Piels Beer
Encyclopedia
Origins
Piels was founded in 1883 by the Piel brothers: Gottfried, Michael and Wilhelm Piel.Michael (born in Stoffeln, Düsseldorf am Rhein
Bilk
Bilk can refer to:* Bilk, a milk beer made by the Abashiri brewery* Düsseldorf-Bilk, a part of DüsseldorfAs a surname:* Acker Bilk, a famous clarinetist...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, 29 March 1849; died at Lake Parlin, Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...
, 12 June 1915) was the brewer
Brewer
Brewer may refer to:*Brewer, someone who makes beer by brewing*Brewer , a disambiguation page that lists people with the surname Brewer*Brewer, Maine, a city in southern Penobscot County, Maine, United States, near the city of Bangor...
. He was the son of Heinrich Hubert and Gertrud (Gispé) Piel, and descended from an old Rhenish stock of farmers. To the original and extensive Stoffeln Farm, his father and uncles had added large tillages in Mörsenbroich-Düsseldorf
Düsseldorf-Mörsenbroich
Mörsenbroich is an urban borough of Düsseldorf. It borders on Unterrath, Rath, Derendorf, Grafenberg and Düsselthal.Mörsenbroich has about 14,000 inhabitants....
.
Michael saw military service in the Franco-Prussian War
Franco-Prussian War
The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War, often referred to in France as the 1870 War was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia. Prussia was aided by the North German Confederation, of which it was a member, and the South German states of Baden, Württemberg and...
of 1870-71. The impressions on the country boy of his years of service at Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, which had already begun to modernize its industries, lingered and served constantly to stimulate his natural gifts of invention. For several years after the war, Michael worked at Mörsenbroich with his elder brother.
Gradually, Michael moved away from the family calling of farming. In the breeding of rose
Rose
A rose is a woody perennial of the genus Rosa, within the family Rosaceae. There are over 100 species. They form a group of erect shrubs, and climbing or trailing plants, with stems that are often armed with sharp prickles. Flowers are large and showy, in colours ranging from white through yellows...
s, and in the development of a new and highly productive breed of bee
Bee
Bees are flying insects closely related to wasps and ants, and are known for their role in pollination and for producing honey and beeswax. Bees are a monophyletic lineage within the superfamily Apoidea, presently classified by the unranked taxon name Anthophila...
s, for both of which, after but two years of experimentation, he was voted the government's highest awards, he found the encouragement he needed for the growing determination to carve out his own future. It was, however, his invention of a centrifuge
Centrifuge
A centrifuge is a piece of equipment, generally driven by an electric motor , that puts an object in rotation around a fixed axis, applying a force perpendicular to the axis...
for the extraction of honey
Honey
Honey is a sweet food made by bees using nectar from flowers. The variety produced by honey bees is the one most commonly referred to and is the type of honey collected by beekeepers and consumed by humans...
, awarded special governmental recognition and immediately adopted into general use, that decided him. As the protégé of a machine manufacturer, he visited the industrial centers of the progressive Rhineland
Rhineland
Historically, the Rhinelands refers to a loosely-defined region embracing the land on either bank of the River Rhine in central Europe....
and soon chose the ancient German industry of brewing as the one offering the best opportunity for his talent of applying machinery to natural processes.
The new science of modern refrigeration
Refrigeration
Refrigeration is a process in which work is done to move heat from one location to another. This work is traditionally done by mechanical work, but can also be done by magnetism, laser or other means...
had just come into practice, and Michael was fascinated by the possibilities for applying it to brewing. He began his apprenticeship as a brewer in the old-style subterranean cellars at the breweries of Dortmund
Dortmund
Dortmund is a city in Germany. It is located in the Bundesland of North Rhine-Westphalia, in the Ruhr area. Its population of 585,045 makes it the 7th largest city in Germany and the 34th largest in the European Union....
, Westphalia
Westphalia
Westphalia is a region in Germany, centred on the cities of Arnsberg, Bielefeld, Dortmund, Minden and Münster.Westphalia is roughly the region between the rivers Rhine and Weser, located north and south of the Ruhr River. No exact definition of borders can be given, because the name "Westphalia"...
