Innholdsfortegnelse for November 1, 2016 i Shanken's Impact Newsletter

AN AMERICAN BUSINESSMAN HAS purchased a Bordeaux château and at press time was in negotiations to acquire four others. It’s an ambitious project, but local real estate executives say it’s part of a new wave of interest from foreign buy-ers. And rather than trying to purchase famous estates, they’re looking for lesser-known properties in order to tap a grow-ing demand for value-priced Bordeaux. Tom Sullivan, the chairman of Lumber Liquidators and Cabinets To Go, pur-chased the 12.7-acre Château du Parc in St.-Emilion from Alain Raynaud for an undisclosed sum in September. He says it’s just the first of five Right Bank estates he is hoping to acquire. “If everything happens as planned, we’ll have an [annual production of] more than 300,000 bottles,” Sullivan told Wine Spectator, while stressing that the…

PERNOD RICARD HAS OFFICIALLY unveiled Ultis, the first blended malt Scotch whisky to be released under the Chivas Regal brand. A blend of hand-selected Speyside malts from Tormore, Longmorn, Strathisla, Allt A’Bhainne and Braeval, Ultis (80 proof) is hitting limited cities across the U.S. at a retail price of $200 a bottle. Ultis is launch-ing alongside the next phase of Chivas Regal’s “Win the Right Way” cam-paign, which stars actor Javier Bardem. Ranked sixth among Scotch brands in the U.S. market, according to Impact Databank, Chivas was roughly flat at 357,000 cases last year.…

JAPAN’S KIRIN GROUP HAS TAKEN A 24.5% stake in Brooklyn Brewery, one of the U.S. craft beer movement’s pio-neer companies. Financial terms of the deal weren’t disclosed. Kirin will sup-port growth for the craft player, and the two companies will form a joint venture in Japan to market Brooklyn Brewery brands. That joint venture, in which Kirin will hold 60% and Brooklyn 40%, may also develop original prod-ucts for the Japanese market and launch a restaurant business, Kirin said. Brook-lyn Brewery will continue to operate independently, and its current manage-ment team will remain in place. The craft brewer is slated to move into new headquarters at the Brooklyn Navy Yard in 2018. Those facilities will in-clude a 75,000-square-foot brewery and rooftop bar. Brooklyn Brewery is the 12th-largest craft brewer in…

BARDSTOWN BOURBON CO., THE Kentucky distiller in which Constel-lation recently took a minority stake (story, cover), is planning to expand its current capacity of 1.5 million proof gallons (roughly 750,000 nine-liter cases) to 6 million proof gallons (3 million cases) looking ahead. Led by entrepreneur David Mandell and former Maker’s Mark master dis-tiller Steve Nally, Bardstown began production at its $25 million facility in September, and says the planned expansion is owing to the early success of its “Collaborative Distilling Pro-gram,” through which it creates cus-tomized whiskies for craft distillers and brand owners. Along with Con-stellation’s recent acquisition of High West, the Bardstown investment “jumpstarts our opportunity to further explore innovation in the brown spir-its category,” noted Constellation CEO Rob Sands. –Daniel Marsteller…

 RÉMY COINTREAU HAS FORMED A JOINT VENTURE WITH LUCAS BOLS ON PASSOÃ passion fruit liqueur. Under the terms of the jv, Rémy will continue handling distri-bution, manufacturing, trademarks and inventory, while Lucas Bols will contribute working capital (estimated at around $5.5 million) and assume operational and fi-nancial control of the jv. Additionally, Lucas Bols could acquire all shares held by Rémy Cointreau in the venture at a future date. Under Rémy’s stewardship, distribu-tion of Passoã (launched in 1986) has reached more than 40 countries, with Western Europe accounting for most of the brand’s roughly $20 million in annual turnover.…

BEAM SUNTORY HAS REVEALED PLANS to pour $1 billion into its Kentucky Bourbon operations over the next five years. According to the Louisville Busi-ness Journal, Suntory Holdings Ltd. CEO Takeshi Niinami told a Japan/ American Society of Kentucky lun-cheon in late October that the outlay won’t cover new capital investment, but rather will fund ongoing operating costs at its Jim Beam and Maker’s Mark dis-tilleries amid the U.S. market’s Bour-bon boom. Niinami also noted that Jim Beam Bourbon now sells more than half-a-million cases in Japan, up from 30,000 cases in 2012.…

