Bacardi Limited

Bacardi_Limited_Corporate_logo_gold_20120329.jpg
Type	Private company
Founded	Santiago de Cuba, Cuba (4 February 1862)
Headquarters	Hamilton, Bermuda[1]
Key people	Facundo L. Bacardi, Chairman; Edward D. Shirley, President and CEO[2]
Products	Bacardi rum, Grey Goose vodka, Dewar's Blended Scotch whisky, Bombay Sapphire gin, Martini & Rossi vermouth and Asti, Eristoff vodka, Cazadores blue agave tequila
Revenue	US$ 5.5 billion (2007)
Website	bacardilimited.com

Bacardi Limited, the largest privately held, family-owned spirits company in the world, produces and markets internationally recognized spirits and wines. Its brand portfolio comprises more than 200 brands and labels, including the eponymous Bacardi rum.^[3] Founded on February 4, 1862, and family-owned for the past seven generations, Bacardi now employs nearly 6,000 people, manufactures its brands at 27 facilities in 16 markets on four continents, and sells in more than 150 countries. Bacardi Limited refers to the Bacardi group of companies, including Bacardi International Limited.^[4] The company sells in excess of 200 million bottles per year in nearly 100 countries.^[5] The company's sales in 2007 were US$5.5 billion, up from $4.9 billion in 2006.

Bacardi Limited is headquartered in Hamilton, Bermuda and has a 16-member board of directors led by the original founder's great-great grandson, Facundo L. Bacardí.

Early history[link]

Facundo Bacardí Massó, a Catalan wine merchant, was born in Sitges, Catalonia, (Spain) in 1814, and emigrated to Cuba in 1830. During this period, rum was cheaply made and not considered a refined drink, one rarely sold in upscale taverns. Don Facundo began attempting to "tame" rum by isolating a proprietary strain of yeast still used in Bacardi production today. This yeast gives Bacardi rum its unique flavor profile. After experimenting with several techniques he hit upon filtering the rum through charcoal, which removed impurities. In addition to this, Facundo aged the rum in white oak barrels, which had the effect of "mellowing" the drink. The final product was the first clear, or "white" rum in the world.

Moving from the experimental stage to a more commercial endeavor, he and his brother José set up shop in a Santiago de Cuba distillery they bought in 1862; that distillery housed a still made of copper and cast iron. In the rafters of this building lived fruit bats. Hence, the Bacardi bat logo.^[6]

The 1880s and 90s were turbulent times for Cuba and the company. Emilio Bacardí, Don Facundo's eldest son, was repeatedly imprisoned and was exiled from Cuba for having fought in the rebel army against Spain in the Cuban War of Independence.^[7]

Emilio's brothers, Facundo and José, and his brother-in-law Henri (Don Enrique) Schueg, remained in Cuba with the difficult task of sustaining the company during a period of war. The women in the family were exiled in Kingston, Jamaica. After the Cuban War of Independence and the US occupation of Cuba, "The Original Cuba Libre" and the Daiquiri were both born with Bacardi rum.^[8] In 1899 US General Leonard Wood appointed Emilio Bacardí Mayor of Santiago de Cuba.

The Bacardi Building in Havana, Cuba.

In 1912 Emilio Bacardi travelled to Egypt where he purchased a mummy for the future Emilio Bacardí Moreau Municipal Museum in Santiago de Cuba,(mummy still on display).^[9] In Santiago, his brother Facundo M. Bacardí continued to manage the company along with Schueg, who began the company's international expansion by opening new bottling plants in Barcelona (1910) and New York City (1915).^[10] The New York plant was soon shut down due to Prohibition, yet during this time Cuba became a hotspot for US tourists.

In 1914 Emilio bought a large amount of land in Ponce, Puerto Rico from successful business man, Narcisus Mage. Emilio spent a very large sum of money because of the land's great location.

In 1922 Emilio opened a new distillery in Santiago. In 1930 Schueg opened the art deco Bacardi building in Havana and the third generation of the Bacardí family was entering the business. Facundito Bacardí was known to have invited US-Americans (still subject to Prohibition) to "Come to Cuba and bathe in Bacardi rum."^[9] A new product was introduced: Hatuey beer.

