Bacardi Chief Urges Education Drive Around Cocktails, Exclusive Interview at just-drinks

BROMSGROVE, England, October 17, 2013 /PRNewswire/ --

The head of Bacardi has called on spirits producers to do more to improve consumers' knowledge of cocktails to help drive growth in the overall category.

In an exclusive, two-part interview with just-drinks, the first part of which has been published this week, Ed Shirley, president & CEO of the privately-held firm, says that the spirits sector needs to work together on the issue. "If we as an industry can help consumers better understand how to make cocktails and enjoy them we can continue to fuel the growth in the sector," he told just-drinks earlier this month.

Shirley says that education for consumers around cocktails offers the spirits category's "biggest growth opportunity".

In the wide-ranging interview, Shirley, who joined the Bermuda-based spirits group in March last year, also bemoaned the sector's image in the retail environment. "The spirits industry needs a shake-up in terms of how we present the category to consumers," he said. "If you go down the large aisles of the large retailers, all you see is a sea of bottles, whether it's wine, or spirits. They're not differentiating themselves or helping consumers decide why they should enter this category, or buy this brand."

Shirley admitted that he is not satisfied with the company's current performance, and suggested that it has not done enough to tell the stories behind its brands, such as Bacardi rum and Martini. "We'll tell those stories and I'm confident it will connect with consumers," he said.

Asked about potential M&A opportunities, Shirley suggested the group is not actively on the hunt for anything in particular. "We are going to focus on the things we do have, which we think are really underdeveloped," he said.

Part two of just-drinks interview with Ed Shirley will be published early next week.

About just-drinks.com

Established in 1999, just-drinks is a leading online resource for the global beverage industry, publishing around 20 news articles, analysis features and insights every working day. Under the direction of managing editor Olly Wehring, its experienced team of journalists, consultants and analysts provide a unique and comprehensive blend of reports and interpretation of the beverage industry, including key events, trends, interviews and research that are delivered to over 92,000 business executives per month.

Through its web site, webinars and in-depth management briefings just-drinks offers insight into soft drinks, wine, beer, spirits and bottled water industry developments and supply-chain trends, brand and corporate strategies, CONSULT research platform, enterprise technologies such as PLM and ERP. Furthermore, just-drinks supplies news on manufacturing developments and how the drinks industry is performing around the world.

For details of how just-drinks is helping decision makers make decisions, visit http://www.just-drinks.com.

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