A large, hulking brick building, currently used as a garage, stands at the NW corner of Liberty and Sheffield Avenues in East New York. A row of bricked-up windows on the Liberty Avenue side and a quartet of arched entranceways and two large arched windows attest to its former grandeur. This was the original home of Piel’s, once a widely distributed and famed brand of beer sold in NYC and the Northeast.
The brewery was found by three immigrant brothers from Dusseldorf, Germany, Gottfried, Wilhelm and Michael Piel in 1883. The youngest, Michael Piel, was the company innovator and employed new refrigeration technologies in the brewing and storage process. The windows you see on the Liberty Avenue side originally looked into a beer garden, similar to the existing Bohemian Hall beer garden in Astoria, until 1912 when operations expanded and the Piels needed the space. After surviving Prohibition by brewing “near beer,” the company built what was the USA’s largest neon sign to date and placed it on the corner in 1936.
The 1950s was Piel’s golden age as it purchased the Trommer brewery in Bushwick and the Rubsam and Hormann brewery in Stapleton, Staten Island. During this time, popular commercials featuring animated fictitious owners Bert and Harry Piel, voiced by the comedy duo Bob and Ray, appeared on TV. When sales slowed in the 1960s under pressure from other regional brands (Schaefer, Rheingold) and national brands (Schlitz) Piel’s sold off its acquired breweries, and closed the East New York plant in 1973. In subsequent years, Piel’s was acquired by Schaefer, which was in turn bought by Stroh’s, itself purchased by Pabst, which ended the Piel’s label in 2015. A new Piel’s was founded in 2018.
I don’t remember the Bert and Harry Piel commercials, but I do recall Jimmy Breslin’s “Good Drinkin’ Beer!” spot from 1978. What else can you do with it, clean windows or wash floors?
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4/24/23