EXCLUSIVE: Distell consolidates, appoints bespoke WPP agency

by Herman Manson. Distell has consolidated and awarded its account to a new WPP bespoke agency led by Fran Luckin and Paul Jackson.

Shelf Life: #DontLetThemDisappear — elephant taken off Amarula label

Amarula, FCB Africa fight ivory trade; SA’s first craft-gin club, The Gin Box; and eBay partners with Mall for Africa — Cheryl Hunter’s weekly pick!

Shelf Life: Amarula’s quarter-century celebrations

Louise Marsland (@Louise_Marsland)’s weekly pick of recent product, packaging and design launches: Amarula’s R25m, 25-year celebration; Pick n Pay supports WDC2014 with design deal; Barista Chardonnay 2013 launches; and Melrose Arch has a designer Man Cave!

Shelf Life: New digital media network for forecourt stores

Louise Marsland’s (@Louise_Marsland) pick of new product, packaging and design launches.

Graffiti gives forecourt screen advertising a go;Amarula has a full harvest for Spring; the bygone era of the ‘gentleman’s club’ revitalised by the new McCullagh & Bothwell designs; and Huggies gets a dose of reality.

Shelf Life: SA mayo campaign wins international award & an app for Elephants

Louise Marsland’s (@Louise_Marsland) pick of new product, packaging and design launches.

How to look like Brad Pitt with V05, Tequila wins something, sponsorship goes large with Sunfoil and Amarula does something really cool with elephants.

Amarula – the elephant in the global liqueur cabinet

by Herman Manson (@marklives) Amarula, the cream liqueur owned by Stellenbosch based Distell, has in recent years emerged as a global brand name that is achieving ongoing growth in numerous key markets including Brazil and Angola. Few consumers would guess that the brand launched in 1983 as a clear spirit with an alcohol content closing in on the 40% mark.

Distell was looking for indigenous ingredients with which to compete in a market which had just gone crazy for fruit flavoured liqueurs which ranged from strawberry to peaches to litchi. It picked the fruit from the Marula tree. The clear spirit was of middling success.

Six years later the cream liqueur we know today was launched. The lower alcohol content produced a softer taste and opened it to a wider audience. By 1991 it was being exported to the Netherlands and given an international brand focus. Today it’s exported to over a 100 markets.

Drinks International, a magazine devoted exclusively to the global spirits market, this year ranked Amarula as one of its fastest growing global brands at a time when rival Baileys (the biggest selling cream liqueur brand globally) experienced “sluggish growth” as did the number two cream liqueur brand De Kuyper which experienced a decline in its main US market. The Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay triangle makes up its second biggest market for Amarula after South Africa and is followed in turn by Angola.

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