| Extra info | The company originated from a village brewery founded in 1797 by Willem van Hooff. . Willem was succeeded in 1836 by Jan van Hooff who died in 1848 . His widow, Catharina Thijs, continued the business and reunited in 1850 with the Budel- born brewer Peter Koekhofs. Their daughter Han married in 1873 with Jan Winters, a brewer's son from Saint-Huibrechts-Lille who brought it to Maarheeze's Alderman . The company was then completely : Beer Brewery De Vogelsberg J. Winters-Koekhofs . Jan Winters died in 1912 . The brewery had ceased to exist in 1914 after the company had been sober for some time. Son Everhard went to sell beer that was brewed elsewhere (at Beer Brewery 'De Gekroonde Valk v / h Van Vollenhoven & Co' in Amsterdam ) and also started a vegetable desert, an activity that left many brewers after the number of breweries had been dumped by raw material scarcity. Everhard Winters asked and received permission to set up a liquorice factory, but eventually became a 'beer bottlery and lemonade factory'. The start date for this is 1918 .
The comany's limonade factory opened in 1913 . The brandless lemonade began to compete with the Coca-Cola soft drinks and 1933 from Hero 's fruit juices since 1930 . Everhard Winters obtained the agency for these beverages and later for Chocomel and Julianawater, a mineral water from Woeste Hoeve .
Thee beer bottling activities were discontinued as they were no longer outsourced by the large breweries.
After World War II, a rapid disappearance of the small lemonade factories, which it joined the cooperative NV Vitam Fruit Products Society, was established in 1945 and based in Utrecht . Everhard Winters did this in 1947 . The cooperative would produce Vrumona soft drinks. This was also realized, at a factory in Bunnik . Indeed, Coca-Cola became increasingly aggressive and demanded a lot of money for his sales licenses. Winters therefore involved Coca-Cola from the Bottelmaatschappij Dongen NV in Dongen since 1950 . The Van Vollenhoven agency for beer sales was transformed into a Heineken agency. In addition, Winters acquired an agency for Brand's beers .
In 1950 , Everhard was succeeded by Rob Winters, who marketed a tonic drink under the brand name Tiger Tonic. In 1951 Hero followed a competitive drink: Hero Tonic. Further brands of winters were 'Wiso' (Winters sodawater) and 'Jo-Jo' (sinas).
In 1952 , Winters acquired sales rights for 7Up in North Brabant and Limburg, while in 1953 , production was also started. The company continued under two names: NV Limonadefabriek v / h EJ Winters and Seven-Up Bottling Company Het Zuiden NV . The beer agency was loose again. Since 1955 the company grew very quickly and in 1957 a large property was taken into use at the current location. At the old location, only the beer agency remained.
In 1972 , Winters received the Royal Prize, and the lemonade factory called 'Royal Soft drinks Industry Winters'. In 1977 , American food company Beatrice took a majority stake in Winters. Because Beatrice was deeply blamed by the acquisition of Esmark in 1984 , it became a prey of acquisition. This was funded by the sale of business units, including Winters, which was resold in 1987 to the American investment company TLC Group . All of this led to a break with Seven-Up in 1989 , up to 40% of Winters revenue.
In 1963 Winters acquired a license for Sunkist , a citrus fruit limonade marketed by Sunkist Growers, a US citrus fruit growers cooperative. The company had already hired a Tetra Pak production line in 1962 . In 1989 , after the loss of the Seven-Up license, there was also an end to cooperation with Sunkist.
The cooperation with Coca-Cola was short-lived. Here ended when Winters 7Up began to bottle. In 1961 , co-operation was sought with Cola's competitor, namely Pepsi-Cola , which was licensed by Vrumona . But Winters also registered their own brand 'Puppy Cola'. This led to a brand war with Pepsi. Discussions were also held with Dr Pepper . In 1971 , the Canada Dry brand was introduced, including a wide range of soft drinks. In 1976 Royal Crown Cola was added to the licenses. This license was terminated in 1983 in favor of the "Like-Free" brand, a caffeine-free cola beverage, introduced by Seven-Up. This brand has never conquered a significant market share.
After losing the major licenses in 1989 , Winters focused on contract filling : bottling on behalf of third parties. To this end, a thorough reorganization was required, with the number of employees dropping from 160 to 79, accompanied by 74 forced redundancies. In 1955 , the French mineral water producer SA des Eaux Minérales de Saint-Alban was acquired by TLC Beatrice International. A new company was established in Saint-Alban-les-Eaux to serve the southern European market. Since 1994 , Winters also filled beer cans. Since 1998, Winters belongs to the Sun Beverage Company and is now part of Refresco . |
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