What happened?
We have received the latest US Nielsen retail off-trade data for the US Spirits industry, covering the four weeks to 9th August 2025 (''July''). Note, within this report we refer primarily to ''core spirits'' trends which excludes the growth of spirits-based cocktails/RTDs. Our ''core spirits'' estimates by distiller are formed by aggregating all major brands separately disclosed by Nielsen. We also present the growth trends for ''total spirits'' (incl. spirits-based RTDs) in the second table for which we would caution volume and price / mix trends are distorted by the impact of cocktail/RTDs.
BNPP Exane View:
US Spirits industry: Off trade
We estimate US core spirits retail sales in the US off-trade declined by -3.1% in the latest 4-week period to 9th August, improving from -4.6% last month (cf. Q2 -3.2%, Q1 -2.4%). We estimate core spirits volumes declined by -3.3% in the month vs -4.2% in Jun/Jul (cf. Q2 -3.7%, Q1 -3.3%). We estimate core spirits retail price/mix was around flat in the month at +0.2% (cf. Q2 +0.5%, Q1 +1.0%).
Including Cocktails/Spirits-based RTDs, US industry off-trade sales grew by +2.0% in the latest 4 weeks (cf. Q2 +0.1%, Q1 +0.3%). From a sub-category perspective, we note that Prepared Cocktail growth accelerated materially to +26.7% in the latest 4-weeks (cf. Q2 +18.9%, Q1 +21.1%).
Company Summary
Diageo core spirits retail sales declined by -4.0% in the latest period, improving from -6.6% last month to (cf. Q2 -3.9%, Q1 -1.9%). Diageo Q2 core spirits volumes declined -5.1% (cf. Q2 -5.4%, Q1 -4.1%) while price /mix growth moderated to +1.2% (cf. Q2 +1.6%). The sequential improvement in Diageo''s off-trade spirits growth appears to be primarily driven by Crown Royal comps, driven by Blackberry. Crown Royal sales in the latest 4 weeks grew +0.8% (cf. Q2 -4.7%, Q1 -3.3%) including +155% growth for Blackberry. which saw it brand sales decline -12.2% in the month (cf. +1.3% last month) as Blackberry returned to decline....
