The quality of beer is controlled in breweries at each individual level of the production process. The presence of beer spoilage microorganisms is associated with an elevated risk to beer quality. Microbial contaminations create a negative impact on the taste, the texture and the smell of the final product. Contamination can occur over the entire production process, although the area of the filling machine is the main spot for contamination. For this reason, filling machines are cleaned intensively on a regular basis and the success of the cleaning process is controlled via close hygiene monitoring.

During this process, swabs are taken from different places on the illing machine, especially in the area of the fillers, and are transferred to a selective culture medium in order to monitor the potential bacterial growth. In the case of slow-growing or hard-to-cultivate bacteria being present in the swab, it can take days, up to