Hatuey beer bears the name of a Taino Indian chief who died fighting the Spanish conquerors and is often described as Cuba's first national hero.
The Bacardi group that traces its roots to Cuba and is best known for rum, is developing the brand as a craft beer in the United States, starting with sales in South Florida and its large Cuban communities.
At the Miramar outlet of Cuban restaurant chain La Carreta, the beer already is popular, sparking pride among Cuban-Americans and drawing interest from others curious to try new beers, employees said.
Some Cubans revel in the legend of the brave chief who was captured by the Spanish and readied to be burned alive. A priest asked him to pray, so that Hatuey could go heaven. The chief asked if Spaniards went to that heaven. When the priest said yes, Hatuey refused and said he wouldn't go there.
Bacardi launched Hatuey beer for the U.S. market in 1995, and after hiccups, re-launched it last year with new packaging and a new formula. Today's pale ale more closely resembles a premium beer that was a top-seller in Cuba from the 1920s through the '50s, said Anler Morejon, brand manager with Bacardi USA.
In Florida's crowded beer market, Bacardi is positioning the brand as a specialty beer, more expensive than top-selling imports Heineken and Presidente and similar in price to U.S. craft beers like Sam Adams. The suggested retail price is $8.99 a six-pack, making it more a brew to savor than to guzzle.
Hatuey's new formula kicked off last summer in Miami-Dade and Monroe counties, selling about 10,000 cases in its first year. The recent addition of kegs to meet demand for draft beer should help boost sales beyond 12,000 cases this year. Plus, expansion later in Tampa, Orlando and other Florida cities could grow sales annually to more than 50,000 cases in another five years, said Morejon.
Craft beers are the hottest segment of the U.S. beer market, up by double-digits for years as the overall market droops. Even so, craft beers represent just 6 percent of the U.S. beer market, and they face tough competition, said Benj Steinman, editor of newsletter Beer Marketer's Insights of Suffern, N.Y.
More than 2,000 craft beers now are sold in America, with at least 1,300 more in planning stages. Hatuey remains just a "speck" in a U.S. craft-beer market that's reached 170 million cases a year, said Steinman.
Still, for Bacardi, the brand carries special weight. In Cuba, before the 1959 revolution, Hatuey's sales of millions of cases yearly helped fund the company's expansion in Puerto Rico and Mexico. That business overseas provided a base after Fidel Castro's government nationalized Bacardi holdings on the island.
"The family doesn't want the brand to go by the wayside," said Morejon. "We want to keep the brand alive, because if things do change in Cuba, we want to be back there in a heartbeat."
