Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/646914
44 / the tasting panel / march 2016 There are 11 fifth-generation members of the Brown family currently employed by Louisville-based Brown-Forman. The company, built on the business of selling American whiskey, was founded 146 years ago. Campbell Brown is one of those fifth-generation family members. He started working for the company in 1994 and found his talent for developing strategic business and brand plans for the company's portfolio in the U.S. and emerging markets. Most recently, he managed Brown-Forman's wine and spirits brands in Canada and the Midwest. Last year, he was appointed President of Old Forester, which was the country's first bottled bourbon brand. He is responsible for the whiskey's worldwide growth, and he also oversees the construction of the new Old Forester Distillery being built on Whiskey Row in downtown Louisville, where Brown-Forman offices once stood on West Main Street. The company's progress, Brown insists, is introducing its brands to a new generation of wine and spirits drinkers, but also spreading its wings worldwide. That can be a challenge in markets where information may be difficult to come by or even more complex to decipher. "It was Owsley Brown's vision that pushed the company internationally," noted Brown, who talked to THE TASTING PANEL last month. The late Owsley Brown II, a fourth-generation family member, worked for years in developing sales outside the United States. "We needed to grasp on advancing our market reach and asked ourselves which mature markets would work. We have suc- ceeded in that globally, especially in the U.K., Japan and Australia." One of Brown's major efforts was centered in South Asia. "I was fortunate enough to work in India, where we developed a joint venture. It's a vast country with emerging channels—but we did not have decent data, so we were com- pelled to have our feet in the street and retrieve as much information as we could, laboriously, from consumers and distributors." Forced to rely on macroeconomic indicators—statistics that indicate the cur- rent status of the economy of a state based on factors such as industry, popula- tion growth, trade, income levels, etc.—Brown and his team realized this was a by Meridith May / photo by Clay Cook DELIVERING ONE VERSION OF THE BROWN-FORMAN'S CAMPBELL BROWN TALKS TO US ABOUT THE SUCCESS OF ACCESSING DATA IN REAL TIME TRUTH