COM•Diageo has announced a number of changes to its commercial leadership team in North America, naming Tom Looney to the new role of president, U.S. Spir-its and Diageo Canada, ef-fective October 1. Looney, formerly president, U.S. open and control states, takes over national accounts and central commercial re-sponsibilities from current Diageo NA chief commer-cial officer Jeff Ivey, who is retiring. Ivey will stay on in a transitional role through next June. • Jackson Family Wines (JFW) has named Charlotte Selles vice president, mar-keting. Previously market-ing director for Paul Hobbs Winery, Selles will oversee JFW’s international portfo-lio, including Chateau Lassègue, Chateau Vignot and Bellevue-Seillan from France; Tenuta di Arceno and Tenuta L’Illuminata from Italy; Rock-Bare and Yangarra Estate from Australia; Catalina Sounds from New Zealand; So-noma’s Vérité; and Chile’s Alcance. She…

THERE’S NO LACK OF HOT CATEGORIES IN THE U.S. spirits market, but Irish whiskey may well be the hottest of all. In 2015, category volume jumped by more than 18% to just under 3 million cases, capping off a decade that witnessed one of the most remarkable rises in industry history. In 2005, Irish whiskey volume in the U.S. stood at less than 600,000 cases. Then, as now, Jameson held a commanding lead atop the category, but obviously the brand— like Irish whiskey as a whole—was in a much different place than it is today. Back then, Jameson sold less than 400,000 cases annually. In 2015, it was more than six times that figure. Jameson’s success has sparked widespread interest in Irish whiskey, lifting its com-petitors (as well as its…

 JACKSON FAMILY WINES HAS BOLSTERED ITS OREGON PRESENCE WITH THE acquisition of Willamette Valley’s Willakenzie Estate. Known for single-vineyard Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris, Willakenzie has 125 planted acres in the Yamhill-Carl-ton and Dundee Hills areas. The deal includes the brand, winery, hospitality cen-ter and vineyards. A price wasn’t disclosed. Concurrently, Jackson Family has an-nounced plans to build a new small-lot winery in McMinnville, Oregon, dedicated to producing Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Pinot Gris. Construction began in Au-gust, and the facility is expected to be operational by the 2017 harvest. In addition to the newly added Willakenzie, Jackson Family’s Oregon portfolio includes Zena Crown Vineyard, Gran Moraine and Penner-Ash. The company’s La Crema and Siduri brands also offer Willamette Valley wines.…

ANHEUSER-BUSCH INBEV (ABI) HAS completed its blockbuster acquisition of SABMiller, in a move that reshapes the beer landscape both globally and in the U.S. The new entity, created with ABI’s $100 billion-plus purchase of its archri-val, will continue to be known as An-heuser-Busch InBev SA/NV. Its global market share exceeds 30%, according to Impact Databank. In the U.S. market, the deal paves the way for Molson Coors to become the sole owner of MillerCoors. Molson Co-ors, which now becomes the world’s fifth-biggest brewer, according to Im-pact Databank, is paying $12 billion to acquire SABMiller’s 58% stake in MillerCoors. MillerCoors, the U.S. market’s second-leading brewer, was formed in 2008 when SABMiller and Molson Coors merged their U.S. brew-ing interests. It will remain based in Chicago, where it’s headed by CEO Gavin…

IN ORDER TO MEET THE CHALLENGES OF THE COMING decade, Wine Spectator has engineered two major pro-motions. Kim Marcus, formerly managing editor of Wine Spectator at the New York headquarters, has been named bureau chief in our Napa office, where he will join senior editor James Laube and the entire West Coast team. Cordelia Winton will succeed Marcus as the mag-azine’s managing editor in New York. Marcus joined Wine Spectator in 1988 as a news re-porter in the San Francisco office; he was previously edi-tor of the St. Helena Star. He moved to New York in 1993 and became managing editor in 1999. In addition to his editorial responsibilities, he has written cover sto-ries on subjects as diverse as Napa’s Bill Harlan, Califor-nia’s phylloxera crisis and, most recently, the wines…