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Top 50 Drinks Wholesalers 2024 ranking: 40-31 revealed

Published:  01 October, 2024

This week marks the launch of our Top 50 Drinks Wholesalers 2024 results, singling out and celebrating the best in the business when it comes to supplying wines, spirits and beers.

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Top 50 Drinks Wholesalers 2024 ranking: 50-41 revealed

Published:  30 September, 2024

This week marks the launch of our Top 50 Drinks Wholesalers 2024 results, singling out and celebrating the best in the business when it comes to supplying wines, spirits and beers.

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Joshua Castle: ‘Looking Back, Forging Ahead’

Published:  12 August, 2024

We continue our series with Joshua Castle, group head buyer, Keeling Andrew, Noble Rot and Shrine to the Vine.

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The results: Top 50 Sommeliers 2024

Published:  01 July, 2024

Harpers is delighted to reveal our newly expanded Top 50 Sommeliers list, celebrating the best in this dynamic and hugely important part of the hospitality and drinks world. Special congratulations go to Gareth Ferreira MS, head sommelier and beverage director at Core by Clare Smyth, who tops an incredible round up of talent.

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Jerry Lockspeiser: Are we getting the most from our marketing spend?

Published:  24 June, 2024

I like to consider myself an open minded, flexible kind of guy. But when I ran businesses I could sense the shutters coming down every time we had a management discussion about how much to spend on marketing.

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Nick Gillett: Satisfying distributors – the secret sauce for spirits brands

Published:  13 May, 2024

I don’t think I have to preach about the benefits of working with a distributor when it comes to the UK spirits industry. It’s a complicated market at the best of times and currently full of challenges like cost-of-living pressures and hospitality closures, which in turn lead to more cautious buyers that are harder to access.

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Jerry Lockspeiser: Why the government doesn’t understand entrepreneurs

Published:  26 March, 2024

Someone once told me that you know what your ideal job is when you enjoy it so much, are so motivated to get up and crack on every morning, that you’d do it even if you weren’t paid. That’s perhaps a bit unrealistic for most people whose primary motivation is to earn money to live, but the point is clear. It helps a lot if you love what you do.

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Round table: Sustaining the trade

Published:  25 March, 2024

Imagine a near future where there is little need for talk of sustainability. This would be coupled with an overarching accreditation that joins the dots for sustainably-minded consumers, with drinks companies naturally taking an holistic view of all aspects of their businesses, aligned with their partners up and down the supply chain. There would, of course, be those left behind, who had failed to embed sustainability in their DNA. But such companies will have become few and far between as the combined power of green consumer purchasing and supply-partner pressure increasingly left such organisations by the wayside, as relics of a bygone era.

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Jerry Lockspeiser: Are we forgetting what customers care about most?

Published:  25 January, 2024

Izzy is a twenty-year-old student at York University. Many decades ago I was one there too. In my time students received grants for living costs and tuition fees were paid by the Government. Today those are dealt with by repayable loans. But the loans may not be enough to allow access to all. Like Izzy, for example.

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50 Best Indies 2024 ranking: 30-21 revealed

Published:  10 January, 2024

This week we continue the rollout of our 50 Best Indies 2024 results, celebrating the top merchants from across this dynamic and ever-engaging sector.

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Nick Gillett: How the duty rise reveals the lack of duty to business

Published:  08 August, 2023

It doesn’t seem to matter what flavour of government you have at the moment – when it comes to the spirits and hospitality industries, there’s a stench of incompetence. In Scotland we have the incredibly public failure of the DRS scheme, which, as a result, has wasted millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money. But don’t be fooled – it really is no better, south of the border. Westminster will raise you a cock up, in the form of the increased duty rates.

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Drinks trade welcomes new personnel in summer reshuffle

Published:  28 June, 2023

A diverse line-up of manufacturers, distilleries and promotional organisations have announced new appointments this week, including Glenmorganie and the BIVB.

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Jerry Lockspeiser: It’s time the Bank of England joined us in the real world

Published:  28 June, 2023

The Bank of England’s decision to increase the base rate to 5% is a stab in the eye to under pressure businesses and struggling consumers. It would be hard enough to swallow if it were the right medicine for the illness. When it is based on a misdiagnosis it is unacceptable.

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Exclusive: The Drinks Trust launches ambitious Cost of Living Crisis Appeal

Published:  08 June, 2023

The Drinks Trust is looking to raise an unprecedented £230,000 with its new Cost of Living Crisis Appeal between now and the end of the year.

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Cashflow support fails to soothe Scottish DRS concerns

Published:  22 February, 2023

Circularity Scotland has announced that £22 million of cashflow support will be made available to Scottish producers preparing for the Deposit Return Scheme (DRS).

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Looking Back, Forging Ahead Q&A: Steve Moody, Fells

Published:  09 January, 2023

In the last of our end of year Q&A series, Steve Moody, CEO at Fells, reflects on the highs and lows of 2022, plus the hopes and plans for the business in the year ahead.

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Hennessy Partners with Golden Vines for diversity scholarship

Published:  11 April, 2022

Hennessy, the leading Cognac Maison and the premium spirits brand leader (#1 in value worldwide in 2021), is proud to support the newly introduced Hennessy Golden Vines Diversity Scholarship in Spirits in partnership with the Gérard Basset Foundation and Liquid Icons.

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Jerry Lockspeiser: Resetting business values in the wake of P&O

Published:  28 March, 2022

Business morals and behaviour are never far from the headlines. Nor should they be. Business in its various forms is arguably the motor of our world. From the urban corner store and rural small holding to the multinational finance business and corporate drinks giant, business is central to the lives of virtually everyone on the planet today. From working in the private sector to sourcing medicines for a hospital or shopping in a supermarket, the web of business surrounds us all.

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Hospitality cries for help

Published:  07 March, 2022

James Bayley dives into ‘quintuple shock’ looming on the horizon in April, as businesses call for more ongoing support to boost recovery.

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The Drinks Trust opens applications for vocational hardship programme

Published:  22 February, 2022

The Drinks Trust has announced that applications for its new vocational programme are now officially open to applicants. For the first time in its 135-year history, the Trust has introduced an initiative to alleviate long term hardship and train and educate the next generation of drinks and hospitality industry professionals.

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