The youngest generation of the Stroh family — whose brewery empire was once valued at $9 billion — has almost no money left to fight over, so now they are bickering over the family‘s reputation.
The Stroh heirs are furious with fifth-generation family member Frances Stroh, of San Francisco, for cooperating with a Forbes magazine story headlined, “How To Blow $9 Billion: The Fallen Stroh Family.”
In the July 21 issue, Frances talks about snorting cocaine in 1985 while the family was having Christmas dinner and said, “My life with my father felt like being inside a gilded bubble.”
One Stroh recently told a friend, “My family is now the laughingstock of the entire American family trust community.”
Frances’ father Eric quit the company — which owned the Schaefer, Schlitz and Old Milwaukee brands, as well as Stroh’s — after a fight with his brother in 1985.
After taking on debt to expand into the nation’s third-largest brewer, the company collapsed and was sold in 1999. The heirs received their last checks in 2008.