Protect
4,141
edits
Changes
m
→History
The journey to the top of the lambic world for Belle-Vue began in the 1949-1950 season when Belle-Vue began to send lambic across the country and into France and the Netherlands. Belle-Vue, who was at the time the only lambic brewery with filtered and pasteurized gueuze, managed to escape the heatwave that resulted in exploding bottles for the majority of the lambic brewers and blenders that season. Business was so good that the brewery began buying up other breweries in the 1950's and 1960's. <ref name=MonsieurConstant> Eoghan Walsh, "Monsieur Constant // How One Brewer Defined Beer and Football in Brussels for the 20th Century", Beercity.Brussels, Jun 3, 2020. [https://www.beercity.brussels/home/2020/belle-vue-constant-vanden-stock-anderlecht Link]</ref>
Constant, who was always involved with the football leagues in Belgium and Europe brought his son, Roger, as well as Roger’s cousin Philipe, into the business in 1962. In 1969, Belle-Vue acquired two more key breweries: [[Brasserie De Boeck| De Boeck]] and [[Brasserie Goossens| Goossens]], known together as [[Brasseries Unies]] (''United Breweries''). These two breweries together had already acquired Brasseries [[Brasserie de la Couronne]] (De Kroon), Toussaint Frères, [[Brasserie De Coster-Heymans | De Coster-Heymans]], and [[Brasserie Vandenkerckhoven | Vandenkerckhoven]]. Again in 1970 Belle-Vue acquired [[Brasserie Brabrux| Brabrux]], which had already acquired other well known lambic breweries [[Brasserie De Keersmaeker | De Keersmaeker]], [[Brasserie Van Haelen-Coche | Vaan Haelen-Coche]], [[Bécasse-Steppé]], and [[Brasserie Vandenperre | Vandenperre]]. At this point, Belle-Vue controlled approximately 75% of the lambic market. [[Brasserie_De_Neve | De Neve]] was also taken over by Belle-Vue in 1975, which is now a set of luxury apartments in the old brewery building.<ref name=GeuzeKriek>Jef Van den Steen, [[Books#Geuze & Kriek: The Secret of Lambic Beer|Geuze & Kriek: The Secret of Lambic Beer]], 2012</ref>
Belle-Vue was riding a wave of success that very few lambic breweries were achieving at the time, but to do this Belle-Vue needed the help of one brewery still bigger than them in Belgium: Artois. Belle-Vue partnered with Artois to help expand its brand in the export market. The cost of this was a 43% minority share for Artois in Belle-Vue, with Constant still remaining in charge of Belle-Vue. When Artois merged with Piedboeuf (most recognized as the brewer of Jupiler) in 1988 to create Interbrew, it effectively put an end to the Vandenstock family stake in Belle-Vue.