Pernod Ricard ousts Stamford distributor
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- May
- 7
Pernod Ricard USA LLC, the Purchase company that sells alcoholic drinks, has succeeded in ousting a Stamford, Conn.-based distributor of Seagram’s Coolers in the United States, the Caribbean and U.S. military bases worldwide.
The company said High Falls Brewing Co. LLC of Rochester has been named the exclusive distributor for the drinks. High Falls will also make and pack the drinks, which are currently made at a Pernod facility in Indiana. United States Beverage, the distributor since 2002, will remain the distributor until the end of June.
Pernod sued United States Beverage, arguing that the supplier’s five-year contract to buy and sell Pernod’s Seagram’s Cooler low-alcohol drinks expired at the end of March.
Pernod Ricard wanted to replace United States Beverage with the High Falls Brewing Co. United States Beverage countered that it paid Pernod more than $30 million in fees and spent additional tens of millions of dollars to market the drinks based on Pernod’s promises of a long-term relationship.
The sides settled their lawsuit in March but did not announce terms of the settlement at that time.
In court papers, Pernod indicated it was important for it to have a clear picture as to who the supplier would be before warm weather hit.
The company said most of the sales take place from May to August and that by insisting that it would still be the supplier during those months United States Beverage was causing “great confusion� in the marketplace, making it hard for High Falls to take over the job smoothly and harming the brand.
The company said it considered 2007 a particularly important year for the brand, since sales of the drinks fell last year.
This entry was posted
on Monday, May 7th, 2007 at 3:49 pm by Allan Drury.
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