Yuengling Brewery
| Dick Yuengling Rewrites Family History |
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Monday, 27 June 2011 06:35 |
When Richard "Dick" Yuengling Jr. first took a job at his family's
brewery as a teenager, his grandfather's secretary discreetly gave him
this advice: "You ought to go out and do something else, because we're
barely making payroll."
That was more than 50 years ago, long
before he purchased America's oldest brewery from his father to become
the fifth-generation owner of D.G. Yuengling and Son.
After 26 years at the helm, Dick Yuengling is doing a lot better than making payroll.
Yuengling
is one of the fastest-growing and most coveted brands in the beer
industry. And in one generation, Dick Yuengling has rewritten the family
storyline from one of surviving to one of thriving.
Through four
generations, it hadn't changed much from its origins in 1829 when
founder David Yuengling, a German immigrant, made beer for thirsty coal
miners in Pottsville. When Dick Yuengling took over in 1985, the company
put out 137,000 barrels of beer each year from its historic Pottsville
brewery. The beer was sold mostly in Pennsylvania with a little
trickling in to neighboring states of New York, New Jersey and Delaware.
"That wasn't what I thought America's oldest brewery should be," said Yuengling, 68.
Today,
Yuengling sells more than 15 times that amount, or nearly 2.2 million
barrels annually. Even though it is only available in 13 states, its
sales rival what Samuel Adams-maker Boston Beer, a $500 million annual
business, does in 50 states. And Yuengling, which does not disclose
revenue figures, does it with 250 employees compared with Boston Beer's
780.
Yuengling beers are sold in bars, supermarkets and
convenience stores and through distributors from New York to Florida
along the Eastern Seaboard plus West Virginia, Tennessee and Alabama.
The company plans to enter Ohio later this year, and is fielding
interest from Louisiana and Texas. Beer drinkers in New England are
clamoring on the social networking site Facebook to bring Yuengling
farther north.
Yuengling sales now account for 1 percent of the
country's beer business, and its market-share is between 2 percent and 4
percent in states where it is sold. That's tiny compared with
mega-brands such as Budweiser and Miller. But Yuengling keeps growing
while larger beers' sales keep shrinking.
Dick Yuengling, who
walks through his breweries in dungarees, occasionally stopping to puff a
Marlboro, is quick to shift credit elsewhere, including the company's
first sales director, David Casinelli, whom Yuengling hired in 1990.
"It's
very rewarding to see what we've accomplished, but it's not all me,"
Yuengling said. "It's the people I work with ... I just spent the money
on breweries and expansion to meet the demand [Casinelli] created."
America's oldest brewery
The
family business began in 1829, when David Yuengling opened Eagle
Brewery in downtown Pottsville. It burned down two years later, and a
new one was built on Mahantongo Street, where Yuengling is still made
and where wooden beer barrels are on display as relics.
In 1873,
the brewery's name was changed to D.G. Yuengling and Son after David's
son Frederick became a partner. Yuengling (pronounced Ying-ling) means
"young man" in German. The tricky name -- some beer drinkers mistakenly
think it is Chinese -- would later present marketing problems for the
company.
The business survived 14 years of Prohibition by selling
the legal low-alcohol substitute "near beer" and making ice cream. When
Prohibition ended in 1933, Yuengling celebrated by brewing a batch of
"Winner Beer" and sending a truckload to PresidentFranklin D. Roosevelt.
Following
World War II into the 1980s, the beer industry drastically changed.
National brewers grew bigger, building modern facilities with greater
capacity and launching big-dollar advertising campaigns.
That pushed many smaller breweries the size of Yuengling to close or sell their operations.
Dick
Yuengling took over a business that was an endangered species. The
brewery had to grow to thwart the threat of being gobbled.
Old product, new life
Two
years into his run as owner, Dick Yuengling made a pivotal move by
reintroducing Yuengling Traditional Amber Lager, which had been out of
production for decades.
