Warsteiner Brauerei Haus Cramer brewing group, which is mainly known for its flagship brand Warsteiner, will invest heavily in its Herford location. The total investment in the next two years amounts to about EUR 20 million.
According to Jens Hoffmann, new CTO of the group, EUR 15 million alone will flow into a new bottling plant, which will work more efficiently, more flexibly and with less energy. The new machines enable the filling of 0.2 liter to 0.5 liter cans as well as different product packaging configurations such as 4-packs or 6-packs.
Warsteiner is also building a mixing plant and a syrup room at the site of the Herforder Brewery. This enables the group to produce non-alcoholic beverages or mixed beer beverages on site.
Finally, Herford’s logistics will be integrated into the group's warehouse management system and the brewery's empty space will be expanded to accommodate the increased variety of containers.
“Of course we see that the market is very disruptive and that we have to try to open up to reduce our base costs a bit. And that's why we're also open to other products that we want to produce here, in the brewery. And it could be the case that a customer comes to us in the future and wants a lemonade bottled, and we'll comply with that,” Hoffmann told Radio Herford on Friday.
“In the spring of 2024, we will start construction”, said Herford site manager Frank Rottmann. “The Herford brewery will then have one of the most modern bottling lines in Germany”, he added.
The Herforder brewery from the Westphalian town of the same name is a regional brewery that was sold to Warsteiner by the Uekermann family in 2007. Warsteiner's ambitious plans for Herforder never came to fruition and there have been several plans to sell or close the brewery in recent years.
Christian Gieselmann, Spokesman of the Board of the Haus Cramer Group from 2019 until 2021, was born in Herford and was therefore emotionally close to the brewery. Because he wasn't ready to close the brewery, he launched an extensive marketing campaign for Herforder in 2020 and later renewed long-term sponsorship contracts with regional sports clubs. (inside.beer, 23.6.2021)
Before the pandemic, Herforder employed around 100 people and produced around 500,000 hl of beer, around half of which was for contract breweries.
