Italian label maybe but the beer's British brewed
Budweiser Budvar's head brewer, Adam Brož, says the popular Czech lager will never be brewed outside of its hometown.
"There is no way we could brew elsewhere in the world and still be considered authentically Czech," says Mr Brož who is only the 10th person to be in charge of brewing at Budvar since it launched 127 years ago.
"Firstly there are the ingredients. To be authentic you need quality, local Czech ingredients... and there is no other place with identical water [like our brewery's natural well].
"Secondly, there is the equipment of the brewery... if you have two breweries, they won't always have exactly the same geometry or size etc, and you could end up with significant differences despite using the same recipe."
Lastly, he says brewing has "an artistic aspect", which can be lost if a beer is also brewed elsewhere by a different team.Based in the Czech city of České Budějovice, Budweiser Budvar gets its name from the old German name for the city - Budweis.
Owned by the Czech government, it should not be confused with its namesake, the US lager Budweiser. That is an entirely separate brand owned by the world's largest brewing group, Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev).
What makes Budvar increasingly rare among lagers sold around the world, is the fact it is only brewed in its country of origin.
By contrast, if you look at the list of the 10 best-selling beers in the UK this year, all lagers, eight of them are foreign brands which are brewed under licence in the UK - Carling (originates in Canada), Fosters (Australia), Birra Moretti (Italy), Coors (US), Stella Artois (Belgium), Carlsberg (Denmark), San Miguel (Spain), and Amstel (Netherlands).
So if you are sitting in a UK pub, drinking a cold pint of Moretti while daydreaming about Italy, your drink was actually produced at a brewery in Manchester. Meanwhile, your crisp pint of Stella is from South Wales.
But unless you are a beer snob, does this blurred provenance actually matter?world's largest brewing companies are quick to point out that it is far more environmentally friendly to brew their best-selling brands at numerous breweries around the world, rather than have to ship the billions of litres of finished beers per year all the way from their original country of origin. It is also far more cost-effective.
Molson Coors is a case in point. It sells an increasingly popular Spanish lager called Madrí Excepcional, which for the UK market is brewed in Yorkshire.
"Madrí Excepcional is a collaboration between our Molson Coors master brewers here in the UK and at La Sagra Brewery, our joint venture partner based near Madrid," says Fraser Thomson, the company's western Europe operations director.
"We continue to work closely with the team at La Sagra, but brewing Madrí Excepcional here in the UK enables us to deliver efficiently, more sustainably - reducing the miles travelled from brewery to bar or shelf, and quickly respond to demand. And all our beers in the UK are produced using 100% renewable electricity."