"It was a marketing ploy, that's all,"
Yuengling said. "Our name is hard to pronounce. People in Pennsylvania
know how to pronounce it. But bartenders in Maryland and Virginia, they
didn't know how to pronounce it. We said, 'Just call it lager,' and it
worked."
Lager became the engine that propelled the company's
rapid growth and now accounts for 75 percent of all Yuengling sales.
Whether you're bellied up to the bar at a biker joint or dining at a
white tablecloth restaurant, bartenders and servers throughout
Pennsylvania know that a customer ordering a lager wants a frothy glass
of amber-hued Yuengling.
It turned out to be the right product at
the right time. Initially, it offered robust flavor compared with
Budweiser, Miller and other brands in its price range right as the craft
beer movement started to gain traction. The cachet of being from
America's oldest brewery, which resonates with customers upset that
Anheuser Busch is now owned by a company in Belgium, has helped boost
its sales more recently. And Yuengling has always been modestly priced,
which enabled growth through the Great Recession. In the Lehigh Valley,
you can buy a case of Yuengling lager for about $15 and a 12-pack for
about $10.
"Consumers perceive a difference between Yuengling and
the mainstream brands they compete against," said Eric Shepard, editor
of Beer Marketer's Insights in Suffern, N.Y. "They have been able to
exploit a touch of craft, a touch of the little guy, a touch of flavor.
You put all that together and a reasonable price, and the consumers have
responded. It hasn't been any one thing."
The biggest challenge has been keeping pace with demand.
Growing for the next generation
In
1992, Yuengling expanded its downtown Pottsville brewery, and the
company sold all of the additional beer by the time the project was
finished. Yuengling knew he had to expand elsewhere, but was reluctant
to spend the money unless someone would continue the family legacy.
Yuengling's
oldest daughter, Jennifer Yuengling, recalled a conversation with her
father in 1995 when she was finishing her master's degree in psychology
at Lehigh University. Her father wanted her to join the business. At the
time she was thinking of pursuing a career in sports psychology, but
she agreed.
"This is our family history and there's no other
family in the world that can claim what we have," said Jennifer
Yuengling, 40, who manages the company's plants.
Her sister,
Wendy Yuengling Baker, 35, also works for the company in administration.
She credits her father with instilling a strong work ethic in his
family.
"He works a lot and he's hands-on," Wendy Yuengling Baker
said. "He cares about the employees and people in town, and that always
goes into the decisions he makes."
In the mid-1990s, demand for Yuengling exceeded capacity and the company had to pull back from some markets.
With
the next generation on board, Dick Yuengling invested heavily in
expansion. In 1998, he announced plans to build a modern brewery in an
industrial park on Mill Creek Road, in a village just outside of
Pottsville. A year later, he purchased a brewery in Tampa, Fla., from
Stroh's. Production at the Mill Creek brewery began in 2001. And another
expansion is being finished at the brewery that will bring its annual
capacity up to 1.5 million barrels.
Beer making past and present
Touring
the two Pottsville-area breweries underscores the vast changes in the
industry. The historic plant is built into a hillside in downtown
Pottsville, wedged between homes and businesses. Different shades of
brick reveal where the plant has expanded through the years. Stairways
and halls cut through the disjointed brewery. A machine shop is loaded
with tools needed to keep the old equipment running. On the lower
levels, tunnels carved deep into underlying bedrock were once used to
store beer before it was shipped.
It's a charming place to visit,
like a museum of industrial history. More than 30,000 people from
around the world come to see Yuengling's historic plant every year,
making it one of Schuylkill County's top tourist destinations. But it's
hardly a model of efficiency. Narrow streets, hillsides and the multiple
levels in the plant present production and shipping challenges. Output
is constrained to about 200,000 barrels of beer each year.
