Koert van 't Hof

For the vast majority of our customers, beer is an innocent pleasure that helps make their lives more pleasurable. And we would like it to stay that way. Naturally, selling beer is Grolsch's core business, and we aim to sell as much as possible. However, at the same time we also want to remain vigilant about the potential harmful effects of irresponsible alcohol consumption, particularly amongst teenagers, pregnant women and in the traffic. Nevertheless, at Grolsch we need to live up to our responsibility, as our role is to provide thorough and accurate information and to behave in a responsible manner.

Grolsch is a strong advocate of self-regulation and enforcement. We believe that banning alcohol advertising, raising duties on beer and introducing legal restrictions on the availability of alcoholic drinks are not the best way to combat alcohol abuse. Instead, only an approach that focuses on the target group can ensure that those beer lovers who drink moderately and responsibly can continue to do so in future.

As stated in the policy on commercial communication and in the Dutch Advertising Code for Alcoholic Beverages, Grolsch ensures that the advertisements reach as few as possible minors (18-). The advertising codes specify that the messages can reach up to 25% of minors (> 75% 18+).

Over the past year, Grolsch has achieved an 18+ percentage of 87, 1% with all of its media (TV, radio, print, digital channels). Grolsch's policy is aimed at a constant improvement of this percentage, with the SMRC's review of both the expression and the medium being a very important factor.

Attention pionts remain, in particular, the various social media channels of which Grolsch only uses if they are provided with a decent age gate. Channels that do not comply here are excluded from using Grolsch expressions.