Americans Drinking A Hell Of A Lot More Whiskey

The love affair Americans have with whiskey continues to grow – that’s the big take away from the release this week of the Distilled Spirits Council’s annual information related to spirits growth the previous year. This group, representing “producers and marketers of distilled spirits sold in the United States,” said that, overall, there’s strong growth in every whiskey category, be it bourbon, Scotch, Canadian or whatever.

There’s a lot of data to sift through from what this trade organization talked with media and Wall Street analysts about around this. Rather then produce a super dense article for you, we’ve put the nuggets below as bullet points for you to ponder over a good glass of your favorite whiskey:

• Strong growth in every whiskey category for the second straight year, with revenues rising 8 percent.
• Super premium whiskeys were particularly popular among American consumers with luxury Bourbon, Scotch, Canadian and Irish whiskeys all recording double-digit gains.
• The appeal of American whiskey – Bourbon, Tennessee and Rye – with consumers here and abroad resulted in 7.8 percent overall growth for the category.
• Corn used in spirits production increased 176 percent while rye used in spirits production was up 64 percent from 2010 to 2014, benefiting America’s farmers and boosting exports.
• American whiskey export volumes of Bourbon, Tennessee and Rye grew 4 percent due to growing consumer interest in these products around the globe.
• 12.3 million more new cases of all types of whiskey were sold last year versus 2010 (59.4 million vs 47.1 million).
• $2.7 billion more in revenue was generated last year versus 2010 ($8.1 billion versus $5.4 million).
• Across revenue categories: Bourbon, Tennessee, rye & white/corn – $2.9 billion; Canadian/blended – $1.8 billion/$664 million; Irish – $664 million; Single malt Scotch/blended Scotch: $732 million/$1.4 billion.

“The positive performance of distilled spirits is the result of many factors including market modernization, product innovation, consumer premiumization and hospitality tax restraint,” said Distilled Spirits Council President and CEO Kraig R. Naasz in a statement.