The Millionaire Club - Alcohol Imports
The definiTive ranking of The world's million-case spiriTs brands
2012
The
The
June 2012 drinksint.com
3
welcome to the club here are clubs for ladies, for gentlemen, the gentry and the socially sedentary. Clubs where handshakes, back-slaps and ridiculous blazers maintain a cosy elitism. The Millionaires’ Club is not one of these clubs. Here we favour meritocracy over cronyism – if a spirits or liqueur brand sells a million 9-litre cases it’s in, if it doesn’t, it’s out. This year the revolving door has welcomed more brands than it has ejected, with membership now numbering 181. We have a slew of novice Millionaires – affirmation to burgeoning brands that if you get the proposition and market right, the million-case mark is eminently achievable. Of the newcomers to Millionaire status there’s La Martiniquaise’s Poliakov vodka, which inched its way past the million-case mark, presumably in the very last knockings of 2011. Then you have Cîroc which, through P Diddy’s notoriety and Diageo’s know-how, managed to pole-vault nearly 50 of its competitors to debut at 133. The global analysts at Euromonitor International have also unearthed some new names. There are those that have quietly amassed sales but been shy up to now about opening their ledgers. For those maintaining a non-declaration policy, the arrival of the Philippines’ Emperador to the list should dispense with the need for rhetoric. The brand debuted at number four in the list and simultaneously announced itself to the drinks world as the number-one selling brandy. Glenfiddich’s advancement is also worth a column inch. The Speyside malt is somewhat of an avant-garde figure among the 100 or so scotch distilleries that, up to now, might have resigned to thinking their place in life was in the narrow, not broad market. With the likes of The Glenlivet poised a few hundred thousand cases short of a million, Glenfiddich may be the pioneer, but it won’t be the single single malt in the list for
2012
The
The
June 2012 drinksint.com
3
welcome to the club here are clubs for ladies, for gentlemen, the gentry and the socially sedentary. Clubs where handshakes, back-slaps and ridiculous blazers maintain a cosy elitism. The Millionaires’ Club is not one of these clubs. Here we favour meritocracy over cronyism – if a spirits or liqueur brand sells a million 9-litre cases it’s in, if it doesn’t, it’s out. This year the revolving door has welcomed more brands than it has ejected, with membership now numbering 181. We have a slew of novice Millionaires – affirmation to burgeoning brands that if you get the proposition and market right, the million-case mark is eminently achievable. Of the newcomers to Millionaire status there’s La Martiniquaise’s Poliakov vodka, which inched its way past the million-case mark, presumably in the very last knockings of 2011. Then you have Cîroc which, through P Diddy’s notoriety and Diageo’s know-how, managed to pole-vault nearly 50 of its competitors to debut at 133. The global analysts at Euromonitor International have also unearthed some new names. There are those that have quietly amassed sales but been shy up to now about opening their ledgers. For those maintaining a non-declaration policy, the arrival of the Philippines’ Emperador to the list should dispense with the need for rhetoric. The brand debuted at number four in the list and simultaneously announced itself to the drinks world as the number-one selling brandy. Glenfiddich’s advancement is also worth a column inch. The Speyside malt is somewhat of an avant-garde figure among the 100 or so scotch distilleries that, up to now, might have resigned to thinking their place in life was in the narrow, not broad market. With the likes of The Glenlivet poised a few hundred thousand cases short of a million, Glenfiddich may be the pioneer, but it won’t be the single single malt in the list for