The
Mill Creek brewery stands in sharp contrast. Built on 16 flat acres in
an industrial park off state Route 61, the highly automated plant is a
snapshot of efficiency. Empty kegs run along a series of conveyors to be
steam-cleaned and filled by machines. Robotic arms stack the heavy
barrels on pallets for shipment. Green glass bottles meander along a
similar path to be filled, labeled, capped and packaged. Beeping
forklifts scurry the sprawling floor. Outside, rail cars deliver corn
and barley from the Midwest and Canada that form the mash used to make
beer.
Dick Yuengling beams with pride walking through both
plants. At Mill Creek, his eye for production is on full display. In an
endless stream of bottles moving along a production line, he snags one
with excessive head off the conveyor and sets it aside.
In
downtown Pottsville, his customer service skills shine through. He takes
a camera from a young couple touring the brewery and offers to take
their picture together. "You better give me that camera so you both can
be in the picture," he said. When he spots a crowd sitting on a bench
outside the gift shop, he makes sure a tour guide shows them around even
though the last one scheduled for the day had already started.
Yuengling's
growth strategy has been slow and steady. The company works to build
the brand in each new state and then add an adjacent one. A critical
factor is finding a good network of wholesalers in each new market to
help build the brand.
Breweries have to form partnerships with
wholesalers who bring their beer to retailers. Those wholesalers are
also peddling larger, competing brands, so establishing sales goals and
growth targets up-front is important. Yuengling wants to know its new
wholesalers will do more than just put its products on shelves. The
company wants partners who will help establish the brand in new markets
and nurture its growth, Dick Yuengling said. Once licensing agreements
are signed with new wholesalers, getting out of them is difficult if
sales don't meet expectations, Yuengling said. So the company is
deliberately cautious.
That measured growth hit a snag last year.
Yuengling was poised to buy a brewery in Memphis, Tenn., that would
have more than doubled Yuengling's capacity and provided a platform for
growth into the Midwest and Texas. But the brewery required extensive
repairs from tornado damage and Yuengling backed away from the move,
fearing the company was taking on more than it needed.
"Common
sense told me this isn't a good idea," Yuengling said. "I want to get to
a point where we have to do it. There's nothing worse than having a 1
million-barrel plant and selling only 100,000 barrels out of it."
For
now, Yuengling is biding his time. He has not expressed interest in any
other breweries for sale, and building from scratch is expensive. So
the company has to keep a careful watch on the inventory of its
customers so it knows whether to put beer in kegs, cans or bottles,
especially in the busy summer season. Sales to shore towns in New
Jersey, Delaware, Maryland and North Carolina are up significantly, and
last year Yuengling was running out of beer.
"The only risk that
he takes is does Yuengling stay hot or does interest fall off?" said
Shepard, of Beer Marketer's Insights. "Does he lose an opportunity?
Everyone is hot to get Yuengling right now if he really wanted to
aggressively expand. The only risk he takes is will that interest fade
...? They're looking awfully smart right now in how they've grown slowly
and deliberately, and there doesn't seem to be any reason to change."
In Pottsville and beyond
In
economically depressed Schuylkill County, where the unemployment rate
is stubbornly high at 8.8 percent, Yuengling is a destination company.
Production employees earn more than $20 an hour plus regular overtime,
far more than the state average of $14 an hour for production workers.
Plus, Yuengling employees don't pay for their medical benefits, a rare
private-sector perk.
And while most companies have been trimming
payrolls or putting off hiring since the Great Recession hit, Yuengling
has been hiring to accommodate growth. It recently hired about six new
workers related to its brewery expansion, Yuengling said.
Forklift
operator Jim Cavaluchi of Port Carbon, who has worked at Yuengling for
13 years, said he is proud to play a role in the company's growth.
"This
is one of the best places in the county to work," Cavaluchi said. "If
you give Dick Yuengling 110 percent, he's more than glad to help you
out."
The downtown brewery is an international tourist
destination. Maps outside the brewery's gift shop are pricked with
colored tacks showing where visitors come from. They are most heavily
clustered in the mid-Atlantic region. But the tacks have spread as far
as China and Africa.
