Recently in the town of Beardeaux, in France, an exhibition of wines and brandy named “VINEXPO” was held, in which the most famous wine producing companies of the world were represented. Even Moldova, the wines of which had earned a “veto” on the part of the world supervising organization, was represented at the exhibition in order to enter the market again.
Naturally, Armenian visitors at the exhibition were trying to find the pavilion of the Armenian Brandy Company, which belongs to the French Perno Ricard, which however wasn’t represented in this exhibition. Only one or two employees of the factory were walking in the huge lobby of the exhibition hall. There was no pavilion or billboard. Among the Armenian brandy producers, only the Ararat Yerevan Brandy Company was represented, with its “Noy” brand. Noy was represented by the Russian beverage business named Luding Trade LTD, which is the distributor of 45% of the alcoholic beverages in Russia. Is our brandy so famous in the world that there is no need to represent it? Or maybe the second brandy producer in the world, Perno Ricard, doesn’t care much about the Armenian Brandy Factory production, although the former director of the YBF, Erve Karoff, assures that the YBF spends a lot of money on advertisement. Or maybe the factory or Perno Ricard didn’t have money to rent a pavilion. “It’s not true. We wish more to present Armenian Brandy in the UK market. Here they like to explore new beverages. It’s not a very big market for French brandy,” said Karoff when talking to us yesterday. By the way, it may sound pretty strange for many people, but YBF brandy has never been exported to France. Perno Ricard has been the owner of the factory for over 8 years, and during those years it wasn’t able to export the Armenian brandy. Some amount of brandy was sold in Lyon. Karoff said that so far they haven’t been able to find professionals to do that work. “We have tried to export the product to France but it didn’t work out. It’s very important who the importer is. We have even found somebody who can splendidly represent Ararat brandy in France,” said Karoff. According to him Ararat brandy is being consumed in 20 countries of the world, including Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, the Baltic States, etc. Recently it has been exported to the US and UK. Moreover, 70% of the exported brandy is consumed in Russia. But in general, according to the management of YBF, the product of the factory is most consumed in countries where there is a significant number of migrants from CIS countries. For that reason, the management notes the importance of that market. They consider the former Soviet Union migrants ambassadors of YBF worldwide. And an impression is formed that the hope of the management is only the migrants of the former Soviet Union, those consumers who knew our product before Perno Ricard bought the Brandy Factory in Armenia. And if the geography of consumption of the Armenian brandy increases, it’s done only at the expense of the post-Soviet Diaspora. And, in fact, it seems that Perno Ricard isn’t making much effort to raise the fame of the Armenian Brandy, relying mostly on its past fame and history. Weren’t the past 8 years enough to at least double the consumption rate of the brandy? Didn’t the French prior to buying the factory promise that they were going to use the French culture of brandy production in the industry? It’s natural that the French management of Perno Ricard wouldn’t agree with our “negative” observations. “Don’t forget that the Russian consumer has known Ararat Armenian brandy for over a century. They are the best ambassadors of Ararat, and are going to open doors for us in other countries. But this doesn’t mean that our production is only going to be limited to countries where there is no Russian Diaspora. Ararat is also represented in Vietnam and Japan. Besides that, after privatization in 1998 our main goal was to expand the production levels of the brandy and reach international markets. This is exactly what Perno Ricard is doing right now,” said Karoff, and added that they have made an investment of 15 million USD every year. Especially, the sale of the Premium and Super Premium brandies was raised. The consumption is also being raised in RA. During the 2006-2007 fiscal year, the YBF has provided the consumer with a 3650 hegaliter brandy. This is about 4% more than the previous fiscal year. Last year the YBF stored 28,000 tons of grapes and 2200 hegaliters of alcohol. Moreover, the money paid for grapes and alcohol has also been considered as an investment. The YBF factory is going to expand the varieties of grapes and produce a new brand called “Dvin”. Karoff has been replaced by Sedrik Retayo, 29, who has arrived from Georgia, and together with the GVS company in Georgia, is going to direct the YBF.