The MillerCoors brewery in Wisconsin is located on a 90-acre campus in the heart of Milwaukee, in what used to be the corporate headquarters for Miller Brewing — MillerCoors now has its headquarters in Chicago. The brewery, which runs to 2.3 million square feet under roof, turns out more than 8 million barrels, which is equivalent to 248 million gallons, a year of Miller Lite, Miller Genuine Draft, Coors Banquet, Coors Light and other Miller and Coors products, in sizes ranging from 12 ounces to kegs.
North and South Brew Houses brew all the beers produced, which are subsequently filled on one of eight packaging lines. Turning out both Miller and Coors products is one of the facility’s major challenges. The differences between the two products extend to packaging as well as formulation. For one thing, most Miller products are heat-pasteurized after filling, while almost no Coors products are. This means that Coors products must undergo extra-fine filtration in an extra-clean environment to reduce the level of microorganisms enough to confer a shelf life comparable to pasteurized products, which is about 17 weeks.