Bavaria history

In 1890, the society Kopp and Castello was dissolved and was created the company Bavaria Kopp's Deutsche Bierbrauerei, which on 22 April of the following year recorded as factory image the German imperial eagle, and opened its headquarters in San Diego, downtown Bogotá, on 28 May.

In 1894, the company was incorporated as the Bavarian Brewery Company, Inc. with Lengel serving as president.

The final batch of beer was made on the Platzl on May 22, 1896, and then removed to the new fermenting cellar on June 2.

In 1898, the firm sold out to a group from investors from Washington, DC, headed by brewmaster Carl H. Eisenmenger.

Poor health forced Eisenmenger’s retirement in 1908.

In 1911, Magdalene Eisenmenger stepped aside and Herman became company president.

He later bought out his partners and soon dominated the beer business in the area, with Cervecería Águila, founded in 1913, as another important holding.

Eisenmenger, who understood that Prohibition would likely soon be a reality, had began brewing a ‘near beer’ cereal beverage as early as 1918.

In 1919, the Bavarian Brewing Company officially changed its name to the Peninsula Products Company, Inc.

However, some of the obsolete buildings considered unnecessary for brewing south of W. Pike Street were sold by Lucia Riedlin Schott and her husband during Prohibition - beginning in the mid-1920s.

After William Riedlin's death, his son-in-laws, Clarence Cobb and William C. (Will) Schott, along with the former brewmaster, Joseph Ruh, administered the company. It struggled to be profitable and was reorganized as the Riedlin Co. in 1922.

After an initial surge in business, the venture ultimately failed and, in 1925, Peninsula closed its doors for good.

Bavaria absorbed breweries in other cities in 1930, when it formed the Consorcio de Cervecerías Bavaria, incorporating the consolidated business as Cervecería Unión S.A. the following year.

By the time Prohibition was in the process of being repealed in 1932, the brewery property was concentrated north of W. 12th Street, as shown on the aerial below.

A group headed by the husband of Riedlin's granddaughter Rosemary, Murray Voorhees, acquired and reopened the brewery in mid-1935.

The brewery was acquired in bankruptcy by Lucia Riedlin Schott's husband, Will Schott, and three of his brothers, Chris, George and Lou. It was under-capitalized and sustained damage in the Great Flood of 1937, going into foreclosure at the end of that year.

By the time Prohibition was in the process of being repealed in 1932, the brewery property was concentrated north of W. 12th Street, as shown on the aerial below. It was incorporated in January, 1938.

In the night of April 25, 1944, Hofbräuhaus was hit by the first aerial bombs, and three further air attacks did more damage.

When fighting finally came to an end on May 8, 1945, only a small part of the taproom in Hofbräuhaus was still in working order; all the other rooms had been destroyed.

In order to modify their brand and develop new packaging and advertising programs, Louis L. Schott was promoted to Marketing Director in the summer of 1956.

By 1957, the Bavarian Brewing Co. became profitable once again.

Believing that they could be more competitive by joining a larger firm, in 1959 Bavarian Brewing Co, Inc., merged with IBI, a regional brewer with four other breweries and several different brands.

Play a Bavarian's Beer 1960 Radio Jingle

In 1962, Bavarian's Select Beer was awarded a Gold Medal at an International Beer Competition in Belgium.

The Bavarian Brewery was closed in May of 1966.

Their Cervecería Águila, S.A., formed in 1967 by the union of Águila with Barranquilla and Bolívar, was merged into Bavaria S.A. in the same year.

Bavaria acquired Cervecería Unión de Medellín in 1972.

Bavaria S.A. became a public company in 1981, when it first sold shares on the Bolsa de Valores de Colombia, in Bogotá.

The new 76-million mark building was officially inaugurated on November 23, 1988.

By 1991, when Bavaria bought Central de Cervejas S.A., a Portuguese brewery with a large presence in the national market, the Santo Domingo group controlled more than 80 companies with combined annual revenues of almost $2.2 billion.

Bavaria extended its foothold on Europe's Iberian Peninsula in 1992, when it purchased a small brewery in Córdoba, Spain, where it continued to make El Águila as well as introducing another beer, La Sureña.

By 1993 the Bavaria empire in Colombia had grown to 17 breweries, three malting plants (including the first sea-level tropical one anywhere for converting raw barley into malt), a bottling plant, and a factory for producing bottles, cans, and labels.

Ardila introduced his group's own beer, Leona, in 1994.

In 1995, Ken Lewis transformed the former brewery into a giant supermarket for liquor and gourmet foods along with a large assortment of beers, known as the Brew Works at the Party Source.

Grupo Empresarial Bavaria was established in 1996 to consolidate the finances of Bavaria S.A. and its subsidiaries.

On 3 November 1997, a lavish celebration was held in downtown Munich to celebrate the one hundredth birthday of Hofbräuhaus as a restaurant in its current appearance.

In 1998, the property became known as Jillian's, part of a chain that expanded nationally with a total of 30 locations.

The addition of La Casera, with its 180,000 points of sale throughout Spain, promised to improve the prospects of unprofitable La Sureña, but in 2000 Bavaria disposed of these companies.

By contrast, Leona, after a slow start, carved out a one-fifth share of the beer market by 2001, when a majority share was sold to Bavaria.

In 2002 Bavaria took a 24.5 percent interest in Unión de Cervercerías Peruanas Backus y Johnston S.A.A., which controlled practically the entire Peruvian beer market, paying about $450 million for the acquisition.

With now six years since the beer was introduced in the United States, it was now time for a real Hofbräuhaus in the United States In the spring of 2003 a brewhaus and beer hall opens in the style of the Munich original in Newport, KY.

Financial analysts questioned whether it could compete against the onslaught of AmBev, which was merged with the Belgian company Interbrew S.A. in 2004 to form InBev, the world's biggest brewer by volume.

By early 2005, SABMiller plc, the London-based third largest beermaker in the world, had emerged as the likeliest buyer.

However, the chain had difficulties in servicing their debt and closed their location in the former Bavarian Brewery in 2006, causing the property to become vacant again.

"SABMiller's Colombian Unit Says Pays $494 Mln in Foreign Debt," Dow Jones International News, March 21, 2007.

The property sat vacant for a couple years after Jillian's closed, but was purchased in 2008 by Columbia Sussex.

The county decided to purchase an re-purpose the former brewery property with castle-like architecture for their administrative offices in 2015.