. In 1883, when his apprenticeship ended, he joined his younger brother, Gottfried, then already established as an export merchant in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. Together they founded in East New York a typically German brewery, to be conceived on modern and scientific principles.
Early years
The brothers, as a partnership, secured title to a small old-style brewing plant, then in disuse, and set to work converting it to newer ideas. The soft water from Long IslandLong Island
Long Island is an island located in the southeast part of the U.S. state of New York, just east of Manhattan. Stretching northeast into the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island contains four counties, two of which are boroughs of New York City , and two of which are mainly suburban...
was preferred by German brewers and breweries in Brooklyn proliferated at this time. Michael was the brewer, superintendent, and engineer, and found that his hours were from four o'clock in the morning till ten at night. By 1888, the ability of Gottfried as the financial head of the firm, and the excellence of Michael's products, had assured success.
The enterprise prospered and the partnership became a corporation in 1898, an established business of national reputation. The popular demand for the products of the plant — a typical German beer was then a novelty in the American brewing industry — necessitated enlarged facilities. A new era began: the acquired plant was demolished and a new plant was erected. Subterranean cellars made way for a building of cellars above surface, under modern refrigeration. The plant represented a new achievement in brewing construction. Michael easily adopted new principles and contributed many ideas of his own. Continued success justified this enlargement of facilities, and twice more during his lifetime the plant was expanded in size and facilities.
The brewery's reputation spread abroad, and for years brewing academicians, experts, and scientists from Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
and South America
South America
South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...
visited to study Michael's work. Many of his ideas were copied abroad. The plant enjoyed the distinction, as the result of Michael's constant scientific advances in his field, of the continued exchange with European authorities of German brewing ideas, a unique achievement for an American manufacturer. Piels union employees are reputed to have been guaranteed ice cold beer on tap 24 hours a day in their union contract.
Michael retired from active management as the technical head of the corporation in 1900, devoting his last years to the acquisition of German paintings of hunting scenes.
Bert and Harry
In the 1950s, the Piels brewery had a very successful television and radio campaign when the Young & RubicamYoung & Rubicam
Y&R is a marketing and communications company specializing in advertising, digital and social media, sales promotion, direct marketing and brand identity consulting.-History:...
ad agency created Bert and Harry Piel, the fictitious animated
Animation
Animation is the rapid display of a sequence of images of 2-D or 3-D artwork or model positions in order to create an illusion of movement. The effect is an optical illusion of motion due to the phenomenon of persistence of vision, and can be created and demonstrated in several ways...
owners and pitchmen for the brewery. Voices were provided by the comedians Bob and Ray
Bob and Ray
Bob Elliott and Ray Goulding were an American comedy team whose career spanned five decades. Their format was typically to satirize the medium in which they were performing, such as conducting radio or television interviews, with off-the-wall dialogue presented in a generally deadpan style as...
. Harry (Bob Elliott) was tall and soft-spoken, always calming down the short loudmouth Bert (Ray Goulding) when something went wrong. The first Bert and Harry commercials aired December 1955 and ran until 1960.
Like most regional breweries, including its New York competitors, Ballantine, Schaefer and Ruppert, Piels was facing an influx of national brands such as Schlitz, Pabst and Budweiser. These brands, backed by massive advertising campaigns, began infiltrating Piels primary sales territory and slowly overtook the market. This was coupled with a disastrous 81-day brewery strike in 1949 that allowed out-of-town brewers to establish a foothold in New York City and helped to end the Piels dynasty. A definitive August 8, 1988, article on beer and sports, "Beer: How It Influences the Games We Play and Watch" (Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated is an American sports media company owned by media conglomerate Time Warner. Its self titled magazine has over 3.5 million subscribers and is read by 23 million adults each week, including over 18 million men. It was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the...
) suggests the popularity of the Piels ads actually hurt beer sales because people liked the ads, tried the beer and found out they did not actually enjoy it. Many of the Burt and Harry signs, trays and coasters with slogans (Harry: "Beer anyone?", Bert: "Piels everyone!") are now collectors' items.
