StateWays is the only magazine exclusively covering the control state system within the beverage alcohol industry, with annual updates from liquor control commissions and alcohol control boards and yearly fiscal reporting from control jurisdictions
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Lunazul, from Heaven Hill Distilleries, is another 100% agave product line with approachable pricing. Beam is partnering with Playboy for a series of in-store promotions and sweepstakes, culminating in invitations to attend celebrations at the iconic Playboy Mansion in Los Angeles. Patron's Halo Effect F rom its modest launch in 1989 to today, Patron Tequila has ushered in a remarkable series of changes in how tequila is perceived, in the trade and with the public. In this journey to now the country's second largest tequila brand, Greg Cohen, spokesperson for Patron, says, "Education has always played a very large role in our efforts and still continues." Nevertheless, Cohen adds, "We still battle poor perceptions of tequila in some quarters, but we hit a milestone in 2012 when we hit two million cases sales." Acknowledging the above-premium tequila segment is getting more crowded, Cohen observes, "We have seen numerous brands come into this segment. We are proud of the fact of widening the entire tequila category." Certainly, Avion's rapid acceptance and growth is in part due to Patron's success. Jenna Fagnan, president of Tequila Avion, says of the original impulse to market the brand, "Ken Austin, our founder, and our team looked at consumer trends, and a product based on quality and authenticity, also required a lifestyle component, so we saw a huge opportunity for a No. 2 ultra-premium Tequila." Its success is a big reason why Avion and PernodRicard USA decided to partner in July 2011, says Fagnan, a development which – given Pernod's distribution clout combined with the turbo-charged endorsement of the brand thanks to its prominence in the "Entourage" television show – lifted Avion to a hot, trendy status other marketers could only envy. In 2013, Fagnan reports that Avion will boost its consumer and trade support across all channels and is still expanding and growing at strong double-digit rates. "Here in the U.S., we're seeing a natural trend toward premiumization," says Jesus Ostos, Brown-Forman's Brand Manager for The new high-end Casamigos Tequila, from Serralles USA. 58 the seventh-ranked El Jimador Tequila, which is, Ostos is quick and proud to point out, the number-one selling brand in Mexico. Citing company research, brands priced in the retail range of $20-$40 a 750 ml bottle are selling the fastest at present. With the brand's marketing aimed at legal age to 29, the brand is aggressively backing its partnership with sports, specifically soccer, with both U.S.-related and Mexicoaccented promotions and sweepstakes. With all this growth, celebrities with a taste for tequila's pleasure have also gotten into the act. Sammy Hagar's Cabo Wabo, marketed by Campari USA, has been in the marketplace for several years, and now there's the newly released El Jimidor has Casamigos Tequila, launched launched another by George Clooney, Rande set of soccerrelated bottles. Gerber and Mike Meldman, with a Blanco ($42.99 suggested retail) and Reposado ($49.99). The new brand is being handled by Serralles USA. One of the more interesting entrepreneurial efforts at the ultra-premium end of the tequila market is that undertaken by Jacob Lustig, national sales manager of Haas Brothers, a San Francisco-based spirits merchant. Lustig, a longtime tequila and mexcal expert, launched Seleccion de Artenom Tequila, unique in that it is the only brand certified by the Mexican government and tequila regulators as available from three different estates. The trio of estate-bottled tequila's all come from higher elevations, where the agave plant is stressed to send down its roots deeper and deeper to capture nutrients and water. This effort yields a richer, more flavorful agave fruit, which in turn adds more complex flavors to the resulting spirit. As Lustig says, "The more you stress your agave, the higher Cazadores, the levels of fruit-driven flavors superpremiumyou'll have." priced tequila line From lively bars where from Bacardi USA, shots and frosty Margaritas gained another 5.3% last year, for rule to colourful floor dis- sales of just under plays of Cuervo or Patron 300,000 cases at the nation's chain and nationally. independent retailers to high-end artisanal tequilas now widely available off- and on-premise, tequila is alive and thriving. Indeed, thanks to plentiful supplies of agave, strong innovation by tequila marketers large and small, and all turbo-charged by growing consumer interest in aged reposado and añejo bottlings, exciting flavors and imaginative line extensions, tequila aficionados SW never had it so good. StateWays I www.stateways.com I May/June 2013