This Past Summer We Visited Twelve of our Award-Winning Spirit Suppliers in Nine Unbelievable Days

Artistry, Passion, and Time: This is what every Heavenly Spirits supplier puts into their products. In June, Christine, four members of our sales team, and I had the pleasure of visiting with twelve exceptional, family-run businesses to get an in-depth look at how they do what they do. We started the tour in Normandy, visiting with Calvados Roger Groult and Calvados Claque Pepin respectively. Nine days later we finished our tour in the Gascony region with visits to Armagnac Artez, Dartigalongue and Delord. In between, we visited with the makers of ArmoriK Single Malt Whisky, Jahiot Creme de Cassis, and Domaine Magnaut, as well as Cognacs: Normandin-Mercier, Jean Fillioux, and Du Peyrat. Plus, there were several other surprise stops along the way.

A Team Tour Travel Diary

Christine and I arrived in Paris three days before the team, mostly so we could acclimate to the time change and the new “buy-back” touring van we would be driving, but it was also so that we could spend a day with our sons, Austin and Keenan. Austin now lives in Versailles and we hadn't hung-out together as a family since Christmas. We ended up spending our day together visiting Claude Monet's garden at Giverny. French Art is something I have always admired. Whether it is in the form of fine paintings or fine spirits, the French always seem to strive to attain a universal quality grounded in nature. Despite temperatures in the high 30s Celsius (100 F) we had an enjoyable day walking, talking, eating and laughing together in Claude Monet’s house and garden. In retrospect, learning about this French artist’s art and his passionate expressions of life was a perfect way to prepare ourselves for the tour we were about to embark on.

A Weekend in La Rochelle

Day 3, Saturday the 24th was spent driving from Brittany to La Rochelle, Christine's hometown. Part of the Bois Ordinaire cognac designation, La Rochelle is also known for its sea salt and outstanding seafood, and it boasts the largest pleasure sailing port in Europe. This was the longest leg of our trip without a distillery visit, but we did our best to make the drive interesting with several stops along the way, including a spontaneous picnic with breads, cheeses and charcuterie purchased at a small village outdoor market. Once we arrived in La Rochelle, the team was given the evening to themselves so they could explore the famous fortified medieval port town and make discoveries of their own.

Artez Bas Armagnac, Arvani and La Muse Verte

Day 7, part 2 (Tuesday) - After a quick look at a very old but impressive dolmen, (a type of megalithic tomb) located in the middle of a field only a few miles from the Fillioux home, we had a longer-than-expected drive from Cognac to Armagnac. Despite the two-hour delay caused by an overturned truck in Bordeaux, we arrived in time to meet and eat with Jean-Philippe and his wife Susie at Armagnac Artez. The sun hadn’t quite set, so we had an opportunity to view Jean-Philippe’s garden full of Grande Absinthe plants, of which he only uses the baby leaves to make his highly-rated Absinthe La Muse Verte. Susie had prepared a wonderfully appetizing dinner that began after we tasted several aperitif variations of the house: pastis and absinthe. The dinner started with Foie gras on toast with chutney, duck breast with ratatouille, home-made French cheesecake, and finally a tasting of a new Armagnac specialty spirit, still in the works, and a wonderful Bas Armagnacs 1995, the first ever single vintage single barrel released by Artez.

As late as it was getting, we still took time for a look at the absinthe lab where the group had a good laugh at the extra large coffee filters that are used to strain the absinthe in its final stage before bottling. If this is not "artisanal," what is? We were only 30 minutes from our hotel on a clear, but pitch-black moonless night, driving on twisted roads that were not much wider than a cow path. I was glad this was not my first time at this rodeo. 

(Lakeville, MA) As the leading importer of Armagnac in the United States, Heavenly Spirits, a Massachusetts-based importer is accustomed to handling rare vintages, but nothing they have ever imported quite compares to their most recent shipment, which includes a single bottle of vintage Bas Armagnac distilled in 1848, and valued at over $20,000. To put that in perspective, we are talking about a brandy that was distilled one hundred and sixty-nine years ago, when the United States was only seventy-two years old, before the (so called) Civil War, before the invention of the telephone, electric light bulb, or the gas-powered automobile. It is a work of living art and a piece of French history. “We were almost too nervous to handle it while we were doing the photo shoot,” says Christine Cooney, founder and co-owner of Heavenly Spirits.” “In case you were wondering,” adds Dan Cooney, Christine’s husband and co-owner, “Yes, this Armagnac is still wonderfully drinkable.” “Someone asked us if we had the opportunity to try it, and we actually did several years ago,” says Christine. “We thought it was wonderfully intact, but joked that it might need a few more years.”

