The great shake-up: style and flavour essential

The incresing global spread of the cocktail lifestyle is boon to the liqueurs sector. The traditional role as a sweet after-dinner tipple for ladies to sip, has being rapidly eroded as mixologists seek out the latest flavours to create fashionable cocktails in the world's top style bars. Felicity Murray reports

The global liqueurs market has been growing slowly but steadily over the past five years to reach a value today of some 80 million 9-litre cases with a similar pattern of growth predicted over the next five years.

Despite a severe decline in the category’s traditional role as an after-dinner drink the sector is, in the main, in good health thanks to the rise of the cocktail culture. Although the largest import markets for liqueurs will remain the western European countries and the US, exciting new markets are emerging in cities across the world – in Scandinavia, Eastern Europe, and Asia – where cocktails and style bars are becoming an essential part of the lifestyle. This movement in the market has encouraged producers to reposition their brands in stylish new packaging as back-of-bar mixers and target their marketing campaigns at bar managers and mixologists in key cities.

Marketed squarely at women
Among the internationally exported brands, the Irish cream liqueur Baileys from Diageo remains the outstanding number one, reporting sales of 7.7m cases in 2007, followed by De Kuyper at 4.9m, Pernod Ricard’s Malibu at 3.63m, Brown-Forman’s Southern Comfort at 2.48m, Kahua at 2.14m, Rémy Cointreau at 1.3m, Bols at 1.26m and Amarula from Distell at just over 1m (source: Drinks International Millionaires 2008).

Baileys and other popular cream liqueur brands – all marketed squarely at women wishing to “indulge” themselves – do seem to be bucking the trend and holding their ground as traditional sipping liqueurs, while other styles are having to reinvent themselves as fashionable flavours for cocktails. But as the global economy continues its downward spiral, people are tightening their belts and the hospitality sector is already feeling the pinch.

Variety of flavours
Lucas Bols’ commercial director Jacco Van Vliet comments: “In some markets, the US for example where the on-trade is suffering, bar owners and operators are focusing on ‘costs per drink savings’ which leads to opportunities for quality range liqueurs that offer good value and a wide variety of flavours.”

One of Bol’s most important marketing tools is its Bartending Academy set up to train bartenders from all over the world.

“Among the skills we teach is ‘speed and efficiency’ and ‘up selling’ and, with that, raised awareness in profitability in serving cocktails,” says Vliet. “These parts of the business have always been important but they become an even more important part of the overall challenge when the on-trade faces stronger competition from home consumption.”

The inspiration for creating cocktails at home, however, tends to come from the consumer’s experience in the cocktail bar. It is with this in mind that brand owners, like Bols, are welcoming a revival of some of the old classics while at the same time introducing and promoting new and inspirational mixes that are simple to create – “just pour over ice and add tonic”.

Return to the classics
“In more developed cocktail markets where we are seeing a return to the classics,” says Vliet, “there is a higher demand for classic and authentic flavours. But in many other markets, innovation, adding new and exciting flavours to the range, helps increase the offer and attract new cocktail consumers. It is a combination of consistently offering the classics and at the same time inspiring with newly added flavours and signature drinks.”

The French liqueur Cointreau, for instance, is the original ingredient for some of the world's most famous cocktails, such as the Cosmopolitan and the Margarita. Top mixologists like Tony Abou-Ganim in the US believe only the best ingredients will do: “The chain is only as strong as its weakest link,” he says, ”and it’s difficult to make a fabulous Margarita is you don’t have a fabulous orange liqueur such as the traditional staple, Cointreau. When people start to cheat on ingredients and use artificial flavours, then the overall quality of the drink is going to go down.”

"Cointreau, much like the cocktail classics, has always transcended fashion," agrees Jane Wilson, distributor Maxxium UK's senior brand manager, "which is why this year we are encouraging bartenders to take a different ‘Cointreauversial twist’ on the classics.”

Richard Ridley, export director Wenneker Distilleries, says the bulk of its sales are concentrated around the traditional ingredients for making cocktails – Triple Sec, Cherry Brandy, Blue Curacao, Coconut, Amaretto, etc. – with the top eight flavours producing about 70% of total sales. “However,” he says, “we have introduced eleven new flavours over the last 18 months. The most popular of which have been Sour Apple, Kiwi, Mango and Watermelon, as barmen continue to look for ways to create new cocktails or jazz up old ones. We are adding Lychee to the range this month, due to “a lot of demand, especially from the Far East”.

