The Tippling Point | What the fridge did for Foster's in Australia

Piccadilly Circus, London, in 1992. Foster's reached UK shores in 1972, and quickly became popular there. (Photo: Matthias Prinke via Wikimedia Commons 2.5)

"Australian for beer"

Few among you beer aficionados would not have noticed that tagline adorning the blue wrapper of the bottle. Yeah, you're right. It is Foster's. The most authentic of Aussie experiences in liquid form, you might think. But sorry.

Down under, if you breeze into a bar in Melbourne and place an order for Foster's, quizzical eyes and raised brows may turn to you. In many states in the country, people don't even know such a beer exists in the world. Carlton Draught and Victoria Bitter are way ahead in the hit chart.

Still, Foster's was born in Australia when two Yankee siblings - William M. and Ralph R. Foster - arrived in Melbourne in 1886 to try their luck in brewing. Foster's brewing company was set up in Collingwood with the help of an American refrigeration engineer and a German brewmaster. The brothers delivered their first lot to hotels in Melbourne.

But what was the world like in Australia before Foster's made its debut in 1889? What were the Aussies chugging to quench their thirst? Ales, warm British-style ales. You know ales could only aid the blistering sun that rolled over the Continent in making life more intolerable. People would wait inexorably to pounce on anything cold to bring the heat down. Enter Foster's.

The refrigeration engineer that Foster brothers thoughtfully brought down with them to their brewery in Australia had serious work at hand.

Unlike the process of making ales, the new lager beer introduced by the company needed refrigeration. Make it cold. Sell it cold. The hotels that sold the beer enthusiastically joined the game, packing in ice along with bottles of Foster's even during the hottest month of the year. What a bargain!

Lighter, crisper, colder. Foster's beer hit the bullseye with the new strategy that would take a punishing Australian sun head-on.

What did a bottle of Foster's have in its belly?

Many of you know hops provide that unique flavour to beer, and Foster brothers used Pride of Ringwood hops, exclusively grown in certain parts of the country. They were added to the brew during the last stage of the process to provide freshness to the lager. The special yeast (Tim Foster's yeast) that the company uses imparts that bold flavour that you identify Foster's with. And no chat about Foster's flavour would be complete without mentioning the iconic sweetness of the beer. Well, this is it, instead of conventional malt, the brewers used cane sugar to cut the bitterness of hops. Time to test the water in Foster's.

Some of you know that the wrong kind may spoil all the fun in the amber liquid. Initially the company used to take the water from the nearby Yarra river which lent a unique flavour to the beer.

When the brothers left Australia for their home country, Forster's merged with five other brewing companies to form Cartlon and United Breweries in 1907. It kept on changing hands. In 1972, Foster's reached the shores of England where it was destined to flourish to become one of the leading beers in the country. The beer got a shot in the arm when that celebrated artist Paul "Crocodile Dundee" Hogan, decided to feature in its UK ads.

Swigging bottles of the amber nectar, Paul made the drink iconic among the English. Foster's became the postcard picture of the Englishman's concept about Australia, though in Australia few now know about the connection.

Today the beer is brewed in more than seven countries and sold in over 135 in the world. Launched in India in the late 1990s, Fosters' went on to become one of the most successful international brands in the country.