The "Cathedral of Rum" at the Bacardi distillery in Cataño, Puerto Rico, near San Juan.

Bacardi's transition into an international brand was due mostly to Schueg's "business genius"; Schueg "branded Cuba as the home of rum, and Bacardi as the king of rums" and expanded overseas, first to Mexico (1931), then to Puerto Rico (1936), under the brand name Ron Bacardi. (Ron is the Spanish word for rum). Post-Prohibition production in Puerto Rico enabled rum to be sold tariff-free in the U.S. after Prohibition.^[11] He then expanded to the United States (1944).^[12]

During the World War II years the company was led by Schueg's son-in-law José 'Pepin' Bosch. Pepin founded Bacardi Imports in New York City, and was named Cuba's Minister of the Treasury in 1949.

Cuban Revolution[link]

Portuondo and other Bacardí family members initially supported the Cuban revolutionaries, including Fidel Castro and the broader M-26-7 movement: Bosch personally donated tens of thousands of dollars to the movement, and acted as an intermediary between the revolutionaries and the CIA to assuage the latter's concerns.^[11] Family members, employees, and facilities were put to use by the movement and the company supported the revolution publicly with advertisements and parties.^[11] But their support turned to opposition as the pro-Soviet Che Guevara wing^{[citation needed]} of the movement began to dominate and as Castro turned against American interests.^{[citation needed]}

The Bacardí family (and hence the company) maintained a fierce opposition to Fidel Castro's revolution in Cuba in the 1960s. In his book, 'Bacardi, The Hidden War', Hernando Calvo Ospina outlines the political element to the family's money. Ospina describes how the Bacardi family and Company left Cuba after the Castro regime confiscated the Company’s Cuban assets on October 15, 1960; in particular, in nationalizing and banning all private property on the island as well as all bank accounts. However, due to concerns over the previous Cuban leader Fulgancio Batista the company had started foreign branches a few years prior to the revolution; the Company moved the ownership of the Company's trademarks, assets and proprietary formulas out of the country to the Bahamas prior to the revolution as well as constructing plants in Puerto Rico and Mexico after the prohibition era to save in import taxes for rum being imported to the US. This helped the company survive after the communist government confiscated without compensation all Bacardi assets in the country.^[13]

Ospina also explains the close ties Bacardí family members had to the US political elite as well as organizations of state such as the CIA. The family funded various Cuban exile organizations such as CANF.

Embittered Bacardi helmsman José Pepín Bosch bought a surplus B-26 bomber with the hopes of bombing Cuban oil refineries (the bold plan was foiled when a picture of the bomber appeared on the front page of The New York Times. He was also allegedly involved in the CIA plot to assassinate Fidel Castro; documents uncovered during congressional investigations into John F Kennedy's death bring to light a message outlining how he had plans to assassinate Castro, his brother Raúl Castro, and Che Guevara. The RECE (Cuban Representation in Exile) also receives funding from Bacardi family members.

More recently, Bacardi lawyers were influential in the drafting of the 1996 Helms-Burton Act which sought to extend the scope of the United States embargo against Cuba.^[14] In 1999 Otto Reich, a lobbyist in Washington on behalf of Bacardi, drafted section 211 of the 1999 Omnibus appropriations act, a bill that became known as the Bacardi Act. Section 211 denied trademark protection to Cuban businesses products expropriated after the Cuban revolution, a provision keenly sought by Bacardi. The act was aimed primarily at Havana Club brand in the US, which was created by the José Arechebala company which was confiscated without compensation in the Cuban revolution. The Havana Club trademark had been registered by the Cuban government government in the United States without permission of the rightful owners.^[15] Section 211 has been challenged unsuccessfully by the Cuban government and the European Union in US courts; however, the act has been ruled illegal by the WTO (August 2001). The US Congress has yet to re-examine the matter.

Bacardi and Cuba today[link]

Bacardi drinks are not found in Cuba today. The main brand of rum in Cuba is called Havana Club, a formerly private company nationalized by the government. Havana Club was not a Bacardi brand, though Bacardi later bought the brand from the original owners, the Arechabala family, who had it seized from them by the Revolutionary Government without compensation. The Cuban government in partnership with French company Pernod Ricard, sells its Havana Club internationally, except for the United States and its territories. Bacardi created Havana Club rum based on the original recipe from the Arechebala’s, and the product is crafted in Puerto Rico and currently sold in Florida.Drinks now made in the former Bacardi distillery are sold in Cuba under the name Caney.

