Alex Johns makes excellent company. In fact he would be an ideal guest for a long rain delay on Test Match Special as he has so many stories to tell from such a wide and varied career helping to create, promote, and advertise brands across multiple sectors including drinks, sport, fashion, music, health and beauty, using where he can disruptive technologies.
He could also share his opinion on cricket for as well as being a more than handy cricketer, Johns can claim to have three former English cricket captains in his family - Peter May, Harold Gilligan, and Arthur Gilligan.
After a career in advertising, brand development and working with major FMCG brands Alex Johns is excited about the potential that Nicholson's range of ready to serve cocktails have backed by its breakthrough on tap cocktail serve technology
In fact it was his close cricket connections that led him into the world of gin and premium batched cocktails and his decision in 2019 to take over the famous Nicholson spirits company, first founded in 1736, and re-invent it as one of the sector’s most disruptive brands, taking it into whole new territories and potential areas of growth.
He first heard on the cricketing grapevine that Nicholson - whose founder Sir William Nicholson first bought the freehold for Lord’s Cricket Ground in 1864 and saw Marleybone Cricket Club adopt its red and yellow “bacon and eggs” colours for its members - had fallen on hard times and was looking for a potential buyer.
“With my advertising and sports sponsorship background I thought there could be an opportunity here to disrupt an old British heritage brand,” he says.
But he did not need to be in the drinks industry to appreciate just how hard taking over and re-inventing an old gin brand would be in the extremely competitive UK market - never mind how well known or respected the Nicholson name is.
So why not re-introduce it and see what they could do with the brand in a completely different market - thousands of miles away in the Caribbean? Which is how he first brought the brand back to life in the beach bars of Antigua.
Cocktails on tap
It’s where he has spent the last few years to experiment and innovate and come up with not only its own range of pre-batched cocktails - Nicholson Original Cocktails - but a way to serve them thanks to its breakthrough on tap cocktail draught system - which has the potential to be even more disruptive than the cocktails they are serving.
Where it all began...Nicholson opened a cocktail bar in the marina in Antigua to test, trial and develop its range of ready-to-drink cocktails
The beach lifestyle and Caribbean cocktail scene is very much at the heart of what Nicholson wants to offer
He was able to open its own Nicholson on tap cocktail bar - Up - in a prime site in Antigua’s English Harbour where it was able to serve a fresh daily supply of “yachties” to come and party and test and trial the cocktails. It was soon also outselling famous rosé brands by offering rosé wines via the on tap system too.
It all works through a 20 litre chilled keg that can hold the equivalent of 28 bottles of spirits - or wine - and offers bars the potential of an average 250% increase in spend per cocktail drinker, explains Johns.
Not only a fast serving solution - with 10 chilled cocktails served every minute - but a sustainable one too, he adds.
“You don’t need to store heavy bottles or cans and there is no waste or recycling,” he says.
“We were able to learn so much and develop so quickly by starting out in Antigua at a fraction of the price it would have been to do the same in the UK. Everything we are now doing here is the result of what we have been able to achieve in the Caribbean,” he explains.
It was able to put all the work it had done in Antigua firmly to the test when it won the contract to serve on tap cocktails during the 2024 T20 World Cup held in the Caribbean - serving over 50,000 cocktails to happy cricket fans as a result.
Chelsea, Chelsea
Nicholson has signed an exclusive deal to serve its cocktails on tap at Chelsea's Stamford Bridge
It was on the back of the publicity it got for that when Johns got a call from Chelsea Football Club to see if it could install the Nicholson on tap cocktails in its bars - which went live at the start of this season as part of a three-year deal.
The beauty of the on tap system, he says, is the fact you can potentially sell 35 different types of cocktail from the same taps, simply by changing the keg supplying it. Providing bars and venues a huge choice of ever changing cocktails to offer their guests.
Including from its core Nicholson Original Cocktails range: Gin & Tonic; Blood Orange Gin & Tonic; Paloma; Pomelo Spritz; Rum Punch, Margarita, Espresso Martini, Picante, Skinny Margarita and many more!
Being smart
Johns is also looking at how he can take Nicholson’s relationship with Chelsea - and potentially other customers - to another level by using the experience he has had working with disruptive technology brands.
As he explains: “Chelsea says it has around 4 million fans in the UK, 70% of which don’t go to its games. So how can we tap into that market?”
It is developing an app specifically for Chelsea members that can send them personalised offers and promotions to the wallet on their phones for discounts at bars & local retail stores.
