RUM: A Social and Sociable History

Lead Last Updated: Nov 22nd, 2005 - 16:18:52
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Carib News

Ian Williams
Nov 22, 2005, 13:47

In the Caribbean there are many mansions - the islands and the coastal states have widely differing cultures, languages and traditions. But from the Spanish Main out to Bermuda, there is one thing they share - rum, “the global spirit with its warm beating heart in the Caribbean,” is a huge part of their ways of life.

It was in Barbados that, as far as we can tell, rum was invented, although of course from Demerara to Jamaica and Trinidad, there are many claimants to be those who perfected it in the English speaking Caribbean.

The Caribbean was a great melting pot for cultures and peoples and for a brief period in the seventeenth century, Barbados was at their focus. The Portuguese in Brazil had brought sugar growing from the Arabs in the Mediterranean. The Dutch and the Portuguese Jewish refugees had brought milling and trading skills. And one can only suspect that among the prisoners and indentured servants sent from Britain were some Irish or Scottish exiles who were familiar with the new technology of the still.

People knew that the molasses left behind by sugar refining fermented easily, but only the bold risked drinking it. However, put it through a still and you had a potent and palatable drink. They called it Kill-Devil, or rumbullion, “a hot hellish liquor,” - and they loved it. Rum was born.

Within decades, they discovered that storing it in wooden barrels did wonders for it. “Barbadoes Water” was in demand across the Atlantic World, until in Jamaica, they discovered that if you redistilled the liquor, it was still hot, but a little less hellish.

Despite this history, the French and the Spanish speaking Caribbean show signs of winning the battle of the brands for highly regarded aged rums. The reason is that the famous island fractiousness that is guaranteed to split every proposed federation proposal seems to afflict the rum producers as well.

So what is so important about the Demon Rum? Consider, the few remaining Caribbean sugar producers have to sell their sugar on world market dominated by subsidies and tariff walls. The Europeans have for years encouraged sugar beet producers. In the US a combination of Cuban American owned sugar plantations in Florida, and producers of High Fructose Corn Syrup, not to mention the corn growers, have kept out Caribbean sugar.

As Fidel Castro has discovered, mass marketing high-value added Havana Club rum across the world produces far more revenue that bags of sugar in the supermarkets. Of course, his brand is almost helped by the American embargo - drinking Cuban rum is for many Europeans a way of cocking a snook at Uncle Sam.

The value of branding is often neglected. American Sidney Frank’s sold the “Grey Goose” vodka brand to Bacardi for over three billion dollars last year. Frank began his career making alcohol-based jet fuel. His “invention” of Grey Goose was based on sound economic principles. As he has explained, “A bottle of Absolut sells for $20 a bottle. Vodka is just water and alcohol, so if I sold a bottle for $30, the $10 difference is almost all profit.” He knew that there is nothing as easy as parting a snob from his money, and made Grey Goose in France, to tickle American consumers’ sense of chic - and to rake in the extra dollars.

Real Caribbean rum drinkers will not be surprised that Bacardi wanted to expand its bland product line with one that is in essence alcohol and water. But what are the Caribbean rum distillers doing about it? For most of them, not nearly enough. In compensation for the opening up of European markets to rum from Latin America, the EU has offered money to West Indian rum producers to sell their product.

Sadly, it is unlikely to help if it means each island and each distillery jealously fighting on its own against the global liquor giants who now dominate the world’s bars and liquor stores. Even in Caribbean resort hotels, it is sometimes difficult to get island rums: companies like Bacardi have bought the concession.

In the months since my book “Rum: A Social and Sociable History of the Real Spirit of 1776,” came out I have been giving lectures and signings around the US, and I have offered rum tastings with the books. Readers have been astounded at the quality of fine rums. They rush out and buy bottles for home. Even so, at least one high quality rum producer refused to provide samples because I had not mentioned his product in the (history) book, and others are unhappy because there are other brands also getting exposure.

It is clear that in these markets they should be cooperating. Just like the single malt producers marketed a concept, and allowed the individual brands to compete for share, Caribbean rum producers have to persuade consumers to try rum and then find the brand that meets their taste.

Rum producers should be selling more than a drink - they should be selling a concept, a life style. As Johnny Depp exulted, staggering round his desert island in Pirates of the Caribbean, “Rum, sand and run! It’s the Caribbean!”

Somehow, the Caricom island rum producers have to overcome their insularity. Like selling the Caribbean as a concept, they should be building Caribbean rum as the distilled essence of the islands, whose every sip in the cold of winter evokes happy memories of sultry tropics, and an altogether better and more relaxed life style.

Rum distillers have millions of potential customers coming into their territories who can take their acquired tastes back with them to the bars of London and New York. They have expatriates in their millions who can guarantee exporters of a market.

But it will take quality and brand building. It takes more than variations on “Old” and “Aged,” on the bottles. Discerning and affluent consumers want to see precise ages and they want a back story for their bottle.

And what a story rum has. It can beat any other drink.

Rum launched revolutions, slave rebellions, and fuelled wars on land on sea. It has pirates, sailors, and admirals, planters and field hands, rum shops and chic bars. There are almost four centuries of Caribbean history to call on.

The rum producers should be working with their tourism boards to ensure that each visitor not only carries a bottle back, but a continuing demand for more of the same, and in turn, every rum bottle on every bar shelf should be a spirited ambassador for Caribbean tourism. Vodka, whose sales are booming world wide, is just a dull spirit - but rum is the spirit of the Caribbean. It almost takes effort not to sell it!
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Ian Williams is a British Journalist based at the United Nations. He is the author of “Rum: A Social and Sociable History of the Real Spirit of 1776)

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