HAVING AGREED to sell the three liqueurs it acquired recently from CC, Scotland’s William Grant Sons is focusing on driving the growth of Tullamore Dew Irish whiskey that it also bought as part of the €300 million deal.
Tullamore Dew is currently shifting about 650,000 cases of whiskey a year, making it the number two brand in the category behind Jameson.
But Grant’s chief executive Stella David believes this is only the tip of the iceberg for her new “star” brand.
“It should be a 1-2 million case brand, easily, within five to 10 years,” David told me yesterday.
With such growth in mind, might Grant, as has been speculated, build a distillery in Ireland?
“It’s something that we might consider,” David said. “We will evaluate it. We don’t have to come to a decision on these things really quickly.
“Right now, the most pressing thing to do with Tullamore Dew is to establish it in new markets and expand its geographic footprint and grow the brand value.
“We can do more in markets like South Africa, Australia and Russia. It’s places where the brand has several thousand cases but could do a lot more. It’s about fuelling that growth.”
Offloading the Clonmel-based liqueur brands to Gruppo Campari for €129 million means that Grant, a family-owned business, will have paid €171 million for Tullamore Dew.
David described this as an “excellent price”. Many of her peers would agree, especially as Irish whiskey has been achieving growth of 20 per cent a year in the United States in recent times.
“When you buy something like Tullamore Dew you look to the long term and ask, What’s the brand potential?” she explained.
“Irish whiskey is the ‘hot’ spirits category at the moment, and I think it’s going to continue with long-term double digit growth globally.”
Cheers.
