Staropramen Brewery’s history begins in 1869 when shares for a “Joint Stock Brewery in Smíchov” were offered for sale. The brewery building was completed and beer first brewed in 1871. The Ostravar Brewery opened in 1898 followed a year later by the Braník brewery; these two breweries would later merge with Staropramen. Due to competition from other Prague breweries, the brand name Staropramen, which translates as “old spring,” was registered in 1911. After the First World War all three breweries saw a period of sustained growth, and by the 1930s Staropramen was the largest brewery in Czechoslovakia. With socialism after the Second World War, all Czechoslovakian breweries were nationalised, including…

Hacker-Pschorr Brewery traces its ancestry back to 1417 when the Hacker brewery was founded in Munich, Germany, 99 years before the enactment of the Reinheitsgebot Purity Law of 1516. In the late 18th century, Joseph Pschorr bought the Hacker brewery from his father-in-law. He subsequently founded a separate brewery under his own name. His two sons divided his estate by each taking control of one of the two separate breweries. In 1972, Hacker and Pschorr merged to form Hacker-Pschorr, but the beers were sold as separate brands well after 1975. The brewing process has remained virtually unchanged for over 580 years.