Diente y Compañía

Tooth and Co. fue una importante cervecera de Nueva Gales del Sur , Australia. Fue una de las empresas más antiguas de Australia, fundada como sociedad en 1835. Anteriormente cotizaba en la Bolsa de Valores de Australia .

The logo and trademark of Tooth and Co was based on the battle standard of two Saxon chiefs, Hengist (stallion) and Horsa (horse) who invaded Britain more than 1,400 years ago, landing at Ebbsfleet in 449 AD. On the crowning of Hengist's son, Eric, as the first King of Kent, their standard, a white horse known as Invicta, became the emblem of Kent. It was adopted in more modern times as the ensign of Kentish Units in the British Army. Kent has always been the principal hop growing area of the UK, and John Tooth was born in Kent. He made the white horse rampant his company's trademark. In the early 1970s, in an apparent attempt to modernise the image of the company, the symbol was secretly gelded. The more observant staff of the company noticed the change, and saw it as a portent of things to come. Subsequently, the trademark was changed, with some fanfare, to a stylised horse head, as shown on the label shown above. A more recent annual report (1995) showed both the gelding and a knight, located on the corner of a chess board.

Tooth offered numerous staff benefits. The company offered a £10 marriage bonus to those employees getting married while in the company's service. Leave was four weeks per year, with 50% loading. Although there was no formal superannuation available, employees retiring from the company "would be provided for" on confidential terms. There was a staff social club coordinated by Kent Brewery. Following restructuring circa 1975, Tooth had a gymnasium (at Kent Brewery), "Wet" canteen (Kent and Waverley breweries) and a (non-technical) reading room/library. The social club also purchased an old fishing boat, sponsored by the company. The social club published a magazine called Tooth Topics.

Employees had a generous ration of beer at morning tea (called the beer break), lunch, afternoon tea and when they clocked off. Some of the trade supervisors were able to float between bars during the day. The brewery had several bars, in addition to which plant operators could tap a leaking cask for their own enjoyment; such a cask was called the honeypot. Tooth unsuccessfully sought a ruling from the Industrial Relations Commission that the honeypot would be banned. The ruling was that a precedent had been set. Subsequently, an inebriated operator, while travelling home, was hit by a train. Tooth successfully appealed the IRC decision. The honeypot was banned and instead Tooth would issue plastic tokens allowing employees to take home one carton of beer per week for their private enjoyment. That arrangement ended with Carlton & United Breweries.

En una aparente contradicción, Tooth no toleraba la embriaguez entre su personal. Dependiendo del valor que se le atribuyera a la empresa, el alcoholismo podía conllevar un despido inmediato o un periodo de desintoxicación en una clínica.

Antes de 1974, Tooth se basaba en un acuerdo verbal con sus rivales interestatales según el cual no invadirían los territorios de los demás, mientras que los hoteles de Tooth estaban vinculados , lo que significaba que los licenciatarios estaban obligados a comercializar las cervezas de Tooth.

Ambas prácticas serían prohibidas por la Ley de Prácticas Comerciales de 1974. Tooth contrató a McKinsey & Company para que revisara sus procedimientos, empresa que estaba dirigida por Fred Hilmer , un firme defensor de la libre competencia.

Tras la revisión, Tooth realizó varios cambios estructurales; McKinsey siguió en general la línea de pensamiento de la Harvard Business School , que consideraba que la empresa debía recurrir a consultores externos para sus actividades no estratégicas. Entre 1975 y 1980, Tooth realizó numerosas adquisiciones, dos de las cuales fueron la empresa de catering Wright-Heaton y Budge Refrigeration.

En 1975, Tooth reconstruyó la fábrica de cerveza en Irving Street, Sídney, con fondos propios. Entre 1976 y 1982, Tooth and Co. fue propietaria de la bodega Penfolds . Como muestra de la prudencia financiera de Tooth, la adquisición se financió reduciendo las condiciones de crédito con los hoteleros de 90 a 30 días. Posteriormente, Penfolds fue adquirida por Southcorp Wines .

Tooth detectó la debilidad de su situación financiera y tomó medidas para evitar ser objetivo de una OPA. Intentó una adquisición inversa de LJ Hooker para adquirir la experiencia de Hooker en la gestión de propiedades inmobiliarias; la operación fracasó.

En 1981, David Jones , entonces una división de Adelaide Steamship Company , un inversor agresivo y desmantelador de activos , adquirió una participación mayoritaria en Tooth and Co. En 1983, Adelaide Steamship Company vendió los intereses cerveceros a Carlton & United Breweries . ^{[ 10 ]} Posteriormente, Victoria Bitter , Fosters, Cascade Light y Stirling Light se elaboraron en Kent Brewery. Las adquisiciones de Adelaide Steamship Company se financiaron con enormes préstamos, y el grupo tenía altos niveles de deuda ( apalancamiento ). Con el inicio de la recesión de principios de la década de 1990, las tasas de interés aumentaron.

