An­gos­tu­ra has ap­point­ed a Russ­ian com­pa­ny, Sim­ple Ltd, as its dis­tri­b­u­tion part­ner for its range of spir­its. The com­pa­ny said that Sim­ple, based in Moscow, could prove to be a very im­por­tant one for An­gos­tu­ra as its dis­tri­b­u­tion net­work is strong­ly in­te­grat­ed in­to Moscow's on-trade scene where key em­pha­sis is on be­ing placed in the top on-trade ac­counts. To launch the An­gos­tu­ra range, a num­ber of events took place in Moscow and St Pe­ters­burg last De­cem­ber.

John Georges, se­nior man­ag­er, and Bri­an Woods, se­nior in­ter­na­tion­al mar­ket­ing man­ag­er, con­duct­ed tast­ing, train­ing, pre­sen­ta­tions and mas­ter class­es. "Since the launch, the in­tro­duc­tion of An­gos­tu­ra in­to the Russ­ian mar­ket has been very suc­cess­ful with sales of rum up in the first half of 2010. "Thou­sands of bot­tles of the com­pa­ny's Reser­va, five-year-old and sev­en-year-old rums, part of the in­ter­na­tion­al rum range, were or­dered by the Russ­ian dis­trib­u­tor, and a sec­ond or­der has al­ready been placed.

"The launch has been so suc­cess­ful that the An­gos­tu­ra rum range is al­ready list­ed in the top 20 bars and restau­rants in Moscow and is pour­ing in some of the newest trendy Moscow bars (Rolling Stones, MAO).

"The in­ter­est in An­gos­tu­ra's rums in Moscow was a wel­come sur­prise, giv­en that it was a new mar­ket for the range. "As the cur­rent trend con­tin­ues and as fur­ther growth op­por­tu­ni­ties are pre­sent­ed, Rus­sia is an­tic­i­pat­ed to be the Num­ber One ex­port mar­ket for An­gos­tu­ra in 2010 and the com­ing years," the com­pa­ny said in a state­ment.