# Egypt

Country page of DA Caps, a collection of beer bottle caps. Web page: https://dacaps.imcoll.info/country/eg/info

- Official name: Arab Republic of Egypt
- Local name: جمهورية مصر العربية
- Caps in the collection: 16 (https://dacaps.imcoll.info/country_caps/15)
- Brands: 10

## Beer in Egypt

Beer in Egypt is older than the state. The breweries excavated at Hierakonpolis and Tell el-Farkha, of the mid-fourth millennium BC, made a few hundred to perhaps a thousand litres a batch. At North Abydos an expedition of New York University and Princeton, led by Matthew Adams and Deborah Vischak, has found a royal brewery of the time of King Narmer, about 3100 BC: eight structures with some 40 vats each, able to make more than 22,000 litres in a batch for the funerary rituals of the first kings; the find was announced in February 2021. Bread and beer were the daily food of ordinary Egyptians, while wine was the drink of the upper class. Its descendant is bouza, a barley-and-bread beer of up to about 7% that is still brewed at home by the old method and is a cheap alternative to bottled beer.

The modern industry began with Belgian investors. Until then Egypt's foreign community drank imported Guinness, Tennent's and Beck's. On 15 May 1897 the Crown Brewery opened in the Ibrahimieh district of Alexandria, and a year later the same group opened the Brasserie des Pyramides, the Pyramid Brewery, near Cairo at Giza. Both sold a beer called Stella, Italian for star, made at first to two different recipes. In the 1920s the rivals split the market, Crown serving Alexandria and Pyramid Cairo, and sold one Stella across the country. In 1937 Heineken became a major shareholder in both companies, and Pyramid took the Arabic name Al Ahram. More than a million Allied soldiers passed through Egypt in the Second World War, and the name Stella became known abroad.

In 1963 the state took over both companies and merged them as the Al Ahram Beverages Company (ABC); Heineken lost its shares and was not fully compensated until the 1970s. Privatisation came in two steps, 1996 and 1997: in November 1996 the Luxor Group of investors, led by Ahmed Zayat, bought 75% of ABC for 231 million Egyptian pounds, and in February 1997 an $87.6 million issue of global depositary receipts was listed in London. Under Zayat the company put weight on the non-alcoholic Birell and Fayrouz, and with advisers from Danbrew (Carlsberg) it built a new brewery at El Obour north of Cairo; the old Giza brewery closed in 2000.

A private rival appeared in 1999. El Gouna Beverages was founded in April 1999 by Samih Sawiris of Orascom as the first independent privately owned wine and beer maker in Egypt, and launched Sakara beer; ABC bought it in March 2001 for 255 million pounds and kept the Sakara brand. In 2002 Heineken came back: it bid $287 million, $14 a share, on 12 September, and ABC's shareholders accepted on 25 September 2002; ABC kept its name and management. Sawiris returned in 2005 with the Egyptian International Beverage Company (EgyBev), which brewed the Luxor beers at El Gouna and sold the Luxor brand to ABC in 2009; EgyBev now makes wine and spirits.

Today ABC, a Heineken company, brews Stella, Sakara, Meister Max, Heineken and Desperados at Obour and sells the non-alcoholic Birell and the malt drink Fayrouz. Euromonitor put its share of the beer market at 89% in 2016, when Stella sold 47.5 million litres, about a third of Egypt's beer. Another brewer, Al Masria Co. at Obour, is credited with Castelo and Sphinx in a 2011 list of Egyptian beers. In 2023 ABC spent about 30 million euros on a new headquarters in New Cairo, to which it moved on 1 September 2024, and on two new lines at its Sharqia plant for the Fayrouz malt drink.

Sources:
- [Wikipedia: Beer in Egypt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beer_in_Egypt)
- [Wikipedia: Stella (beer)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stella_(beer))
- [Photorientalist: Egypt's Stella Beer, Celebrating 120 Years (2017)](https://photorientalist.org/?p=2279)
- [Photorientalist, Omar Foda: Stella Beer Caught in the Ebb and Flow of Egyptian History](https://photorientalist.org/?p=1843)
- [Photorientalist: Trucks of Stella at the Giza brewery, closed in 2000 (c. 1998)](https://www.photorientalist.org/?p=1904)
- [Photorientalist: Danbrew advisers and the new brewery at El Obour (c. 1998)](https://www.photorientalist.org/?p=1896)
- [Al-Monitor: Egypt's beer industry toasts long history (2014)](https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2014/10/beer-egypt-stella-heineken-pyramids.html)
- [MEES: Al-Ahram Beverages in $87.6Mn GDR Issue (1997)](https://archives.mees.com/issues/731/articles/28836)
- [MEED: Heineken bids $287 million for Al-Ahram Beverages (2002)](https://www.meed.com/heineken-bids-287-million-for-al-ahram-beverages/)
- [News24: Egypt brewery shareholders agree to Heineken takeover (2002)](https://www.news24.com/business/egypt-brewery-sholders-agree-to-heineken-takeover-20020925)
- [EgyBev: Our Heritage](https://www.egy-bev.com/heritage.html)
- [Abydos Archaeology: The Thirstiest Kings Who Ever Lived (2021)](https://abydos.org/blog/2021/2/14/the-thirstiest-kings-who-ever-lived)
- [Hyperallergic: Discovery of an Industrial Brewery in Ancient Egypt Rewrites the History of Beer (2021)](https://hyperallergic.com/629493/discovery-of-an-industrial-brewery-in-ancient-egypt-rewrites-the-history-of-beer/)
- [Business Today Egypt: Al Ahram Beverages, 120+ years in Egypt, new investment and new HQ (2024)](https://businesstodayegypt.com/amp/1/5060/Al-Ahram-Beverages-compliments-120-years-of-operation-in-Egypt)
- [Food Business Africa: Al Ahram Beverages announces US$33.1M investment in Egypt (2024)](https://www.foodbusinessafrica.com/al-ahram-beverages-announces-us33-1m-investment-in-egypt/)
- [Camels and Tacos: Egyptian Beer, the Complete List (2011)](http://camelsandtacos.blogspot.com/2011/06/egyptian-beer-complete-list.html)
- [Archontology: Egypt, Polity Style 1867-2026](https://archontology.org/nations/egypt/01_polity.php)
- [Wikipedia: Flag of Egypt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Egypt)

## Breweries (4)

- [Al Ahram Beverages Company S.A.E.](https://dacaps.imcoll.info/brewery/904.md) — 12 caps, 1897–
- [Al Masria Al Alamia Company](https://dacaps.imcoll.info/brewery/7073.md) — 1 cap
- [Egyptian International Beverage Co](https://dacaps.imcoll.info/brewery/5642.md) — 2 caps, 2005–
- [El Gouna Beverages Company](https://dacaps.imcoll.info/brewery/2180.md) — 1 cap, 1999–2001, closed