28-Aug-2008 By John Harrington
Guinness gets its highest share ever of the beer category, despite flat sales.
Global Brands launches RTD inspired by cider
22-Aug-2008
Global Brands is to launch a pear variant of its VK ready to drink (RTD) range in a bid to capitalise on cider's popularity.The drinks company is...
22-Aug-2008 By Ewan Turney
Alcopop Red Square Reloaded has been ordered to alter its packaging to make it clear the drink contains alcohol. Industry watchdog Portman Group's...
13-Aug-2008 By Ewan Turney
WKD are marking the start of the football season by giving one lucky MA reader the chance to re-enact classic Premier League clashes with their very own table football.
31-Jul-2008 By Jessica Harvey
Beverage Brands has published two WKD footie tactics sheets providing licensees with tips on how they can drive footfall and generate business...
Consumers tired of celeb-based marketing
25-Jul-2008
Brands should stop basing marketing campaigns around sports, music and TV stars as consumers are becoming fed up of celebrity marketing, according to...
Football Preview: Brands are football supporters
16-Jul-2008
Big-name brands are once more piling behind football, in the hope that they can associate their drinks with one of the biggest pub draws there...
Cider: Is it back for good?
15-Jul-2008
They said it was a fad. They were wrong.Summers after cider's big bloom, the category continues to be massively important for licensees. The latest...
WKD plans footie-related pub kits
10-Jul-2008
Beverage Brands will be offering licensees the chance to receive football-related pub kits, downloads and offers for its WKD brand in the run-up to...
West Eleven teams up with Bibendum
30-May-2008
Drinks wholesaler Bibendum is getting behind the on-trade launch of West Eleven, a new range of pre-mixed, premium cocktails.The West Eleven range...
30-May-2008
InterContinental Brands (ICB) has launched the first alcoholic smoothie and will back it with two TV sponsorship deals
Beverage unveils WKD plans
29-May-2008
Beverage Brands UK has unveiled a new television advertising campaign to support the recent repackaging launch of WKD. The company said that its...
WKD launches new ads
20-May-2008
A WKD packaging redesign is to be supported by a £2m wave of advertising that will launch on May 26.While its bottle redesign makes a significant...
'Tesco refuses to sell alcohol to adults with children'
15-May-2008
Tesco is refusing to sell alcohol to parents shopping with their children under rules designed to tackle underage drinking. The supermarket has told...
Britons shun lunchtime drinking
02-May-2008 By Tony Halstead
Drinking after work is now more popular, an SAB Miller survey shows
Tesco struggling with underage policy
22-Apr-2008
An industry chief has urged Tesco to "get its house in order" after four out of 10 stores failed to comply with its policy to combat underage...
16-Apr-2008 By John Harrington
Beverage Brands upset at being singled out by new marketing crackdown
WKD warned for promoting 'sexual and social success'
16-Apr-2008 By Matt Eley Matt
WKD producer Beverage Brands has removed a selection of images from its website after a ruling by the Portman Group. Alcohol Concern complained to...
22-Feb-2008 By Ewan Turney
All Party Parliamentary Beer Group chairman John Grogan has hailed Tesco's call to halt cheap deals as a "significant move"
Reaction to Tesco's move on alcohol prices
21-Feb-2008
Why not add your voice to the debate? Click on the link to the right and have your say...Andy Bond, CEO of ASDA "We are already talking to government...
21-Feb-2008 By Ewan Turney
The Association of Licensed Multiple Retailers has slammed Tesco for ducking its responsibilities
28-Jan-2008
Brits are the most generous round buyers in Europe, according to a new survey. An SAB Miller survey of European drinking culture revealed that 82% of...
SoCo promo evokes Mardi Gras
17-Jan-2008 By Rosie Davenport
Southern Comfort is putting pubs at the centre of its plans with a £1m carnival-themed promotion. In a fresh direction, owner Bacardi-Brown Forman...
Stocking Up for Christmas: Best of the brews
21-Sep-2007
Marston'sMarston's Ugly Sisters is brewed using golden promise malt and fuggles and goldings hops , while Jennings' Redbreast "drinks with a full...
RTDs: Market overview
07-Sep-2007
According to Nielsen, sales of RTDs are down by 17 per cent in the year to May 2007. To the untrained eye it is yet another nail in the coffin for a...
RTDs: Kicking to victory
07-Sep-2007
It has been an interesting few years for Global Brands (GBL). The company started out in 1997 as a drinks distributor and then entered the...