Jeremy Whitehead, who lives near Atlanta,
toured the brewery recently with a group of motorcyclists, the Georgia
Rollers Riding Club. He's been drinking Yuengling for the past few years
and wanted to see where it is made.
"They're really becoming popular down in Georgia," he said. "All the grocery stores have it."
Pottsville
businesses enjoy spinoff from all of those tourists. Yuengling flags
are emblazoned in nearly every bar, restaurant and pizza place in town.
Nearby Maroons Sports Bar offers $1 Yuengling drafts on Saturdays, the
brewery's busiest tour day.
"Everyone grew up on Yuengling and we
grew up smelling it brewing," said Kathy Holley, a waitress at Maroons.
"It's good to have here. They employ a lot of people."
Outside Pottsville, the historic brewery has become a point of reference.
"Whenever
we're at a conference out of town, we say 'We're from Pottsville ... ya
know, where Yuengling is made,'" said Frank Zukas, president of the
Schuylkill Economic Development Corp. "It always rings a bell with
people."
'We've survived'
Dick Yuengling shows no signs of
tiring. He jokes that his family is trying to push him into retirement,
but he has no plans for that.
"He's devoted his life to this
brewery," Jennifer Yuengling said. "He doesn't have any hobbies. He
doesn't really do anything else. He loves this brewery."
Standing
behind the bar in the downtown brewery's 75-year-old Rathskeller, or
hospitality room, Dick Yuengling basks in history. He points to photos
on the wall of Yuengling employees who were honored with parties in the
room before leaving to fight in World War II. He brags about the
hard-working, resourceful workers who helped keep the old brewery alive
and how it's tough to find that kind of versatility in today's
workforce.
"We didn't buy conveyor belts," he said. "We built them."
And
he laments about the decline of American manufacturing, which once
offered so much opportunity. Making something is what makes Dick
Yuengling happy, and not giving up is what makes him proud.
"It's
rewarding to see people come in and take the tour, and they're happy to
see we've survived," Yuengling said. "All you see are advertisements
for Bud or Miller or Coors. It used to be that all the little towns had
breweries, and now they're gone. People appreciate having an option when
buying beer."
Copyright (c) 2011, The Morning Call, Allentown, Pa. |
Brewery Tour
Yuengling Brewery Website
D. G. Yuengling & Son
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D.G. Yuengling & Son
 |
| Type |
Private |
| Industry |
Alcoholic beverage |
| Founded |
1829 |
| Headquarters |
Pottsville, Pennsylvania, USA |
| Products |
Beer |
| Production output |
3.6 million barrels 600,000- Pottsville, PA 1,500,000- Port Carbon, PA
1,500,000- Tampa, Florida (2010) |
| Owner(s) |
Richard L. Yuengling, Jr. |
| Website |
http://www.yuengling.com |
D.G. Yuengling & Son is the oldest operating brewing company in the United States, having been
established in 1829, and is one of the largest breweries by volume in the country. It is the second
largest American owned brewery after the Boston Beer Company.[1] Its headquarters is in Pottsville,
Pennsylvania.[2]
Yuengling produces 3.6 million barrels annually, which as of 2005, placed it sixth among American
commercial breweries. Besides its two Pennsylvania facilities, Yuengling also operates a brewery in
Tampa, Florida.
