Heineken was criticized for continuing to sell beer in Russia. Shareholders are also angry, as it turned out during the shareholders’ meeting on Thursday: “Heineken has paid millions to Putin’s treasury.”
Prior to Heineken’s annual meeting in the DeLaMar theater in Amsterdam, the main question was: how strong will the shareholder criticism be on the beer brewer’s decision to launch 61 new brands in Russia last year?
Shareholders have gathered on the red seats of the theater to answer that question. CEO Dolf van den Brink sits on the big stage. There he talks about what is going well at Heineken: the turnover (6.4 billion euros in the first quarter of this year), the profit (403 million euros) and how proud he is of those financial results. And that, in what he calls ‘challenging years for all of us’.
Overwhelmed by criticism
The audience is already holding its breath for what will undoubtedly come: Heineken’s decision not to leave Russia, while it had just been promised not to invest in Russia anymore because of the war with Ukraine. Initially, Heineken said that publications about this were incorrect, later the brewer had to “acknowledge that we should have been clearer earlier about the need to introduce new products”.
Now is the time to show which side of history you’re on
After the revelations of research platform Follow The Money, Heineken was bombarded with criticism. Not in the least by the Ukrainian president Zelensky himself, who, through Karel Burger Dirven, the honorary consul for Ukraine in the Netherlands, made an urgent appeal to leave the country, ‘to no longer fill the Russian war chest in the form of payments of taxes’. ,,This is the time to show which side of history you stand on”, said Burger Dirven.
Workers would be at risk
And so CEO Dolf van den Brink starts talking about it himself after 20 minutes. He repeats what Heineken has been saying for months; namely that Heineken is still active in Russia only to keep the company running there, in order to prevent nationalization and not to endanger the livelihood of its own employees. That Heineken has been taken off the market as a brand and is only involved in the Russian industry. And above all: that Heineken is busy finding a good buyer. You can’t sell a loss-making company.
On Wednesday, Heineken announced that it has found a buyer for its Russian activities, something that Van den Brink points out again. He cannot yet provide details about that buyer in order not to jeopardize the sale. At the end, Van den Brink concludes his speech by saying in so many words that he can continue to look at himself in the mirror.
You cannot sell a loss-making business
This seems to have cleared the air for a while, but the tension immediately returns when director Gerben Everts of the Association of Effectenbezitters (VEB) steps to the microphone on behalf of the Dutch shareholders. He says that he has missed leadership, that communication has been substandard, that Heineken has spread disinformation, and that Heineken has allowed itself to be ‘hostage’ by Putin by not immediately leaving Russia. According to him, Heineken is now at the mercy of the rules of the Russian regime.
Contributed to the Russian treasury
This includes several strong statements: “10 billion hectoliters have flowed down Russian throats.” And: “Heineken has paid millions to Putin’s treasury.”
What particularly stings him is that Heineken has actually increased production in Russia, instead of reducing it. Heineken launched 61 new brands; an example of this is the Stout beer, with which Heineken filled the gap left by Guinness (which did leave Russia). Heineken also came up with new lemonades, unlike Pepsi and Coca-Cola, which also left Russia. “I don’t think that was necessary.”
What follows is an emotional Van den Brink. The period after the Russian invasion was one of the most difficult of his career, he says. He does not want to ‘just throw his 1800 colleagues under the bus’. ,,We tried to sell every day, but it just turned out to be very complicated.” And further: ,,Simply handing in the keys, that is totally irresponsible. We try to do it in a good way. I don’t recognize myself in the image that we would let ourselves be held hostage by Putin.”
No ill will, says Heineken
Later in the meeting there will also be criticism about deposit cans; since April 1, a deposit on cans is mandatory, but the brewery still produced and sold cans without a deposit. The Inspectorate imposed an order subject to periodic penalty payments of up to 1 million euros. Van den Brink denied that his company had been fined.
It had not been ill will, says Van den Brink, who is clearly agitated. He talks about an error of judgment, because Heineken thought it could use a transitional period. “I am very concerned about the media, which always assumes cynical motives. Everyone goes into it with a straight leg these days.”
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