Grey Goose (vodka)

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For other uses, see Grey Goose (disambiguation)

Grey Goose

Type	Premium Vodka
Alcohol by Volume	40.0%
Proof	80
Manufacturer	Bacardi
Country of Origin	France
Introduced	1997 in USA
Variants	L'Orange, La Vanille, Le Citron
Related products	Belvedere, Van Gogh, Chopin, Ketel One

Grey Goose is a premium brand of vodka. It is distilled in Cognac, France from French wheat, then imported by the Sidney Frank Importing Company in New Rochelle, New York. In 1997, it quickly gained a reputation for quality and has won several prestigious awards in distilled spirit competitions. In 2004, Sidney Frank sold the manufacturing rights to Bacardi for $2.2 billion. The first French vodka, Grey Goose has some competitors as the French vodkas Nuage, Idol, and Cîroc are all now on the market. Considered as premium brands, these vodkas are sold at high prices, mostly in North America.

1 Flavors
2 Corks
3 Production and history
4 Grey Goose and the "superpremium" vodka market
5 Notes
6 External links

[edit] Flavors

Besides the original Grey Goose, it comes in several flavored versions as well.

Original (pictured)
L'Orange (pictured)
La Vanille
Le Citron
La Poire

Grey Goose's La Vanille has met only limited success in the United States market.

[edit] Corks

Grey Goose vodka is bottled with a replaceable cork rather than a screw-top cap. This is modelled after Polish vodkas, namely Chopin, Belvedere, and Evolution, as well as some Polish nalewkas.

[edit] Production and history

Unlike vodkas with a long history, Grey Goose was tailor-made for the US market in 1997 as the brainchild of Sidney Frank, a self-made billionaire. His concept was to create a super-premium vodka for Americans. He took the idea from the notion of French manufacturing having an inherent link with high perceived quality, quickly dispatching a team to Europe. As a result, Grey Goose was invented.

Grey Goose uses French winter wheat from the south of Paris, distilled in a continuous still and alpine spring water that has been filtered through the limestone plateaux of the Massif Central. The distillation takes place in the Cognac region of France.

Grey Goose was recently sold in the largest ever single brand sale for $2 billion, in cash, to Bacardi.^[1] This sale made Frank an estimated profit of $1.6 billion. Incidentally, Frank was also behind the success of Jaegermeister before launching Grey Goose. Before his death on January 10, 2006 at the age of 86, his final projects included "Crunk" energy drink, a joint venture with hip-hop entrepreneur Lil' Jon, and a premium tequila named Corazon.

The current "Global Brand Ambassador" for Grey Goose is Dimitri Lezinska from Paris.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Grey Goose and the "superpremium" vodka market

When Sidney Frank created Grey Goose virtually out of thin air, he made the bold move to price it well above established competitors such as Absolut. This high price created a perception that is clear, however, is that Grey Goose was a financial hit and led to significant changes in the market. Many people attribute Grey Goose as being a major inspiration for the various other high-priced superpremium vodkas.^{[attribution needed]} Examples of vodkas that would follow in the footsteps of Grey Goose include Cîroc, from France, and Level, from Sweden.