Expansion
Bushwick, Brooklyn
Bushwick is a neighborhood in the northern part of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood, formerly Brooklyn's 18th Ward, is now part of Brooklyn Community Board 4...
, and in December 1953 the company bought the plant of Rubsam and Hormann in Stapleton, Staten Island, plus the R&H label. However, in 1955 as sales slowed down the Trommer plant was closed. In 1963, the R&H plant was also closed down. In 1963, the Piel management decided to sell the company, and it was acquired by Associated Brewing Company of Detroit, Michigan. They operated a chain of regional breweries, namely Jacob Schmidt (St. Paul, Minnesota), Sterling Brewers (Evansville, Indiana), Drewry’s (with plants in Chicago, Illinois and South Bend, Indiana) and Hampden-Harvard Breweries (Willimasett, Massachusetts).
On September 20, 1973, Piel Bros. plant in East New York was closed down after 90 years of operation. For a short period of time the Willimasett plant, which brewed Piels for sales in New England continued to operate, but then it was shut down. In the 1970s, F. & M. Schaefer Brewing Company
Schaefer Beer
Schaefer Beer is a brand of American beer. Schaefer Beer was first produced in 1842 by the F. & M. Schaefer Brewing Company. The name "Schaefer" is derived from the last name of founding brothers Frederick and Maximiliam Schaefer....
, another Brooklyn based brewer bought the rights to the Piel Brothers label and Schafer continued to brew it at its Brooklyn and Allentown, Pennsylvania
Allentown, Pennsylvania
Allentown is a city located in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, in the United States. It is Pennsylvania's third most populous city, after Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, and the 215th largest city in the United States. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 118,032 and is currently...
, plants. In the late 1980s, Schaefer was subsequently bought out by Stroh
Stroh
The Stroh Austria GmbH is a manufacturer of strong spiced rum from Austria.-History:The brand started in 1832 at Klagenfurt, named after the founder Sebastian Stroh. It was awarded a gold medal at the 1900 Exposition Universelle in Paris. Today Stroh is available in 30 countries...
Brewery company of Detroit, Michigan. Under Stroh, Piels sales stabilized for a time, thanks to new and improved package designs and good point of sale advertising. However, Stroh succumbed to marketing pressure from industry giants, Anheuser-Busch
Anheuser-Busch
Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc. , is an American brewing company. The company operates 12 breweries in the United States and 18 in other countries. It was, until December 2009, also one of America's largest theme park operators; operating ten theme parks across the United States through the...
and Miller
Miller
A miller usually refers to a person who operates a mill, a machine to grind a cereal crop to make flour. Milling is among the oldest of human occupations. "Miller", "Milne" and other variants are common surnames, as are their equivalents in other languages around the world...
, and threw in the towel after 149 years in business. Most of the Stroh brands, including Piels, were sold to Pabst Brewing Company
Pabst Brewing Company
Pabst Brewing Company is an American company that dates its origins to a brewing company founded in 1844 by Jacob Best and by 1889 named after Frederick Pabst. It is currently the holding company contracting for the brewing of over two dozen brands of beer and malt liquor from defunct companies...
. Piels "Real" Draft and Piels Light were also popular products from this brewery.
Current
Pabst continues to market Piels on a limited basis in New York and the New England states. Piels tall-neck 12 ounce bottles come in a wax coated cardboard case of 24 that can be filled with ice, negating the need for a coolerCooler
A cooler, cool box, portable ice chest, chilly bin , or esky most commonly is an insulated box used to keep food or drink cool. Ice cubes are most commonly placed in it to help the things inside stay cool...
. Because of its low cost and fresh taste, Piels is a beer of choice for college aged students in the Northeast U.S., especially in the states of New York and New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
. It is also popular in Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, lower Delaware (the coastal strip from Lewes down to Fenwick Island), and nearby Ocean City, Maryland
Ocean City, Maryland
Ocean City, sometimes known as OC, or OCMD, is an Atlantic Ocean resort town in Worcester County, Maryland, United States. Ocean City is widely known in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States and is a frequent destination for vacationers in that area...
.