Yuengling is pronounced /ˈjɪŋlɪŋ/ (
listen) YING-ling., an Anglicized version of the German term for
"young man". The family-owned brewery has traditionally changed ownership through the purchase
of the company by the offspring of the previous owner.[3] Due to the popularity of Yuengling Traditional
Lager in Pennsylvania, it can be ordered by simply asking for a lager, especially in eastern parts of the state.[4]
History
A portion of the Yuengling Brewery at dusk 
Historical plaque on the outside of the brewery
The German brewer David Gottlob Jüngling immigrated to the United States in 1823 from Aldingen,
a suburb of Stuttgart, in the Kingdom of Württemberg. He anglicized his surname from Jüngling to
Yuengling and began the "Eagle Brewery" on Center Street in Pottsville in 1829. His eldest son,
David, Jr., left the Eagle Brewery to establish the James River Steam Brewery along the James River
in Richmond, Virginia.[5] The first brewery burned down in an 1831 fire and the company relocated to
W. Mahantongo Street at 5th Street, its current location.[6] The Eagle Brewery changed its name to
"D.G. Yuengling and Son" in 1873 after Frederick Yuengling joined his father David in running the
company. Although the company's name changed, the bald eagle remained the company's emblem.
During the late 19th century, breweries were also opened in Saratoga, New York City, and
Trail, British Columbia, although they were eventually merged with the Pottsville plant.[5]
Frank Yuengling began heading the company in 1899 after his father Frederick died.[3] During
the Prohibition era, Yuengling survived by producing "near beers" (0.5% alcohol) called "Yuengling
Special", "Yuengling Por-Tor", and "Yuengling Juvo".[5] The company also ran a dairy which
produced ice cream and opened dance halls in Philadelphia and New York City.[3] After the
18th Amendment was repealed in 1933, Yuengling sent a truckload of "Winner Beer" to
President Franklin D. Roosevelt in appreciation, which arrived the day the amendment was
repealed-particularly notable since Yuengling beer takes almost three weeks to brew and age.[7]
Richard L. Yuengling and F. Dohrman Yuengling succeeded Frank Yuengling after their father's
death in 1963.[8]
Yuengling suffered from the rise of large commercial breweries during the 1970s. It was able to
survive owing to demand from its customer base in Schuylkill County. The company also experienced
an increase of sales after a renewed interest in history owing to the United States Bicentennial
in 1976.[3] Yuengling bought the rights to use the Mount Carbon (Bavarian Premium Beer) name
and label when Mount Carbon Brewery went out of business in 1977. Yuengling initially brewed beer
at Mount Carbon but eventually abandoned it. The dairy remained in business until 1981, but its
vacant building sits across Mahantongo Street from Yuengling's 1831 brewery and still carries
Yuengling signage to this day.
In 1985, the Yuengling brewery was listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the oldest
brewery in the United States.[9] It was also so listed in the Pennsylvania Inventory of Historic Places
at some unspecified date. (The company's website mentions only a vague national and state
registration in 1976).[8] Yuengling has been a registered trademark since 1995.[10] The Pottsville
brewery was featured on an episode of The History Channel's American Eats.
Richard L. ("Dick") Yuengling, Jr. took over as the 5th-generation company president in 1985.
In 1987 the brewery reintroduced a lager they had not made in decades to take advantage of a
spike in heavier-style beers. Since this time, Yuengling Lager has become its flagship brand,
accounting for 80% of production and much of its rapid growth. In the early 1990s, demand
throughout Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware outstripped the existing brewery's abilities.
In 1999, they increased their manufacturing capacity by purchasing a Stroh's plant in Tampa, Florida,
hiring the former Stroh employees, and began working with a trade union for the first time.[3] In
2000, the company built a third brewery in Pennsylvania, in Port Carbon in Schuylkill County near
Pottsville. With production at the Port Carbon, Tampa, and original Pottsville plants, the company
has been able to expand throughout the East Coast.
After management threatened to shut down the factory and close shop if workers kept union
representation, Yuengling employees filed for union decertification in 2006. As a result, Yuengling
did not renew a contract with Teamsters Local 830 of Philadelphia in March 2006.[11] In response,
the trade union began boycotting Yuengling products.[12]
As of 2009, Yuengling is a moderately priced beer popular northward through New York, westward
until Ohio, and southward through South Carolina. The Tampa brewery supplies the Florida Gulf Coast,
the Florida Keys, Central Florida, North Florida, the Florida Panhandle as well as Alabama and
Tennessee.[13] The brewery uses corn from Minnesota and hops from Washington as ingredients
in its products.
