A battle has erupted on the US vodka market concerning the advertising of Grey Goose vodka in which it claims to be “Rated the No1 Tasting Vodka in the World”.


The row has arisen from a challenge filed by Millennium Import Company, importer of the rival Belvedere Vodka brand. Its dispute with the importer of Grey Goose, Sidney Frank Importing Co, is not its claim that it is the leading tasting vodka in the world but that in the list of comparisons made in the advertising Belvedere comes out so badly.


Grey Goose’s claims come from a 1998 taste test conducted by the Beverage Testing Institute (BTI), in which the vodka was the wining brand scoring 96. Grey Goose’s advertising not only uses this fact but also lists scores of 31 competing vodkas that include a score of 74 for Belvedere Vodka.


The problem with this for Belvedere and its importer Millennium is that in similar tests that have been conducted since 1998, Belvedere has scored significantly better, including a 91 and a 92.


The case has now reached the US’s National Advertising Review Board, which ruled this week in favour of Millennium and Belvedere. The ruling follows a similar decision from the National Advertising Division (NAD) of the Council of Better Business Bureaus.


In a statement, NARB said that while it recognised Sidney Frank’s right to advertise the distinction of having been recognized as the number one tasting vodka in 1998, it determined that reference to the 74 scored by Belvedere Vodka in 1998 was “an unfair and inaccurate representation as to a competitor’s product, and did not provide consumers with a complete factual picture.”

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NARB thus recommended that Sidney Frank’s advertising be modified by discontinuing the comparative reference based on Belvedere Vodka’s score in the 1998 BTI testing.


However, Sidney Frank Importing Co, has said it will continue to use the advertising. In a statement it said: “Sidney Frank is disappointed with NARB’s decision, which fails to come to grips with the central issue that Sidney Frank raised on appeal – that NAD’s decision is flatly contrary to the advertising policies of the Beverage Tasting Institute and that NAD lacks the expertise in taste and rating alcoholic beverages to substitute its own judgment for that of BTI.”


Sidney Frank said that the BTI does not permit advertisers to make comparisons between different taste
tests because it does not believe that such cross test comparisons are valid.


“Yet, NARB, which, like NAD and Millennium Import Company, accepted the validity of BTI’s methodology, and has no more expertise than NAD, concludes that Sidney Frank should modify its ad “to include the current performance of Belvedere Vodka in BTI testing” – in direct contravention of BTI’s advertising policies,” the statement said.


“Sidney Frank cannot both comply with BTI’s policies and the NARB decision.”


The NARB can choose to ask the Federal Trade Commission or the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms to enforce its decision.