestige was brewed in the first and only Haitian brewery, and is an American-style lager.
  • Sagres was introduced in 1934 at the Portuguese World Exhibition, and is a 100% natural lager style beer.
  • Mort Subite is a traditional Belgian lambic beer, matured in oak barrels in which fresh cherries are added.

Five Points Trading Company is named in reference to the five points of Heineken’s red star logo and also America’s first melting pot neighborhood in lower Manhattan, the company says.

 

1 COMMENT

  1. I came across Murphy’s Irish Stout while in the Washington DC area and now I’m hooked! Where can I find and purchase a case of the cans or bottles for me back here in Ohio?

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