For fans going to the games Nicholson can send them a prompt when they are close to the ground that offers them special promotions to spend in the bars in the ground before and after the game.
“The technology allows us to push messages to them within 1,500m of Stamford Bridge,” he says.
The Nicholson on tap cocktail system is ideal for sporting venues and music festivals as well as busy bars and nightclubs
It then has the tools to be able to analyse the data coming from the app to then segment and personalise offers and reward fans and members depending on what offers and discounts they take up.
Technology it can potentially use when working with other hospitality venues, stadiums or music festivals.
Johns sees the use of technology - and particularly AI - as being a vital part of how the drinks industry needs to develop particularly in terms of how brands can get closer to both their trade customers and their target consumers.
“The future of drinks needs to be more intelligent in terms of how you are analysing your sales and using your data,” he says.
He is looking into how AI tools might be able to help create the “intelligent bar” that is constantly analysing what is being sold and then, particularly with its pre-batched cocktails, changing what it is offering based on what people are drinking, or might want to drink in the coming days.
“The bar could then tell you what products to re-order and want to sell,” he says.
Retail opportunity
Nicholson is close to signing up with major retailers to take its read-to-drink cocktail canned range to the next level
Being able to offer such smart technology solutions might also potentially open doors for Nicholson into the much coveted retail space where it is keen to back up its initial success in the premium on-trade with a major multiple listing, says Freddie Copestick.
“That’s the next big step for us,” says Copestick. “We believe we have a compelling offering for the grocery space and we're talking to retailers about brining Nicholson products to their customers.”
WH Smith’s much publicised Travel retail stores are the first UK retailer to take Nicholson’s new canned range with more major UK grocers set to follow this Summer.
Copestick believes says that despite the initial success of pre-mixed cocktails in the retail sector we are still only at the beginning of what is possible for what is such a fast growing category in the on-trade.
Nicholson is well placed to take advantage of that market, particularly now it has the support and investment from a major US backer that came across the brand in Antigua where he has a property. The support given to date has allowed Nicholson to punch way above its weight and take on deals the size of Chelsea which simply would not have been possible.
The fact Nicholson is also busy crafting and dreaming up new quality, pre-batched cocktail recipes is a double win - for them and the venues and potential retailers they are working with.
The initial success of the on tap system is opening doors left right and centre - not just in bars and sports stadiums but at music venues and at festival sites.
The on tap solution is also a timely and very cost effective alternative to hospitality venues and retailers hit by increased packaging and recycling costs - particularly with the new EPR regulations being rolled out.
It also helps operators looking to hit and improve sustainability targets - which was very much one of the requirements that got the Chelsea contract over the line.
“We can provide a sustainable off shelf solution,” adds Johns.
The challenge and opportunity, he says, is to make cocktails that have the same quality and consistency than if they were made by a professional bartender.
Brand power
(Nicholson has signed up legendary bartender and mixologist Ben Reed - formerly of the Met Bar - as its head of creative in charge of developing the liquid in each of its cocktails)
Johns and his team have also worked hard to re-invent and relaunch the original Nicholson Gin since they acquired the brand. This has included a new bottle and label design - using a map of London from 1736 when the brand was first launched - and the Nicholson Lion, said to be the original kitemark for gin quality, which sits proudly on the label.
It has also its Nicholson Original Blood Orange gin made using Sicilian oranges that has long been a firm favourite of bar tenders and restaurateurs - it is house pour, for example, at Chelsea’s Italian restaurant, Frantoio, a regular haunt for the Rolling Stones, Michael Caine and Joan Collins.
Johns has also been able to bring the experience and knowledge of working with major global brands such as L’Oreal, SAP & Virgin to how best to bring Nicholson back into the market.
“I have learnt how to come at a problem from a different angle,” he says pointing to the fact that the opportunity for pre-batched cocktails comes from both the quality of the liquid, but also “how you serve them”.
Hence the big move and investment into developing the on tap side of the business.
Johns says it has only really still got started with the brand and there is so much to explore and take advantage of the fact that this is a much loved “authentic British heritage brand” which at its height was in 130 countries around the world and was “producing and selling 10 million gallons of spirit a month” out of the biggest distillery in the world.
If it can reclaim just a fraction of the size of that market then Johns will have succeeded in putting a very different Nicholson brand back on the spirits map, but one, he stresses, is still very much based “on the roots of the business”.
* You can find out more about Nicholson at its website here.
* You can follow Nicholson on Instagram at @drinkNicholson.
