Jameson whiskey sales up by 18 percent

Jameson Irish whiskey has reported a strong sales growth during the last six months of 2010. Volumes were up by 16 percent while sales values rose by 18 percent.

Jameson's growth really caught the financial world's eye. It sold more than three million cases during 2010, with one million of these cases being consumed in the United States. They enjoyed a 27 percent year-on-year growth in the U.S. market.

However, parent group, Pernod Ricard are failing to reach market expectations of its overall earnings. They saw a 14 percent like-for-like profit growth and 13 percent sales growth for the period.

Irish Distillers/Pernod Ricard chairman and chief executive, Alexandre Ricard said "The progress of Jameson within the Pernod Ricard family of brands has been one of our company’s great success stories — growing from 466,000 cases when Irish Distillers joined Pernod Ricard in 1988 to one million in 1996, two million in 2006 and achieving sales of over three million in 2010."

He said "This six-month period has proven to be one of the most dynamic and successful periods ever for Jameson, as it reached two key milestones on its journey to become one of the world’s top spirit brands.

"We have great ambitions for Jameson over the coming decade."

Currently Jameson is expanding the brand's warehousing and maturation capacity in a new development at Dungourney, County Cork. They are also pumping $109.4 million into their marketing and promotional spend. This is about $13.6 million more than last year's spend.