Veuve Clicquot
Company: LVMH
Brand value: US$1,589.2 million
Headquarter city: Reims
Industry: Alcohol
Year formed: 1772
Veuve Clicquot is a champagne brand that is instantly recognizable around the world for the distinctive yellow label of its flagship product, “Le Brut Carte Jaune”, which the company describes as being “a perfect balance between power and finesse”. The range also spans other products and collections, designed to meet the needs of consumers on different occasions; these include Rose and Naturally Clicquot. Themed accessories are often released to complement the bottles, such as crates and ice buckets. Veuve Clicquot sells through large retailers as well as the hospitality trade, where it offers high levels of training and merchandising, with branded flutes and serving buckets. Veuve Clicquot does little advertising, partly because of restrictions on alcohol promotion and partly because it has never been in the brand’s culture; instead, it signals its association with the image of a woman in black, who represents Barbe-Nicole Ponsardin Clicquot, the widow of the brand’s founder and the woman who took over the business aged just 27 when he died. The brand organizes the annual "Woman's Veuve Clicquot Award" which runs across 27 countries and recognizes businesswomen who share Mrs Clicquot’s entrepreneurial spirit. In 2016, Veuve Clicquot launched three online videos inspired by the life of Madame Clicquot, with the message “Let life surprise you”, primarily to raise its profile among millennials. Veuve Clicquot is owned by the LVMH group, which is listed on the Euronext Eurolist Paris, and is represented on several leading indices, including the CAC 40 and the FTSE Eurotop 100.