Nikkei
Asian Review brings news that Beam Suntory has launched a China/Hong Kong/Macau/Taiwan-facing webstore on Tmall.com in partnership with Alibaba. There’s a fairly decent selection of Suntory’s whiskies available, including some especially popular ones like Yamazaki 18 and Hibiki 21. As of this writing both of those appear to still be in stock too. I assume not for long!
I don’t know a ton about the Asia ex-Japan market for Japanese whisky, but I would say the prices do seem a high compared to other online private sellers in the international market. On the other hand, since it’s an official webstore being run by Suntory China Holdings, there’s probably much less hassle involved if you want to keep it domestic! This deal also allows Beam Suntory to put product on shelves at RT-Mart hypermarkets and Hema supermarkets.
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