Market Watch July/August 2021

What else can be said? Well, apparently a great deal. Every time the Tequila category seems to have gone as far as it can go, it shifts into a new, higher gear. Nothing seems able to stop it—trade worries, supply problems, rising agave prices, and a global pandemic have all been no match for this juggernaut. Since the start of 2020, Tequila has been experiencing a new phase of its remarkable development. Amid the great on-premise surge of 2020, it became one of the biggest beneficiaries. But what’s been so interesting about Tequila is the depth and breadth of its progress. Its range of products has been growing across the board, from the loftiest offerings down through its vast middle tier, and branching into newfound success with prepared cocktails, where…

GoPuff Adds Liquor Barn…. After acquiring West Coast retailer BevMo last year, e-commerce player GoPuff has further bolstered its profile in beverage alcohol with a new deal to purchase Kentucky-based Liquor Barn for an undisclosed sum. The deal will see Liquor Barn, Party Mart, and DEP’s footprint of 23 stores provide infrastructure for GoPuff to integrate into its network of micro-fulfillment centers, currently numbering more than 275 around the country, plus its more than 160 BevMo stores on the West Coast. The Liquor Barn footprint includes seven locations in Louisville, six locations in Lexington, as well as stores in Bowling Green, Covington, Danville, Elizabethtown, Ft. Thomas, and Owensboro. GoPuff added that the acquisition uniquely positions it “to support Kentucky’s Bourbon industry and its thousands of employees by working with distributors to expand…

Las Vegas: Wally’s Wine & Spirits Debuts In New Casino-Resort Wally’s Wine & Spirits, a Southern California institution with more than 50 years of beverage history, made its first moves outside of The Golden State in June with the opening of its new location in Resorts World Las Vegas, a new casino-resort on The Strip that focuses on integrating luxury with modern technology. Wally’s latest unit—which joins locations in Santa Monica and Beverly Hills—is a dynamic two-story venue with a large restaurant and wine bar area, as well as a specialty gourmet market and massive retail operation that spans more than 8,000 labels across wine, spirits, beer, and gourmet foods. Wally’s Las Vegas offers more than 125 wines by the glass, including several prestige labels ($14-$849), and hundreds of bottled wines…

After working as a server for several years in the Los Angeles area, Stephanie Reading had a fortuitous meeting that would make a major impact on her career trajectory. It was 2013 and she was out for drinks with co-workers, speaking to one of their friends about wanting to bartend but never getting the opportunity to do so. “Unbeknownst to me, he was a bar manager himself and looking for new staff,” she says. “Less than two weeks later, I was getting a crash course in classic cocktails and landed my first bartending job at Messhall Kitchen in Los Feliz.” Shortly after that, Reading trained under renowned James Beard-nominated bartender Julian Cox, which opened the door for her to tend bar at several Los Angeles hotspots before finally landing in…

La Naranja China INGREDIENTS: 1 ounce Pueblo Viejo Blanco Tequila;1 ounce Del Maguey Vida mezcal;¾ ounce The Bitter Truth Golden Falernum liqueur;¼ ounce Ancho Reyes ancho chile liqueur;¾ ounce fresh lime juice;¼ ounce kumquat ginger syrup1;3 candied kumquats2, cut in equal sized pieces,plus more for garnish. RECIPE: Combine candied kumquats, kumquat ginger syrup, and lime juice in the small side of a cocktail shaker and muddle. Add Tequila, mezcal, and liqueurs. Fill the large side of the shaker with large ice cubes. Shake the ingredients together short and soft and pour the contents into a double Old Fashioned glass. Sky’s The Limit INGREDIENTS: 2 ounces Aviation American gin;¼ ounce Luxardo Maraschino liqueur;½ ounce Dolin Dry vermouth;¼ ounce The Bitter Truth Violet liqueur;1 dash Scrappy’s Lavender bitters;Lemon peel;Lavender sprig. RECIPE: In a mixing glass filled with large Kold Draft ice…

Dewar’s Japanese Smooth Bacardi has released the latest innovation in the Dewar’s Cask Series, Japanese Smooth. The 8-year-old, 40% abv blended Scotch ($25 a 750-ml.) is finished in Japanese Mizunara barrels for an undisclosed time. Japanese Smooth is the fourth release in Dewar’s Cask Series, joining Caribbean Smooth, finished in rum barrels; Ilegal Smooth, finished in mezcal barrels; and Portugese Smooth, finished in Port casks. The new whisky is available nationwide. For more information, visit Dewars.com. WhistlePig Farmstock Beyond Bonded Rye Shoreham, Vermont-based WhistlePig is releasing two new expressions from the WhistlePig Farm. Following in the footsteps of WhistlePig’s FarmStock Rye Crop Series, released between 2017 and 2019, the new offerings are FarmStock Beyond Bonded Rye and Beyond Bonded Bourbon. Both expressions ($100 a 750-ml.) meet bottled-in-bond standards and are bottled from single…