While fashion often dictates fortunes, sambuca can rely on heritage. Nigel Huddleston investigates its growth
If tequila's the new vodka, sambuca could very well turn out to be the new tequila. Suppliers of major brands are claiming big advances over the last 12 months as drinking tastes in high-energy venues undergo one of their inevitable phases of change.
"It's the most dramatic thing happening in the white spirits market," claims Jeremy Hill, managing director of Hi-Spirits, which markets the Antica brand in the UK.
He adds: "There's huge growth from a significant base of sales, but no one really knows where it's coming from. There's no real sambuca marketing or advertising, but the appetite for it is enormous."
Hill claims Antica sales in the on-trade are about 50% up year-on-year, with sales hitting the million-bottle mark annually.
Rival Cellar Trends claims its Luxardo brand is posting about 20% growth. The company has produced "shottail" kits for pubs, comprising shot glasses, tent cards, recipes for layered cocktails and a layering spoon.
Brand manager Catherine Rigby says growth is being driven by young adult drinkers. She says: "It's really moved over the course of the eight years we've worked with Luxardo, shifting from being a drink that is sipped after a meal to a social drink enjoyed with friends, either as chaser or as a group shot. It's becoming as big as tequila in that respect."
She says shottails - mixed spirits in shot-sized glasses - satisfy a need for mixed drinks and offer an easier serve for busier bars. "We're finding shottails are really taking off," she says. "Cocktails can be very fiddly to produce but a shottail is easier because it just involves layering the various ingredients." One problem for sambuca is that such drinking occasions aren't the political flavour of the month.
Hill at Hi-Spirits insists: "Shots need careful thought when it comes to marketing. Drinking a shot isn't irresponsible, as long as it happens in moderation. In Italy, sambuca is served with coffee at the end of a meal, which hardly makes it an irresponsible drink."
Hill hopes that sambuca's history will help it avoid the pitfalls of the fashion-drinks market.
"For some of the shooters brands and RTDs, the pattern has been for tastes to come in waves, hit a peak and then steadily decline," he says, "I wonder whether that will happen with sambuca, as it's a product with heritage which has been around forever."