Bajo la presión de sus deudas, Adelaide Steamship Company se vio obligada a liquidar todos sus activos tangibles, a pesar de que sus banqueros habían acordado una venta ordenada. La venta comenzó en 1991 y concluyó el 24 de diciembre de 1999, cuando Adelaide Steamship Company, bajo su nuevo nombre de Residual Assco Group Limited, dejó de cotizar en bolsa.

Con la venta de activos, varias compañías miembros de Adelaide Steamship Company cambiaron de nombre. David Jones pasó a llamarse DJL Ltd antes de que los grandes almacenes volvieran a cotizar como David Jones en 1995. Adelaide Steamship Company pasó a llamarse Residual Assco antes de la salida a bolsa de AdSteam Marine en 1997. Los propietarios de Dextran, y por lo tanto IEL, ahora se llamaban Residual Assco, DJL y Tooth, y aún comparten la responsabilidad tributaria. A la espera del resultado de la resolución tributaria, las tres compañías permanecen en un limbo legal. El asunto continuó prolongándose en los tribunales, ya que en diciembre de 2007 se le concedió a IEL permiso para apelar la resolución de la Oficina de Impuestos de Australia , ^{[ 11 ]} y los asuntos se resolvieron en 2010.

Tooth, como empresa cotizada, tenía que publicar un informe anual . Cada año, las tres empresas (Residual Assco, DJL y Tooth) cumplían con la formalidad de una Junta General Anual. ^{[ 12 ]} La reunión sobre las tres empresas sin valor dura unos veinte minutos; basándose en una comparación con tres brujas acurrucadas alrededor de un caldero, los analistas y la prensa las denominaron las tres hermanas feas. ^{[ 13 ]} Tooth and Co fue excluida de la Bolsa de Valores de Australia en febrero de 2010. ^{[ 14 ]}

• KB Lager – named after the Kent Brewery, once one of the most popular beers in NSW, was produced in small amounts by Carlton & United (CUB) was discontinued everywhere apart from Henson Park, NSW, the home ground of the Newtown Jets Rugby League Football Club until a few years ago when it ceased to be available there are as well. Following campaigning by the on-line group, The Reschs Appreciation Society, CUB resumed making it and it is still available despite it initially meant to be only a limited release.
• Kent Old Brown – a brown ale, different in style from the darker and sweeter Old Black Ale brewed by Tooheys. Kent Old Brown is only available on tap. It is most common on tap in Newcastle.
• Reschs Pilsner – originally brewed by Reschs brewery until it was taken over by Tooth and Co in 1929. It was once a very popular NSW beer, but has never been advertised by Carlton United. It has maintained a level of popularity and is still available in most bottle shops in NSW. Old advertisements depicting Rugby League players from the 1930s to the 1960s, with the tagline "Reschs Refreshes", are now considered collector's items. With the current fashion of being "retro" in Australia, Reschs Pilsner has managed to maintain a market share in the younger demographic, and is available throughout Sydney, and other major centres of NSW (e.g. Newcastle, Wollongong). While being brewed in Queensland by CUB, it is sold only in New South Wales. Critics claim that these 'retro' beers from CUB differ only by their labels, and are not true to the original recipes.
• Reschs Draught, the draught version of Reschs Pilsener is readily available on tap in New South Wales (outside the Riverina district).
• Reschs Dinner Ale (DA) – available again unofficially as of 6 April 2022 in cans only when some retailers jumped the gun and made their stocks available early. The re-release followed campaigning by the on-line group, The Reschs Appreciation Society. CUB officially launched it on 12 April 2022. Originally, DA was available in longneck cans and bottles, but there does not appear to be any plan by CUB to release it in bottles again. The brew was often called 'Dirty Annie'. Its supporters considered it to be the finest of Edmond Resch's creations. In 2012, a 1962 bottle of DA was discovered hidden inside a piano, but the owner has yet to open it.

A feature of Tooth and Co was the sponsorship of large pub paintings in the 1930s and 1940s in NSW. Walter Jardine (1884–1970), an internationally known commercial artist of the era, was contracted to do a series of ink and water colour posters for Tooths. These pub posters sought to advertise beer by associating it with sport, health and cultural sophistication. Tooth and Co owned hundreds of pubs throughout NSW at the time and sought to decorate many with these paintings. Many have now disappeared from the pub walls; they are now highly valued as souvenirs of the era.

• Australian pub
• Beer in Australia
• List of breweries in Australia

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