When gin exploded, it was a fast fuse to tonic. Fentiman’s and Fever-Tree spotted the mixer boom first. Indeed, Fever-Tree was created for that exact reason, all the while market leader Schweppes was sleeping on its huge account base. Fast forward to the age of premium tonic and interest in the category is so febrile, just one tonic isn’t enough for a bar. Indeed, while…

Why champagne and not other wine? Because champagne is about brands. And ask a bartender why they stock one of the big marques over a smaller one and they’ll likely answer: “Because they sell.” Just as drinkers have their favourite brands of scotch or gin, they also gravitate towards particular champagne – something we have yet to see in prosecco and other wine categories. It…

The all-time leagues are where we sort the bar-world fads from the fixtures. Over the nine years we’ve been polling the world’s best bars to find out which brands they buy, we’ve seen many come and go. It becomes important then, that we take stock and recognise those that have consistently performed at the top table – brands that are built to last. For our…

So, we know what brands sell best, but do some brands perform better than others for classic cocktails? Here’s our rundown of the brands that are best in classic cocktails. OLD FASHIONED It would make sense that the top three American whiskies would also be the top three to use in the number one whiskey cocktail – and so it is. In…

While the global bar industry continues to stride fourth, ever innovating, ever finding new flavours and ways to combine them, the foundation that is classic cocktails endures. They are the building blocks of the understanding of cocktails and therefore occupy a hallowed place in bartenders’ hearts. Indeed, many of their creations are embellishments on classical form. There’s always speculation surrounding the classics that are popular…

Pernod Ricard’s acquisition of Del Maguey has done nothing to take the shine off the brand – indeed, with added distribution potential this mezcal could rise in popularity. Half the bars that stock mezcal (90% of those polled) stock Del Maguey. Indeed, the cult brand is among the top three best-selling mezcals in 76%  of bars that stock the Mexican spirit. Ilegal Mezcal is more…

Angostura claims its Aromatic Bitters is the most widely distributed bar product in the world. No surprise, then, that it dominates our first cocktail bitters list. Two-thirds of our sample said it was their number one and 81% put it in their top two bitters brands. Peychaud’s, which has long played a supporting role, was only the top bitters in 3% of bars, but was…

It says something of Hennessy’s dominance that it has been found to be the best-selling brandy in bars in each of our nine polls. It’s an all-rounder, with big volume at VS level and expressions at the luxury end of the business. Pretty much every market worth worrying about is covered by the LVMH-owned brand and in the bar channel Hennessy has no equal. Of…

Campari wasn’t always catnip to bartenders. Its success from 2016-2018 as the top liqueur in the Brands Report is undermined by some fallow years – between 2010 and 2013 it didn’t even feature on our lists. Then, it was a bottle gathering dust on the back bar, now those bottles are so regularly replaced they never lose their gleam. Bitter is well and truly back…

Irish Whiskey’s astronomic rise means you can now expect more than a bottle of Jameson at the world’s best bars. The Pernod Ricard-owned brand remains the core of the category, but soon operational distilleries will number more than 30 in this expanding category. With exports around 7m 9-litre cases a year and a forecast to reach 12m cases by 2020, it was about time we…