Heineken: raise a glass - FT.com Dutch brewer is doing well outside western Europe but is still trailing its bigger peers As far as Heineken is concerned, western Europe is the old guy lingering in the corner of the bar short changing the staff. Beer sales in the region continued to drag on the Dutch company's earnings according to full-year results on Wednesday. The good news is that sexier clientele are helping to make that old guy less of an issue. Heineken's organic beer volumes were up 3 per cent last year - growing in all regions except western Europe. The 9 per cent growth in diluted earnings per share helped the company's shares gain 6 per cent. Western Europe has long been a drag for Heineken. But the hefty €5.2bn it paid last year to buy the 58 per cent of Asia Pacific Breweries that it did not already own will reduce the contribution of earnings before interest and tax from the region to 30 per cent, from 35 per cent. Higher margins at the Asian brewer, which is behind premium brands such as Tiger, also help. Heineken should see margin improvement elsewhere, too. The company saved €200m in costs last year as part of its €525m saving programme to be completed within the next two years. Much of that was offset by an 8 per cent rise in input costs, which are set to grow just 1-2 per cent this year. So if Heineken shaves a further €150m off costs this year, say, and keeps advertising spend as a proportion of revenues in line with last year as it estimates, operating margins should almost certainly expand in 2013. Is this enough to close the gap with its bigger peers? Heineken now trades on 17 times forward earnings, a 13 per cent discount to AB InBev and one-fifth below SABMiller. But even after the APB acquisition, western Europe is still twice as important in terms of earnings for Heineken as it is for its peers and its return on invested capital on its physical assets is still lower, notes Bernstein.