Bacardi in the UK, despite having no business ties (in terms of production) to Cuba today, has decided to re-emphasize its Cuban heritage in recent years. This is mainly due to commercial reasons. Facing increased competition in the rum market from the now international brand Havana Club, the company concluded that it was important for sales to associate its rum with Cuba. TV advertisements with slogans of 'Welcome to the Latin Quarter' are but one example of this. In 1998, under the distinctive bat logo, the phrase "company founded in Santiago de Cuba in 1862" was added.

Bacardi has faced criticism and legal problems for supposedly attempting to falsely convince consumers they were purchasing rum made in Cuba rather than just marking its heritage. Bacardi adverts in Spain, since 1966, had described a popular combination of rum and Coke as "rum and coke". However, after 1998, it began to describe the drink as Cuba Libre – literally translated as "Free Cuba" which is the original name of the drink and how it's mostly called in Latin America. In this instance, Bacardi faced a legal ruling from the Spanish Association of Advertising Users which forced the company to stop the advert. They concluded that it could "mislead the viewer as to the true nature of the product" as the advert contained so many pieces of Caribbean imagery, one might conclude it came from Cuba.^[16]

Bacardi continues to fight a war in the courts attempting to legalize their own Havana Club trademark outside of the United States. Havana Club is owned by the Cuban government and has a business joint venture with the French company Pernod Ricard.^[17]

The Bacardi legacy lives on in Santiago and Havana through its grand buildings and its historic significance. The Bacardi Building in Old Havana is regarded as one of the finest art deco buildings in Latin America.^[18]

Brands[link]

Bacardi Limited has made several acquisitions to diversify away from the eponymous BACARDÍ rum brand. In 1993 Bacardi merged with Martini & Rossi S.p.A., the Italian producer of Martini vermouth and sparkling wines, creating the Bacardi-Martini group. In 1998 the company acquired Dewar's scotch and Bombay Sapphire gin from Diageo for $2 billion. Bacardi acquired the Cazadores blue agave tequila brand in 2002 and in 2004 purchased Grey Goose, a French made vodka, from Sidney Frank for $2 billion. In 2006 Bacardi Limited purchased New Zealand vodka brand 42 Below. Other associated brands include the US version of Havana Club, Drambuie Scotch whisky liqueur, DiSaronno Amaretto, Eristoff vodka, B&B and Bénédictine liqueurs.

Bacardi is also the only brand to feature the Mexican free-tailed bat as its icon or logo.

Awards[link]

In its 150 year history, BACARDÍ rum has won upwards of 400 awards for quality and product profile making it the world’s most awarded rum. Emblems of gold medals and the Spanish Coat of Arms awarded during the formative years of the business appear on every bottle of BACARDÍ Rum.

Despite the fact that many of Bacardi's offerings are aimed at the lower and middle-part of the price spectrum, BACARDÍ rums have been entered in a number of international spirit ratings competitions. Several Bacardi spirits have performed notably well. BACARDÍ 8, for example, received two gold medals and a silver from the San Francisco World Spirits Competition between 2008 and 2010. In addition, it received the International High Quality Trophy at Monde Selection's World Quality Selections in 2010, and a Grand Gold Medal in 2011. BACARDI Gold, BACARDI 8, and BACARDI Reserva Limitada were also awarded International High Quality Trophy awards at the 2010 Monde Selection’s World Quality Selections.^[19]

Proof66's , a website that acts as an aggregator of professional ratings including the Beverage Testing Institute, as well as scores from other professional rating organizations, places BACARDÍ Reserva Limitada, BACARDÍ 1873 Solera, and BACARDÍ 8 in the First Tier of all rated spirits.^[20]

Hemingway connection[link]

Ernest Hemingway lived in Cuba from 1939 and stayed until shortly after the Cuban revolution. He lived in the small town of San Francisco de Paula, located very close to the Company’s Modelo Brewery for HATUEY beer at el Cotorro.

