Yerevan Brandy Company
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Yerevan Brandy Company | |
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| Type | Closed Joint-Stock Company |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1887 |
| Headquarters | Yerevan, Armenia |
| Key people | Herve Caroff (President and General Director) |
| Industry | Drinks |
| Products | Alcoholic beverages |
| Website | www.ybc.am |
Yerevan Brandy Company (YBC) (Armenian: Երևանի Կոնյակի Գործարան) is the leading enterprise of Armenia for the production of alcoholic beverages. Its main brand name is Ararat. Currently the company boasts a large following, particularly in Russia, as well as in Ukraine and Belarus. The Russian market accounts for about 85% of exports.[1] YBC is owned and operated by the French giant Pernod Ricard.
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[edit] History
YBC was founded in 1887 by a wealthy 1st guild merchant Nerses Tairyants with the help of his cousin Vasily Tayrov. Tairyants began distilling brandy at the winery he had founded ten years earlier inside the former fortress of Yerevan. The enterprise reached its hey-day in 1898, when it was acquired by Nikolay Shustov, a well-known Russian vodka and liqueur producer. Shustov's company, Shustov and Sons were appointed as the supplier of His Imperial Majesty’s court. During the International Exhibition in Paris in 1900, the brandy received the Grand-Prix and the legal right to be called ‘cognac’, not ‘brandy’, following a blind degustation.[2] In 1948, in connection with the reorganization of the Yerevan Wine & Brandy Factory (known until 1940 as the Shustov Factory), the factory building was separated into the Yerevan Wine Factory and the Yerevan Brandy Factory. The independent history of the plant began in 1953 when a new building was constructed specifically for the production of brandy. The new building stands on a high plateau at the other end of the Victory Bridge in Yerevan, opposite to the Yerevan Wine Factory. With its nine austere arches, and long flight of steps leading to it, the building is hailed as one of the best architectural examples of the Soviet period in Yerevan.
[edit] Production and current state
From 1953 untl 1991 YBC was the only plant that produced Armenian brandy. The remaining plants of Armenia were occupied solely by distillation. YBC bottled ordinary (three -, four- and five-year) brandy's as well as the famous labelled brands ("Dvin", "Yerevan", "Nairi", "Vaspurakan", "Ararat" and "Akhtamar"). YBC's monopoly to bottle and export brandy was liquidated in 1991. For more than 20 years (from 1948 through 1973) the chief technologist of YBC was Markar Setrakyan (Hero of Socialist Labor). YBC was privatized in 1998 and was sold to the international group "Pernod Ricard". The sum of the transaction was 30 million US dollars. The Armenian government was heavily criticized by the general public for the sale.[1]
In April 1999, on the initiative of YBC a new standard was introduced in the Republic of Armenia named "Armenian cognac", which rigidly regulates the production of this beverage. YBC remains the uncontested leader on the volume of production and the export of Armenian brandy. YBC possesses approximately 60% of the total reserve of brandy in Armenia. Several YBC brands are inaccessible to the retail network and can only be obtained by a special order: "Erebuni" - 25 years, "Kilikia" - 30 years, "Sparapet" - 40 years and "Noah's Ark" - 70 years of endurance. Currently YBC brandy is supplied to 25 countries. 47 countries have registered the trade marks of YBC. For four years in a row the brand "Ararat" was favored in Russia as "Good of the year".
[edit] Trivia
- During the Yalta Conference, Winston Churchill was so impressed with the Armenian brandy Dvin given to him by Joseph Stalin that he asked for several cases of it to be sent to him each year.[1] Reportedly 400 bottles of Dvin were shipped to Churchill annually.[2] This brandy was named in honour of the ancient capital Dvin, and was first produced in 1943.
- In the Russian-speaking countries of the former Soviet Union the Armenian Brandy is marketed as cognac, even though technically it is not. The term "brandy" has never really caught on and the full name of such beverages is "cognac-style wine".
