Brown-Forman appoints Siddharth Wadia to head IMENA region
Brown-Forman Corporation that sells Jack Daniel’s, has elevated its India country director Siddharth Wadia to head India, Middle East and North Africa region generally known as the IMENA region.
The Brown–Forman Corporation is one of the largest American-owned companies in the liquor business. As of fiscal year 2016 the company had sales of $3.08 billion. The roughly 40 members of the Brown family, thesex` cousins that are descendants of founder George Garvin Brown, control more than 70% of the voting shares and in 2016 had a net worth of $12.3 billion.
Jack Daniel’s whisky is produced in Lynchburg, Tennessee, by the Jack Daniel Distillery, which has been owned by the Brown–Forman Corporation since 1956.Jack Daniel’s home county Moore is a dry county, so the product is not available for purchase at stores or restaurants within the county but is sold in the rest of the world.
In his new role, Siddharth will oversee the organization’s entire operations across the sales and marketing, finance and supply chain. “We have built a strong foundation for the company over the past few years and our growth in the IMENA region is a reflection of that,” said Wadia who has spent more than two decades in consumer companies including Pepsico, Unilever and Abbott. He has replaced Robinson Brown, who was part of the founding family and has moved to Amsterdam as regional marketing director – Developed Europe.
Brown-Forman has picked India as one of the markets for the increased investment as part of its global strategy 2025. While Indians consumed around 220 million cases of whiskey in 2018, the highest in the world, imported whiskey accounted for about 2% of the overall consumption by volume as Indian-made foreign liquor (IMFL) dominates the segment with relatively low price-tags.
Brown-Forman controls more than half of the country’s American whiskey segment and has grown sales over 20% since the past five years, according to International Wine and Spirits Research (IWSR).
