Netherlands: Dutch beer giant, Heineken, has recently announced its plans to spend £69 million more on its marketing and promotional costs in the current year. Its key target is Western Europe and the United States and follows similar steps taken by Carlsberg - which forked out millions of pounds to sponsor the Euro 2004 football championships in Portugal, Business Scotsman communicated on February 23.

Amsterdam-based Heineken, the world’s third-biggest brewing company, which counts Amstel, Tiger and Murphy’s stout among its 90 brands and operates in 170 countries, stated its intent after revealing its 2004 profits dropped 33 % to £371m, and predicting a further decline this year.

Therefore, chief executive Thony Ruys says the marketing spending aimed to "turn up the heat" and boost the company’s position in the premium beer market. This includes new commercials with actor Brad Pitt, new packaging and other initiatives.

And all that cash that went into the world’s second-biggest football tournament last year could not prevent rival Carlsberg - whose first beer export was a single barrel to Edinburgh in 1868 - booking a three per cent dip in its annual profit to £312m. But the Danish group’s sales of its Carlsberg brand grew by about six per cent, helped in particular through improved sales in Poland and Russia. Total volumes at Carlsberg rose by more than ten million hectolitres to 92 million hectolitres - an improvement equivalent to 74 million bottles of beer a day last year.

That led Nils Andersen, the president and chief executive of Carlsberg, to say: "The Carlsberg brand achieved an unprecedented high level of exposure from the [Euro 2004] tournament." Such high-profile exposure is seen as key to taking what were originally local beers into global markets. To date most brewers’ efforts have been to take their best-selling beers into particular and selected overseas markets.

A multi-million pound advertising drive has recently helped eastern European brewer Baltic Beverages Holding (BBH) - jointly owned by Carlsberg and Scottish & Newcastle - to boost sales by 20 % with growth of 67 % in its newest target market, Kazakhstan.

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