RTDs: How to innovate
07-Sep-2007
One of the more interesting discoveries this year was that Young's pub company had de-listed all ready-to-drink (RTD) brands from its pub estate....
Premiership Preview: getting behind the brands
18-Jul-2007
Major drinks companies are once again getting behind the Premier League season, all with the aim of raising their brands' profiles among football...
14-Jun-2007 By Rosie Davenport
Diageo has pulled the plug on its Quinn's RTD, launched just last year with an £8.5m marketing spend. The company's new head of innovation, Liz...
Ready to re-invent
25-May-2007
The easiest feature to write in the on-trade drinks industry right now is 'The Death of RTDs'. The most recent Nielsen data on the ready-to-drink...
'Supermarket prices encourage drinking at home'
16-May-2007
Deep discounting by supermarkets is encouraging more people to drink at home, says a new report by consumer analysts Mintel. It claims the in-home...
Challenge-25 example set by Asda
10-May-2007
Asda is trialling a Challenge-25 scheme at 10 stores in Scotland and has called on its off-trade rivals to follow suit. The supermarket giant already...
Slate 20's future uncertain as Diageo reviews RTDs
08-Mar-2007 By Rosie Davenport rosie.davenport@william reed.co.u
Diageo is reviewing the future of a handful of brands, including its RTD portfolio as the sector's performance continues to slide. The company is...
Bacardi-Martini closes plant
08-Mar-2007
Bacardi-Martini is to close its Southampton bottling plant in response to "continued and significant" ready-to-drink (RTD) sector decline. Announcing...
06-Mar-2007
WKD is launching a national TV advertising campaign that it hopes will appeal to young adult male drinkers. The ads will continue the 'off-beat'...
02-Mar-2007 By John Harrington
The company blames "significant decline" in the RTD sector
27-Feb-2007 By Sarah Britton
Food developers are constantly switching jobs. Sarah Britton looks at why staff move on so frequently and how this affects manufacturers
27-Feb-2007
A soft toy gift pack containing alcohol has been removed from sale after breaching The Portman Group's Code of Practice on the Naming, Packaging and...
Cool addition to pep-up RTDs
08-Feb-2007
Rosie Davenport rosie.davenport@william-reed.co.uk Beverage Brands is continuing to buck the trend in the RTD sector by launching a new product to...
What can you offer?
05-Dec-2006
There is no doubt when it comes to Christmas Coca-Cola rules the roost. Its TV advertising over recent years has sought to inextricably link the...
Global Brands looks forward to weekends with a vodka kick
06-Oct-2006
Global Brands is stepping up the marketing for VK Vodka Kick with a new push aligning the RTD with weekend fun. The £1.3m 'V KEND' campaign is aimed...
Diageo challenges ASA decision
05-Oct-2006
Diageo has called for an independent investigation into a decision by watchdogs to uphold a complaint against TV adverts for Smirnoff Ice. The...
Stocking up for Christmas: Prepare to take stock and pile up
22-Sep-2006
Selling drinks in pubs at Christmas is the proverbial no-brainer. Just to spell it out, according to recent AC Nielsen statistics, in December alone...
Listening to their customers
11-Sep-2006
"To a large degree, consumers have now taken control of the on-trade market and are not prepared to simply accept what is put before them. The...
RTDs - down, but not out...
11-Sep-2006
"Reports of my death have been great exaggerated". So said 19th century American novelist and humourist Mark Twain. Well if the ready-to-drink (RTD)...
Ready to fight back?
11-Sep-2006
How important is new product development (NPD) for the market?Stuart Davis: I think to keep the category stimulated a degree of NPD is necessary...
The new drinking occasion…
08-Sep-2006
AGE WAITS for no brand. Certainly not RTD brands anyway. Becoming unfashionable is always the danger when you align a product so completely with a...
07-Sep-2006 By Rosie Davenport
Beverage Brands is unveiling a new category-management initiative to help licensees make the most of space in their fridges. Based on AC Nielsen's...
Cinzano unveils Spritzz Up drink
21-Jul-2006 By Jo Grobel
Cinzano is launching its first extension to the brand in 144 years in a bid to attract a younger generation of drinkers. The new wine-based drink,...
Quinn's ripe for Diageo
14-Jul-2006 By Jo Grobel
Diageo is launching a TV ad campaign for Quinn's fruit ferment as part of an £8.5m marketing splash behind the newcomer. Quinn's, introduced in...
