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Winners of The Drinks Business Asian Awards 2024 announced
Last night, db Asia welcomed friends and colleagues from across the industry to celebrate the very best from drinks companies operating in the Asia Pacific region at a ceremony for The Drinks Business Asian Awards 2024. Here, we reveal this year’s worthy winners.
Each year, we choose to honour the impressive achievements of drinks companies operating in the Asia Pacific region. For 2024, db Asia held the annual event at Vinexpo Asia in Hong Kong, welcoming guests to raise a glass to the trade’s shining stars during the first evening of the three-day wine and spirits show.
During the application process, we chose to do things a little differently this year, and asked our friends and colleagues in the drinks industry to nominate the companies in Asia which they believe have outperformed the rest across a range of different categories. Our esteemed panel of judges then elected the very best from the nominees across all seven categories.
This event recognises exceptional accomplishments in a range of categories, from retail buying and marketing to events and auctions. Our judges were so impressed by the calibre of nominees, who have all shown just how tough they can be, even in the face of hard times.
db Asia extends a big thank you to Vinexpo Asia for its support, as well as our sponsors for this event, Townhouse and Riedel and Austrian Wine Marketing Board, as well as our fantastic judges.
On to the winners…
Best Drinks Event
Winner: 67 Pall Mall
Growing on the success of the original London club launched in 2015, 67 Pall Mall now has clubs open in Verbier and Singapore, with Bordeaux, Beaune and Melbourne in development. The private members’ club launched an En Primeur membership in Hong Kong earlier this year.
After six months of planning, on 2 March 2024, 67 Pall Mall hosted 1,000 members and their guests for a sold out, five-hour event hosted at the al fresco Cloud Terrace at Pan Pacific Orchard followed by an after-party at the Singapore Club. The judges were impressed by this entry, and decided to award the members’ club for its event, the revenue of which exceeded S$170,000, with almost 1,000 bottles of wine opened on the day.
Best Retail Award
Commendation: Metabev
Established in 1989, Metabev owns operations in China, Hong Kong and Korea, and offers full regional representation via Eclipse Beverage as well as digital agency Hindsight Creative. Last year, the company ran successful campaigns including its China ‘Top Bartender Tour’, the World Whisky Select showcases in Hong Kong and Korea, and the Cointreau booth at the World DJ Festival in Korea.
This year’s panel of judges decided to commend the company for its efforts in the retail sector through its two-day event at the 2023 HK Whisky Festival, where consumers were given the opportunity to try various styles of whisky from seven brands from around the world, to encourage the idea that whisky can come from anywhere.
Winner: HK Liquor Store
HK Liquor Store was this year’s winner of the Best Retail award, standing out for its commitment to personalised recommendations for customers, its ability to facilitate special orders and deliveries, and execute tastings to interactive workshops for its collection of products from vineyards and distilleries worldwide.
Fine Wine Retailer of the Year
Winner: Crop & Vine
With a team based in five countries, fine wine retailer Crop & Vine has been able to establish connections with vineyards, distilleries, stockholders, negociants as well as collectors and investors across the world throughout its years in operation. The judges awarded this year’s accolade to the company, which continues to react to the market and help clients navigate these challenging times, whether that is dealing with specific sourcing, advice on collections, selling wine or addressing delays in the logistics chain.
On-trade Supplier of the Year
Commendation: Metabev
Winner: Links Concept
Links Concept was founded in 2000 in Hong Kong, before launching branches and wine storage in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen to extend its distribution network to more than 100 cities in China. The company is 100% family owned, distributing over 80 brands in Hong Kong, Macau and mainland China, including Champagne Louis Roederer, Yann Durieux, Marchesi Antinori, Alvaro Palacios and Continuum.
Links Concept has been able to remain resilient in trying times, sustaining volume growth despite the current headwinds that are impacting the industry today.
Best Logistics Company of the Year
Winner: Hillebrand Gori
Based in Germany, Hillebrand Gori specialises in managing logistics for the global wine, beer and spirits industry, whatever the volume — from a single bottle to bulk, along any route, across all modalities.
The company has made recent improvements to its service, helping customers improve overall costs for wine imports, optimising shipment load capacity to save money, and hold stock closer to the market to better meet customer demand and preserve the quality of organic wine imports for its customers.
Best Auction House of the Year
Commendation: Christie’s
Founded in 1766, Christie’s has a presence across 46 countries throughout the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia Pacific, and flagship international sales hubs in New York, London, Hong Kong, Paris, and Geneva.
Christie’s Wine & Spirits department in Asia has been responsible for notable sales including ‘Grands Crus Part III: Finest
and Rarest Wines from the Cellar of Christen Sveaas’ in Spring 2023 (achieved HK$30,274,000, with 99% sold by lot, and 116% hammer above low estimate), and ‘The Dr A. Botenga Cellar: Six Decades of Collecting Part I’ in Autumn 2023 (achieved HK$42,029,000, with, 98% sold by lot, and almost half of lots sold over high estimate).
Winner: Sotheby’s
Sotheby’s operates auction salesrooms across San Francisco, New York, London, Paris, Geneva, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Singapore.
In 2023, Sotheby’s wine and spirits auctions continued to reach new heights by breaking new records and reaching new markets.
Worldwide auction sales reached a new high for the third year in a row, achieving US$159 million.
Indeed, in one memorable week in November, the auction house achieved the highest grossing week of wine and spirits sales ever staged by any auction house, selling as many wines & spirits by value (US$50M) as we did in the whole of 2013. A key part of this week was the US$17 million single-owner sale of The Epicurean’s Atlas in Hong Kong, among the highest totals ever achieved for a single wine sale, and the first chapter in our record-breaking sale from the cellar of Pierre Chen.
In Asia in 2023, Sotheby’s sold more than HK$420m (US$54m) of wine and spirits. In tandem with Sotheby’s 50th Anniversary in Hong Kong, wine and spirits auctions were inaugurated in new parts of Asia – in Shanghai and Singapore. Asia also continues to lead the way for both volume and value of bidders globally for the auction house.
Best Drinks Company of the Year
The headline prize of Best Drinks Company of the Year invites nominations for companies from every corner of the drinks world, from retail and events to logistics and the on-trade.
Commendation: Crop & Vine
Winner: Eclipse Beverages
Metagroup subsidiary Eclipse Beverages won big in 2023, securing regional representation of the Pernod invested Amazzoni Gin, Cincoro, a Tequila co-founded by Michael Jordan, as well as a strategic partnership across Asia with Perrier. The group has also signed a strategic joint venture with Brooklyn born soju Tokki to focus and accelerate growth outside of its core markets, all work which helped to win it the biggest accolade of the year — Best Drinks Company of the Year 2024.