THE fun officially begins this summer as Heineken finally arrives in the Queen City of the South, giving Cebu a taste of one of the world’s international premier beers. The official launching of the brand was held at Morals and Malice last April 6, championing the theme of #OpenCebu, a spin-off from Heineken’s famous tagline “Open Your World.” The theme sends the message of opening Cebu to the whole world and opening the world to Cebu.
“We launched Heineken in the Philippines a few years ago. But we are now here in Cebu. Heineken is a joint venture with Asia Brewery and Heineken International. The decision to come to the Philippines was because we wanted to bring the marketing and the brewing expertise of the Heineken company together with Asia brewery,” said Chris Aguilar, group marketing brand manager of Heineken Philippines.
Heineken is currently available in over 192 countries. Before officially launching in Cebu, one Heineken beer cost over P100. Now it is available for a much more affordable price.
“Heineken will always be a premium beer, but we know that we need to make the brand relevant in every market that we are in. We want the brand to be affordable. If you go down to the supermarket, you will now be able to buy Heineken at around P49 to P52. We believe that Filipinos deserve fantastic high-quality beer at a price that is affordable, and that is why we are launching it here at an affordable price. And we plan to brew Heineken locally, so we have that same great quality that is everywhere in the world,” said Aguilar.
To sustain its affordability, Heineken is looking forward to brewing Heineken beers locally, going as far as upgrading the current facility of Asia Brewery.
The upgrading process began last year and Heineken will be launching a locally brewed Heineken beer in the second quarter of this year. Having partnered with Asia Brewery, the first brewing facility for Heineken is in Cabuyao, Laguna.
Together with the launching of Heineken is also the arrival of a new brew by Tiger Beer. Having been tagged as Asia’s premier beer brand, Tiger Beer reaches out to the Philippines and launched its new brew that has been made to fit the palate of Filipinos which is Tiger Black, a strong beer with 6.9 percent alcohol content.
“Tiger is Asia’s number one brand. It is the fastest-growing Asian brand in the world. For Filipinos, we know that they like strong beers. So, we launched Tiger Black, which is a special brew made especially for Filipinos. For the brew, we worked together with our master brewer and interviewed a lot of Filipinos. We took all that research and we made fantastic beer which is perfect for Filipinos,” said Aguilar.
The party featured Manila’s DJ Euric, along with Cebu DJs and electro-pop acts Carlisle and Friends, Fonzy, DJ Gino and Cathy Muto.