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Zwack: A family as the guardian of a secret recipe

Unicum is one of the oldest herb liqueurs in Europe and is made from over 40 different herbs and spices. The manufacturing process and the 225-year-old secret recipe have remained unchanged since Unicum was created in 1790, staying in the Zwack family for six generations. Today the production lies in the hands of Sándor and Izabella Zwack. Some special ingredients, known as the ‘heart of Unicum’, are personally measured by other family members – currently by Anne Marshall Zwack and her son Sándor Zwack. Two parallel processes are used for the production of Unicum: in the distillation the delicate herbal fragrances are preserved while other herbs are macerated at the same time to retain their characteristic colour and typical taste. Then they are mixed together and matured in oak barrels where Unicum gains its final complexity in taste and bouquet.

In the year 2020, after almost three years of development, the latest member of the Unicum family was presented. With Unicum Barista, a blend of Unicum and 100% Arabica coffee, Zwack took an innovative approach to the old tradition of consuming a herb liqueur with coffee.

At the World Spirits Award, there was gold for Unicum Barista.

MBG International Premium Brands – Brands with added value

“We Love Liquids.” This slogan has accompanied MBG on its worldwide path of success since it was founded in 1993 under the name P.O.S. Marketing + Vertrieb GmbH: Strong brands have been established around the world in nearly 60 countries, with innovative own brands, renowned retail brands, great ideas and a lot of energy. With over 250 employees, the MBG Group currently generates over € 200 million and, every year, more than a million hectolitres are produced. The portfolio in Germany includes 12 own brands and 6 retail brands (from non-alcoholic drinks to low proof drinks to wines & spirits) for 90,000 customers.

“Our recipe for successful brands is the mixture of passion, conviction and knowledge of the market. If all goes well, names and products become new worlds which consumers love. Success is not always predictable, which means that courage is needed above all. The right moment has to be found and hard work put in, just like with a hit single: some are one hit wonders while others become classics.” Little can be added to this definition from Managing Director Andreas W. Herb. From the MBG Group headquarters in Paderborn, a great deal of expertise makes successful brands, tailored to the respective target group and the market segment. Many brands that are well known on shop shelves and in the gastronomy sector have played a role in the history of the company.

Participation in the World Spirits Award yielded gold for Dos Mas Nasty Nuts Shot.

Luding Group: Vodka Tchaikovsky as a high-spirited homage to the famous composer

At the beginning of the 1990s, the modern distillery ‘Fortuna’ was launched in a green field in the south of Russia – in the Krasnodar region, a strip of land with spa resorts and health centres. The distillery has specialised in unusual products, in a region with a particularly green fingerprint. The vodka created in honour of the great Russian composer Tchaikovsky is special. The concept for this exceptional product is comparable with one of his musical scores: the work ‘Swan Lake’ served as an inspiration. Art enthusiasts can thus immerse themselves in the history of Russian estate life in the 19th century. The traditional white and blue colours underline the purity of this vodka.

The technical particularities span a wide quality-orientated spectrum: from the selected wheat, their own well water and the special treatment of the distillate with skimmed milk powder to the crystal-clear filtration with active birch coal. With so much perfectionism and monitoring of the individual production steps, the result is an especially gentle, animating and very typical vodka based on wheat. After the diluting of alcohol and pure distillate, the production process is continued with maturation in steel tanks. The aim is to ‘wed’ both ‘waters’, resulting in an especially harmonious vodka.

At the World Spirits Award 2022, Vodka Tchaikovsky was awarded double gold and honoured as the best vodka with the title ‘Spirit of the Year’.