Bring Me Your Empties!

 

by Pa Rock

Former Beer Recycler

Sometime last winter a party animal in Germany who has since chosen to remain anonymous placed an order with a North American brewer for 2,352 cans of Miller High Life Beer, a product which bills itself, on each individual container, as "The Champagne of Beers."  Unfortunately for the buyer, his order was seized at the Port of Antwerp by authorities from the European Union because of its use of the word "champagne" which is a protected designation in Europe that can refer only to the bubbly wine that is produced in the "Champagne" region of France.  The buyer, who did not get his beer back, apparently did not protest the decision and action of the section of the European government whose mission was to protect the champagne-drinking public from consuming a counterfeit substitute for the beverage.

The beer, which was seized in Belgium, was ultimately destined for Germany.  Somehow importing beer into the world's premier beer-producing country seems a bit like carrying coals to Newcastle - but to each his own.  (Miller Brewing Company was founded by Frederick Miller, a German immigrant to the United States, in the 1850s.)

Miller Brewing Company, which is now owned by Molson Coors Beverage Company, has been using the slogan "The Champagne of Beers" on its "Miller High Life" brand for 120 years.

I find it mildly disturbing that 196 twelve-packs (or 98 twenty-four-can cases) of perfectly good beer had to be destroyed to assuage the feelings of French grape-growers.  Surely there are hospitals which could have used that beer, or senior citizen gulags, or even orphanages!   Couldn't the scouts have gone door-to-door selling beer by the can in order to fund their upcoming summer campouts and jamborees?

Such a waste!

It was not exactly clear how the beer was destroyed, if indeed it was.  The Belgian Customs Authority said that the destruction of the cans was carried out with "the utmost respect for environmental concerns by ensuring that the entire batch, both contents and container, was recycled in an environmentally responsible manner."  

The cans were crushed and recycled, but just what is the "most environmentally responsible manner" for recycling beer?  Was there a party at the Port of Antwerp?  Enquiring minds want to know!