Dartigalongue, the distillers of this rare cultural artifact, is the oldest Bas Armagnac house operating in the world. They were founded in 1838, in Nogaro, France, the heart of the Bas Armagnac region. This bottle of 1848 vintage Armagnac is part of a very small cache of demi-johns that have been quietly hiding away in the Dartigalongue paradis, and the oldest known certified Armagnac in existence. The grape variety used to make this Armagnac was Folle Blanche and of course this was  many years before the devastating phylloxera outbreak.  

Because of its extreme rarity and age, the producer recently decided to sell no more than 1 or 2 bottles per year in the world. The last ones were sold in Sweden and in France. This year, Heavenly Spirits is the only importer so far to have been extended the privilege to purchase this 1848 vintage, and this transaction marks the only bottle ever imported to the U.S.

Other single bottles of Bas Armagnac Dartigalongue, distilled in 1893, 1900, 1918, and two bottles distilled in 1929 accompanied the 1848 vintage in the recent shipment. Each of the rare vintages comes in a specially designed, suede-lined wooden case and includes a certificate of authenticity signed by the Dartigalongue Master Distiller. Another certificate of Authenticity is issued by the BNIA, (Bureau National Interprofessionel de l’Armagnac).

This batch of extremely rare Armagnac vintages will be sold in the U.S. mostly through Binny’s Beverage Depot in Chicago, Illinois. Additional rare French spirits imported by Heavenly Spirits will be made available subject to interest and demand.

Heavenly Spirits is a leading importer of artisanal French spirits, such as Armagnac, Calvados, Cognac, whisky, gin, aperitifs and liqueurs. For the past eight years, the company has been recognized as the number one importer of Armagnac in the US, accounting for 26% of all Armagnac sold each year. Contact Christine Cooney at: Christine@heavenlyspirits.com

Artistry, Passion, and Time: these are what every Heavenly Spirits supplier put into the exceptional spirits they produce. In our new ad campaign, we illustrate this dedication in both word and image. While we have always tried to convey the authentic quality of the small-to-medium-sized family-owned producers that we represent, the difference in this new effort is in the way we show it. Instead of presenting the respective products in sharply-focused photographic images, as is commonly done, we decided to literally paint (or draw) a more authentic picture, reflective of the hand-crafted spirits that we represent.

What the viewer will see in this new campaign is an image of individual Heavenly Spirits products, rendered in a painterly illustration style, symbolizing the unique art and craft that have gone into each of the spirits we sell.

The initial concept for this campaign came about while Dan Cooney, owner, marketing director, and former college art professor was looking at some classic advertising from the 1940s, specifically that iconic French illustrator/designer, A.M. Cassandre. Dan’s intention was to impart a bit of inspired nostalgia by borrowing the look and feel of those classic French designs. After a few experimental sketches, he ended up with an illustration style that combined painting, drawing, and collage, which seemed to communicate the desired hand-crafted look.

As the concept began to take shape, the Heavenly marketing team decided to add some of that artistry and poetic license to the body copy as well, with Naomi writing a great first draft. After that, the team turned their attention to the backdrop for the bottles in the ad and tried a dozen creative options before referring again to A.M. Cassandre for inspiration. Our design intern, Emma helped develop the stylized shadows to place behind the bottles for a Cassandre-esque feel.  After a dozen or more evolved iterations, Dan submitted a tight comp to the magazine, FRANCE Today, to get their reaction, and was very pleased when they said they “loved it.” Additionally, the magazine’s ad team said they wanted to consider it for a back or inside cover, adding, “archetypal French advert/products always resonate with our audience.”

 So far, the reaction to the handcrafted spirit art from the ad campaign was so positive that we have started work on similar illustrations of Heavenly cocktails as well. Look for these to appear in a Heavenly Spirits Cocktail Recipe Book in the future. Cheers!