Yuengling finally began distribution in the state of Georgia on October 27, 2008, and in May 2009
began distribution in West Virginia.
Richard Yuengling only has daughters, so the family name itself will discontinue with him. However,
his daughters are being groomed to continue the Yuengling tradition as the 6th generation of the
brewing family. According to a guide of the free tour that the brewery offers at their flagship location,
each succeeding owner has bought the company from his father at full market price, and that tradition
will carry on with the 6th generation.
President Barack Obama has stated that Yuengling is his favorite beer.[citation needed]
On Friday March 19, 2010, President Obama sent a case of Yuengling to Canadian Prime Minister
Stephen Harper along with a case of Molson Canadian to cover a friendly wager on the outcome
of the 2010 Winter Olympics hockey final.[14] The beer was delivered by US Ambassador to Canada
David Jacobson.
Products
Finished bottles being cased at a brewery
- This is the company's flagship beer, and what is received if a "lager" is ordered throughout
- many parts of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware.[4] It is usually sold in green bottles
- prominently featuring the word "LAGER" on the label but, is also available in cans, and
- brown quart bottles as well as 22 ounce bottles(colloquially known as "bombers") now
- discontinued and replaced with 24 oz cans. Yuengling Lager is 4.4 percent ABV.
- This is a lower-calorie version of the Traditional Lager.
- This is a standard American pilsener.
- Yuengling Premium Light Beer
- This is a lower-calorie version of the Premium Beer.
- This black and tan is a mixture of Yuengling Premium Beer (40%) and Dark-Brewed
- Porter (60%). It was introduced in 1986.[15]
- This porter has a very dark cola color, appearing almost black in the glass with a pale
- tan head, and has a strong malt flavor. Rather than using the traditional top-fermenting ale
- yeasts used in most porters, Yuengling's porter is bottom-fermented; few mainstream
- breweries produce this style. Originally known as "Pottsville Porter," this beer is notable
- for being one of the few porters commercially available from the late 1960s to the early 1980s.[16]
- Named for Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield, this is Yuengling's hoppiest beer and
- only true ale. Like the Traditional Lager, it is usually sold in green bottles (but also in cans)
- and has an element of corn in its profile. It is very carbonated and tends to sprout a large
- but short-lived head when poured. As of 2007, Lord Chesterfield is no longer sold in kegs.
- However, quarter kegs were put back on the market in October 2008.[13]
- Introduced in February, 2009, this is a return of a discontinued beer last brewed in 1970s.
- According to company sources, it will be sold as a draught-only, spring seasonal beer.[17]
- Due to its popularity Yuengling Bock beer was made available for kegs and cases in January 2010.[18]
- Will be produced for the 2011 Octoberfest season.[19]
- Old German (no longer produced)
- This was Yuengling's discount brand. Sold in stylistically unique, short brown bottles that
- resembled barrels, Old German was a flavorful, slightly sweet lager. Its inexpensive retail
- price ($1.15 for a six-pack in 1986, equal to $2.3 today) made it a favorite of college
- students and others of lesser means. Old German was discontinued in 1994.
Note that "Old German" is a popular name for beer brands and even some breweries. The "Old
German" brand which Yuengling produced was purchased from Mount Carbon Brewery after it ceased
production at its own facilities.[20][21]
- Half & Half (no longer produced)
- Originated from Reading's Northeast Taproom where they mixed a 50/50 blend of Dark-Brewed
- Porter and Lord Chesterfield Ale. The local bar then requested that Yuengling sold the draft
- pre-mixed and the official "Half & Half" was born. It was replaced by Original Black & Tan in
- 1986 and was discontinued.
Yuengling Brewery
310 Mill Creek Ave.
Pottsville, PA 17901
Phone 570-622-4441
Dick Yuengling Jr. President
Sales Questions e-Mail; smandel@yuengling.com