Adam Freeth managing director of the Shaker bar school adds that as well as these and the old favorites, DeKuyper’s Rhubarb liqueur is another being well used by the Shaker Events arm of the company at the moment.

Cocktail evolution
“Both the new and the old brands have an equal opportunity in the flourishing cocktail culture of today,” says Kevin Abrook, marketing manager at C&C International which distributes the whiskey-based Irish Mist, Carolans coffee cream liqueur and the Italian hazelnut liqueur Frangelico. “While the US is the biggest consumer of liqueurs, due to its cocktail obsession, other markets are following the trend and these should be watched carefully.”

Benoit de Truchis, export director at Joseph Cartron concurs: “The evolution is really fantastic if you compare now with 10 years ago. We should be optimistic about the cocktail market regardless of the current climate. Nice bars are opening everywhere and having a cocktail has become a way of living. To have a well made cocktail from a good mixologist is like having a good chef in the kitchen of a restaurant.”

Red fruit liqueurs are proving most popular for Catron – strawberry, raspberry, blackberry – and in the last few months the company has introduced Pomegranate and Grapefruit. “Melon is also popular and ginger has become fashionable with Asian food,” adds Truchis.

Rossi D’Asiago launched the Volare range three years ago and, according to export director Nicola dal Toso, business has constantly increased, in part thanks to the bottles being capped with an integrated retractable pourer, Pro Pour, but also though the help of a brand ambassador, Marco Canova, the Italian flair bartender. “Our best selling flavours are Triple Sec and Blue Curacao but many other fruit flavours are growing in popularity, such as Green Melon and Green Apple.”

The introduction of fruit flavours to full strength spirits, such as vodka, has however, had a knock-on effect on the liqueurs category.

“This has increased competition for traditional liqueurs, such as Frangelico, but at the same time brings interest to the category and provides an opportunity for older, more established brands to reinvent themselves,” Abrook says.
Nigel Owen at Match Bar Group, London, confirms this: “Bartenders are indeed trying to come up with new ideas using the old liqueurs, such as Benedictine and Chartreuse, and there has been a bit of a renaissance in ‘disco drinks’ over the past year (bright colours and sweet). Watermelon flavours are popular in cocktails as are passion fruit and kiwi.”

Abou-Ganim concurs: “Yes, we’re going to rediscover many of the classic cocktails as people dust of old Jerry Thomas books and start to make these cocktails which have served us well for the last 120 years. There’s the start of a revival of liqueurs such as Maraschino, Chartreuse, Benedictine, Cherry Herring. Even the Galliano bottle is once again making an appearance on the back bar for Golden Cadillacs.”

Added to this, creative mixologists are searching for liqueurs that are not only new flavours but also use the finest ingredients available. Salvatore Calabrese at the private members club, Fifty, in London’s St James, ifavours an organic liqueur, Gabriel Boudier. “It's basically made from just sugar, fruit and alcohol, just like the old days,” he says. “The essence of the liqueur is very soft and delicate and holds the spirits very well.”

Freeth too is looking for more premium liqueurs that “actually taste like their flavours” and believes organic liqueurs may start to feature. He would like to see the launch of a honey flavoured liqueur while London mixologist Glen Hooper feels what’s missing is the availability of a Mastika liqueur, which is made from the resin of the mastic tree that grows on the Greek island of Chios. It is served cold or at room temperature but usually with ice. It turns milky white when poured over ice or mixed with water and forms small crystals when frozen. Hooper has been bringing it to the UK from Greece and mixing it with gin or vodka. “It’s good in a Martini,” he says.

Bartenders want to try new products and new flavours but Owen makes the point that bar managers/head bartenders can be reticent about buying in these products at the risk of increasing their holding stock and having more dead money behind the bar. “With these types of products you don’t tend to go through them that quickly so if the ideas the bartenders have don’t work then you can be left with a bottle you’re never going to sell.”

After dinner gap
Calabrese thinks it unfortunate that the future for liqueurs is for use in adding to cocktails rather than as an after dinner drink. “I think if people are dining at home they may have a liqueur after dinner but essentially that gap after dinner no longer exists. People used to come to my bar and often ask for specific liqueurs but they no longer do.”

On a more promising note, the bar manager of a popular pub in Surrey, England, told The Drinsk Report: “Our diners are starting to cut back on the amount wine they drink with a meal so they can enjoy that after-dinner liqueur.”

This report by Felicity Murray was forst publlished in Drinks International, February 2009