Brau Union Austria, since 2003 a subsidiary of Heineken, has completely divest its remaining stake in Gasteiner Mineralwasser, one of the leading producer of mineral water in Austria as of Jnaury 1st, 2019. The beer market leader in Austria said it wanted to concentrate in the future on its core business beer.
Buyer is the family-owned company S. Spitz, which already bought 51 percent of Gasteiner in 2007. Spitz, based in Attnang-Puchheim, about 80 km north-east of Salzburg, Austria, is one of the largest Austrian food manufacturers. In 2017, the company employed nearly 700 people and achieved sales of more than € 251 million with about 1100 products.
One of the products of S. Spitz is energy drink Power Horse, which was launched in 1994 to stand up against Red Bull, market leader in the energy drink sector and also produced by an Austrian company. Power Horse is market leader in parts of Africa and in several Arabian countries, where the company took advantage of the fact, that Red Bull in the beginning put all of its efforts in the development of the American market.
"As a family business, we are pleased to take the next step and take over the remaining shares in Gasteiner Mineralwasser. We would like to thank Brau Union Österreich for the great partnership we have enjoyed over the past years, and we will continue to do so in the future, " says Walter Scherb jun. who took over the helm of the company as decendant of the owner family in the third generation as of January 1st, 2019.
Despite the divesture, Brau Union Austria wants to continue its cooperation with Gasteiner and Spitz in the future. "We continue to rely on the crystal clear mineral water from the mountains of the Hohe Tauern. This step had been planned for a long time. We look forward to a very good partnership in the future as well," says Dr Ing Andreas Hunger, Managing Director HoReCa at Brau Union Austria.
