The end of year market report from the UK’s Wine and Spirit Trade Association (WSTA) reported that combined sales of gin and flavoured gin in shops, supermarkets and online went up 22 percent in value last year, breaking the billion-pound mark for the first time, worth £1.2 billion totalling 75 million bottles.
However, total gin sales were down when the loss of revenue from pubs and restaurants were factored in.
British customers bought over 10 million extra bottles of gin from UK retailers during 2020, compared to the same period in 2019.
A large chunk of the bottles sold were flavoured gin which has seen a real surge of popularity since category came on to the scene a few years ago.
In total UK retailers sold around 48 million bottles of traditional predominately juniper tasting gin worth £716 million in the 12 months to the beginning of October 2020 – a 10 percent increase on last year.
For flavoured gin 27 million bottles were sold, worth £456 million, up 31 percent on last year.
The increase in sales comes after the Covid-19 lockdown closed the hospitality sector and saw more people buying alcohol to enjoy at home. With people prevented from socialising in pubs and restaurants off trade sales of alcohol took up some of the slack, however total alcohol sales during 2020 went down, reported WSTA
The loss of the gin sales in pubs means that there has been a dip in total gins sales in the UK. In the 12 months to October 2020 Brits spent £2.2 billion on gin compared to £2.6 billion during the same period in 2019.
Miles Beale, chief executive of the Wine and Spirit Trade Association, said: “Gin has proven to be a real tonic for shoppers wanting to enjoy a bit of down time at home during a turbulent 2020.
“It’s fantastic to hear that some distillers will have benefited from a boost in retail sales, but we have to look at the bigger picture which shows overall gin sales are down by £400 million following the hit taken by the hospitality sector due to the pandemic this year.
There has been a huge amount of investment poured into the world renowned great British spirit industry in recent years – and we would hate to see jobs created by the gin boom take a hit.”
The interest in British gin, which has been dubbed the ‘ginaissance’, has helped to fund new forays into spirit-making, with high-quality English and Welsh whisky and rums coming onto the market in recent years, said WSTA.
