The Hindu Business Line : Shaw Wallace eyes premium segment for wine, rum, vodka

SHAW Wallace Distillers Ltd is exploring the possibility of introducing a premium brand of white wine in the country. Having discarded its imported wine brands such as Golden Mist and Papillion in the past, the liquor major is on the look out for `special grapes' for manufacturing white wine in the country.

Mr A.K.M.A. Shamsuddin, President, Shaw Wallace & Company Ltd, told Business Line, "We used to manufacture white wines at our winery in Andhra Pradesh but due to the prohibitive laws in the State, we had stopped making it.'' Currently, Shaw Wallace sports a range of red wines under its Golconda brand in the medium range.

Added Mr Shamsuddin, "We are looking at introducing a premium brand of wines depending on whether we are able to source the special kind of grapes.'' Currently, Golconda wines are manufactured at its winery in Hospet, Karnataka, with grapes sourced from farmers across the country. "We have entered into a special arrangement with farmers across the country and want to improve upon the quality of our grapes before we can introduce a more premium wine,'' states Mr Shamsuddin.

Focusing on the premium segment for the liquor market, Shaw Wallace is hoping to achieve higher profitable growth for all the categories it is already present in. Apart from a premium wine, it is also contemplating introducing a premium white rum brand in the market, which could be a line extension of one of its existing premium liquor brands.

Bacardi sports a premium white rum in the market and Shaw Wallace is hoping to pit its white rum brand against the same.

Besides it is also planning to tap into the premium vodka market with its own brand. In spite of marketing and manufacturing vodka brands such as Vladivar and Absolut Vodka from Kyndal, Shaw Wallace wants to introduce its own brand of premium vodka in the market after tasting success with its White Mischief in the regular segment. It has also introduced flavoured vodka under White Mischief Zing in the past.

Exploring options

"We are exploring more options in the vodka category which is growing at almost 37 per cent," says Mr Shamsuddin. During 2003-04, Shaw Wallace Distillers achieved sales volume in the IMFL segment of 74.43 lakh, against 62.93 lakh the previous year. The sales of the company rose to Rs 476.65 crore, against Rs 312.32 crore the previous year.

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Shaw Wallace eyes premium segment for wine, rum, vodka