In 1954, Compañía ‘Ron Bacardi’ S.A. paid him homage when he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature of his novel The Old Man and the Sea (1952), in which he honored the Company by mentioning its HATUEY beer. Hemingway also mentioned BACARDÍ and HATUEY in his novels To Have and Have Not (1937) and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1940).

Guillermo Cabrera Infante wrote an account of the festivities for the periodical Ciclón, titled The Old Man and the Band Name (El Viejo y la marca). In his account he described how “on one side there was a wooden stage with two streamers – HATUEY beer and BACARDI rum – on each end and a Cuban flag in the middle. Next to the stage was a bar, at which people crowded, ordering daiquiris and beer, all free.” ^[21] A sign at the event read: BACARDI rum welcomes the author of The Old Man and the Sea.

In his article The Old Man and the Daiquiri, Wayne Curtis tells us how Hemingway’s “home bar also held a bottle of BACARDI rum.” Hemingway wrote in Islands in the Stream “…this frozen daiquirí, so well beaten as it is, looks like the sea where the wave falls away from the bow of a ship when she is doing thirty knots.”^[22]

Chalk's Ocean Airways Flight 101[link]

On 19 December 2005 Chalk's Ocean Airways Flight 101 from Fort Lauderdale, Florida to Bimini, Bahamas, with an unscheduled stop at Watson Island, Miami, Florida, crashed off Miami Beach, Florida. Sergio Danguillecourt, a member of the board of directors of Bacardi Ltd and a great-great-grandson of the rum company's founder Don Facund Bacardí i Massó, and his wife Jacqueline Kriz Danguillecourt were on board. There were no survivors.

United States headquarters[link]

The Bacardi building in Midtown Miami on Biscayne Boulevard served as the USA headquarters of Bacardi.

In 1964 the Company opened its new U.S. headquarters in Miami, Florida. Cuban-exiled architect Enrique Gutierrez created a building that was hurricane-proof, using a system of steel cables and pulleys which allow the building to move slightly in the event of a strong shock. The steel cables are anchored into the bedrock and extend through marble-covered shafts up to the top floor, where they are led over large pulleys. Outside, on both sides of the eight-story building, more than 28,000 tiles painted and fired by Brazilian artist Francisco Brennard, depicting abstract blue flowers, were placed on the walls according to the artist's exact specifications.

ln 1972, the Company commissioned the square building in the plaza. Architect Ignacio Carrera-Justiz used cantilevered construction, a style invented by Frank Lloyd Wright. Wright observed how well trees with taproots withstood hurricane force winds. The building, raised 47 feet off the ground around a central core, features four massive walls, made of sections of inch-thick hammered glass mural tapestries, designed and manufactured in France. The design came from a painting by German artist Johannes M. Dietz.

In 2006, Bacardi USA leased a 15-story headquarters complex in Coral Gables. Bacardi had employees in seven buildings across Miami-Dade County at the time.^[23]

Bacardi vacated its former headquarter buildings on Biscayne Boulevard in Midtown Miami. Miami citizens began a campaign to label the buildings as "historic". University of Miami professor of architecture Allan Schulman said "Miami's brand is it's [sic] identity as a tropical city. The Bacardi buildings are exactly the sort that resonate with our consciousness of what Miami is about".^[24] In 2007 Chad Oppenheim, the head of Oppenheim Architecture + Design, described the Bacardi buildings as "elegant, with a Modernist [look combined with] a local flavour."^[25]

The current America's headquarters is at 2701 LeJeune Road in Coral Gables.^[26] The 300 employees occupy 230,000 square feet (21,000 m²) of leased office space.^[27]

Mexico City buildings[link]

Bacardi had architects Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe and Felix Candela design office buildings and a bottling plant for them in Mexico City during the 1950s. The building complex was added to the tentative list of UNESCO's World Heritage Site list on 20 November 2001.^[28]

References[link]

Bibliography[link]

• Gjelten, Tom. Bacardi and the Long Fight for Cuba: The Biography of a Cause (Viking: 2008).

External links[link]

• Official website Requires Adobe Flash Player
• Bacardi Limited, company website
• Bacardi on Twitter
• Map of Distillery in Puerto Rico from Google Maps
• List of brands made/owned by Bacardi