The Hindu Business Line : UB Spirits mulls extending McDowell brand to Scotch

MCDOWELL & Co Ltd, part of UB Spirits Division (UBSPD), the world's fourth largest spirits marketer, may look at extending its house brand McDowell into Scotch whisky as sections of domestic liquor industry remain upbeat on the market opening up for locally bottled Scotch in the price band of Rs 400 to Rs 600.

Mr Vijay Rekhi, President of UBSPD, told Business Line that the company would look at the possibility of extending McDowell into Scotch. ``We will put our thinking cap on it. If the market opens up for Scotch whisky at a lesser price band, we will definitely be there, and extending house brand McDowell is an option,'' he said in an interview to this newspaper. A host of mid-sized spirits companies are looking at the possibility of taking benefits offered on local bottling of imported bulk Scotch and offering it on par with the top end of the Indian Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL) whiskies.

Currently, McDowell lends its name to No 1 series of brands that straddle three IMFL flavour segments - whisky, rum and brandy - and has a combined sales volume of 13 million cases. Mr Rekhi said the company had initial discussions with lesser-known Scotch labels but saw not much merit as they offered very little in terms of brand equity. It must be mentioned that the company already has two Scotch brands - Black Dog and Scottish Crown - in the deluxe and value segment of the existing scotch market.

Meanwhile, UBSPD, comprising McDowell & Co and Herbertsons, has targeted sales volume of 40 million cases in the current financial year. It clocked 35 million last year to emerge as the world's fourth largest spirits marketer dislodging Bacardi.

However, Mr Rekhi, who has steered the fortunes of UB's spirits business for a decade, cautioned that higher bottle cost and hardening of ENA and rectified spirit (RS) of prices could come in the way of meeting the target. ``But we will not fail in planning for it,'' he added. Its top selling brands include Bagpiper whisky (6.5 million) and McDowell No.1 Whisky (5.5 million). Both these brands are targeting sales increase of one million cases each in the ongoing financial year.