Viking Beer (or ''Víking bjór'' ) is an

Iceland Iceland ( is, Ísland; ) is a Nordic island country in the North Atlantic Ocean and in the Arctic Ocean. Iceland is the most sparsely populated country in Europe. Iceland's capital and largest city is Reykjavík, which (along with its s ...

ic brand, brewed by CCEP "Víking Brewery". The brewery is located in

Akureyri Akureyri (, locally ) is a town in northern Iceland. It is Iceland's fifth-largest municipality, after Reykjavík, Hafnarfjörður, Reykjanesbær and Kópavogur, and the largest town outside Iceland's more populated southwest corner. Nicknamed ...

, Iceland, just south of the

Arctic Circle The Arctic Circle is one of the two polar circles, and the most northerly of the five major circles of latitude as shown on maps of Earth. Its southern equivalent is the Antarctic Circle. The Arctic Circle marks the southernmost latitude at w ...

History of the brewery

The history of the brand of Víking beer can be traced back to 1939 when Efnagerð Siglufjarðar was established in the town of

Siglufjörður Siglufjörður () is a small fishing town in a narrow fjord with the same name on the northern coast of Iceland. The population in 2011 was 1,206; the town has been shrinking in size since the 1950s when the town reached its peak of 3,000 inhabi ...

in Northern Iceland. In 1945, the brewery moved to Akureyri and the name was changed to Efnagerð Akureyrar. In 1962, a new factory was built at Furuvellir 18, where it is still located today. The brewery name was changed to Víking hf. in 1994. The brewery merged several times with other companies, and then in early 2001, the brewery merged with Vífilfell hf. thus creating the largest company in Iceland in the beverage industry. That company was bought by Cobega and later merged with

Coca-Cola European Partners Coca-Cola Europacific Partners plc (CCEP), formerly Coca-Cola European Partners (2016–2021) is a British company formed as a result of the combination of the three main bottling companies for The Coca-Cola Company in Western Europe: Coca-Col ...

(CCEP), and operates as Coca-Cola European Partners Ísland ehf. (in Reykjavík, where

Coca-Cola Coca-Cola, or Coke, is a carbonated soft drink manufactured by the Coca-Cola Company. Originally marketed as a temperance drink and intended as a patent medicine, it was invented in the late 19th century by John Stith Pemberton in Atlanta ...

is still bottled), while Víking is still brewed in Akureyri.

Market-share

Viking Gylltur was by far the most sold beer in Iceland in 2017, and all of Víking's beer has over a quarter of the Icelandic market share (or half of all non-imported beer).

Einstök brand

The Einstök brand (meaning one of a kind), is separate from Viking, while also bottled in Akureyri, and under CCEP, from the beginning mostly sold abroad.

Beer types

Víking mainly produces lager beers (while their craft beer brands are different). The most popular ones are: * Víking Gylltur, 5.6% ABV. * Víking Lager, 4.5% ABV. * Víking Lite, 4.4% ABV. In addition to the above, the brewery also makes seasonal beers for Christmas, Easter and Summer, as well as some all year round special beers such as

Stout Stout is a dark, top-fermented beer with a number of variations, including dry stout, oatmeal stout, milk stout, and imperial stout. The first known use of the word ''stout'' for beer, in a document dated 1677 found in the Egerton Manuscript ...

and Organic Pils.

References

External links

*{{cite web, url=https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/4748/, title=Viking Brewery - Vifilfell Ltd. - Akureyri, Iceland - Beers, website=BeerAdvocate.com, accessdate=25 January 2018
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