Chinese drink Baijiu enter the Indian market

Have you got tired of drinking the regular whiskey, beer or vodka? Here’s some good news for you, China’s national drink, Baijiu has entered India.

VBev, a dynamic company introduced baijiu— world’s largest-selling clear-as-water spirit —in association with premium Chinese Baijiu brand Jiangxiaobai (JXB) recently. Despite variants of the flavor of the spirit, Vbev has launched only one i.e. JXB Pure with 40% alcohol content, keeping in mind the tastes and preferences of young Indians.

“The international white spirits category in India has shown a robust double-digit growth during the last few years and the cocktail culture is also growing well. This provides a great platform to introduce a new white spirits brand in India,” says Sumedh S Mandla, chief executive officer of Vbev, on the rationale behind the launch.

“Chinese food is the second highest selling cuisine in India. We want to capitalize on this and target the ‘Horeca’ segment as well as modern retail to introduce baijiu in the country,” said Sumedh Singh Mandla, CEO at VBev India.

Jiangxiaobai’s target audience is consumers between the age of 18-35 years, making India an appropriate market for the brand, said Zoe Fu, director of the international business department at Chongqing-based Jiangxiaobai Liquor Co. “India has become a young country as the population of youngsters is growing faster than the older sections of people. India is a young country and baijiu is perfectly suited for that demographic. Jiangxiaobai’s official product launch in India consolidates the brand’s mission and marks a significant milestone in the internationalization process of Chinese liquor culture. Jiangxiaobai hopes to popularize the new face of Chinese baijiu and use baijiu as a medium to deepen cultural exchange between China and India. For that, we have appointed Ms. Rojita Tiwari as the Brand Ambassador and Brand Manager and Mr. Leonard Menezes as our India Business Head”.

While India is primarily a brown spirits market with whiskey alone accounting for 65% of the market share, the white spirits segment — comprising mainly of vodka, white rum, and gin — is reported to be growing faster than the brown segment at 12.5% a year.