What They Said
"New Orleans and Tales of the Cocktail are a high-octane mix-with a strong bourbon underbelly, jazzy notes mid-palate and Cajun spices that last long into the night, leaving your soul refreshed and respirited with the memory of it lingering long on your tongue."
Pamela Irving,
premier lifestyle journalist of Living Communications
"This conference is about people who want to learn more and the people who educate them…Having it in New Orleans is perfect. This is the Graceland of spirits."
Rick Jervais,
USA Today
"Now in its seventh year, Tales of the Cocktail has grown into a must-attend event for those in the business."
Stephan Berg,
CEO of the Bitter Truth
"For anyone serious about their cocktails, the Tales of the Cocktail convention should be your only event of the year."
Adam Klappholz,
Vanity Fair
"The amazing thing about Tales is that you're consistently around really brilliant people. You could be having a drink at a French Quarter bar at 4 a.m. and you're talking about dry shake on eggs and fizz techniques."
Kristen Amann,
founding member of LUPEC Boston
"New Orleans is a great city, the food and drink are wonderful, but the reason I come to Tales is to reunite with people I know from previous years, and to meet new folks. I try to spend as much time as possible hanging out with fellow booze nerds and absorbing as much knowledge as I can. It's a social thing, but also incredibly educational….like college, but with better alcohol."
Craig Mrusek,
Dr. Bamboo
"Tales is the place one should go before they head up to OBITS (Outrageous Bar in The Sky)."
Brian Rea
"Sundance of Spirits"
Brittany Chardin
"The networking through this event is unparallel in my 40 years in the business."
Henry Preiss, Preiss Imports
"It's truly a global convention. One of the most important I've seen so far."
Xavier Herit,
head bartender for Daniel Restaurant in Manhattan
"Tales of the Cocktail far exceeded all of my already inflated expectations."
Matthew Quinn Sweeney
"Every living cocktail legend participates in some way making it a MUST-attend for any bartender planning to make a career in the mixology field."
Jason A. Glasser,
COO/CFO of Beverage Media
"Tales of the Cocktail isn't just seminars and networking, it's a family gathering. It's a unique opportunity for the cocktail industry to come together as a family and catch up on all that is happening."
Robert Hess,
Drinkboy.com
"This was our first trip to New Orleans, which we won by entering the Luxury Experience Magazine and Tales of the Cocktail Contest 2009. We had a fantastic experience at the Tales of the Cocktail in New Orleans! The Spirited Dinner at Bacco with creations by Chef Chris Montero and custom drink pairings by Edward Nesta and Debra Argen was wonderful. New Orleans is the perfect host for this event. We thoroughly enjoyed all of the events, tastings, and the French Quarter atmosphere that made this event so spectacular."
Tom & Patrice Krznarich
"I had a great time at Tales of the Cocktail! All our friends are amazed that I won such a fabulous prize package that included so many terrific items from Luxury Experience Magazine and Tales of the Cocktail Contest 2009! The Leblon Cocktail Competition was fascinating and so much fun! My boyfriend and I had never been to an event like that. We can't stop talking about the great time we had. I've been listening to my many CDs, and making plans with friends to go to places like the Insectarium, which were also part of the prize package."
Sandy Parker
"Tales was truly awe inspiring: A gathering of the luminaries, bloggers, bartenders, writers, bar owners, restaurateurs and scholars that I could only hoped to have met in my lifetime had I not attended this years conference. It became clear quite quickly that it was a must attend, and I cleared my schedule for a week in July as soon as I could to ensure I can always be there."
Brooks Reitz,
Cocktail Apprentice
2009 Tales of the Cocktail Recap
Economic Impact | Awards | Seminars & Events
Trails of the Cocktail Recipients
Tales of the Cocktail Tidbits | Media Outreach
Tales of the Cocktail, the internationally acclaimed festival of cocktails, cuisine, and culture held its annual event in New Orleans, Louisiana from July 8 to July 12, 2009. The event brings together the best and brightest of the cocktail community - award-winning mixologists, authors, bartenders, chefs, and designers - for a five-day celebration of the history and artistry of making drinks. Each year offers a spirited series of dinners, demos, tastings, competitions, seminars, book signings, tours, and parties, all perfectly paired with some of the best cocktails ever made.
In its seventh year, Tales of the Cocktail hosted thousands of sippers, and used 12,000 thousand pounds of Kold Draft ice, garnishes, and more in five days. See below for some astonishing numbers:
13,884 mint leaves · 14,000 lemons · 11,250 limes · 192 pounds of sugar · 1,824 Driscoll's Blackberries and Driscoll's Blueberries · 74 Gallons Lime Juice · 82 Gallons Lemon Juice · 45 Gallons Grapefruit Juice · 21 Gallons Pineapple Juice · 25 Gallons Tomato Juice · 75 Gallons Simple Syrup · 950 Luxardo cherries · 450 cucumber wheels · 10 Gallons Rich Simple Syrup · 5 Gallons Honey Syrup · 3100 Driscoll's Raspberries · 1400 Tropicana Orange twists · 1200 Lemon Twists · 1250 Lime Wheels · 940 Lemon Wheels · 400 Lemon Wedges · 430 Lime Wedges · 350 Stalks of Celery
Tales of the Cocktail 2009 Economic Impact
- $9.7 million was total economic impact, $8 million spent by attendees, $1.7 million spent by vendors, $2.1 million dollars increase from 2008
- 95% of visitors were in New Orleans primarily for Tales of the Cocktail
- 96.2% of attendees would recommend Tales of the Cocktail to other people
- 34.4% of attendees were from Canada, 21.4% New York, 15.4% from California, 18.8% from the UK, 7.2% from Texas
- 40.2% of attendees reported seminars and events as their favorite aspect of Tales of the Cocktail
- 91.3% of attendees stayed in a hotel
- Over half (58.5%) of attendees attended Tales of the Cocktail for 4 to 5 days
- 52% of visitors attended Tales of the Cocktail for the 1st time, 48% were repeat attendees
Get the full picture:
AND THE WINNER IS . . .
On the Fly Competition: Giuseppe Gonzales USBG Caipirinha Competition: USBG Las Vegas Chapter: Tobin Ellis and Andrew Pollard Fan Favorite Winner: Tad Carducci Golden Spirit Award: Francesco Lafranconi, Charlotte Voisey Official Cocktail Competition: Maksyum Pazuniak
SPIRIT AWARDS
World’s Best Drinks Selection: Merchant Hotel, Belfast Best American Cocktail Bar: Pegu Club, NYC World’s Best Cocktail Bar: PDT, NYC World’s Best New Cocktail Bar: Clover Club, Brooklyn World’s Best Hotel Bar: Merchant Hotel, Belfast American Bartender of the Year: James Meehan, PDT International Bartender of the Year: Tony Conigliaro, London Best New Cocktail/Bartending Book: The Essential Cocktail – Dale DeGroff Best Cocktail Writing: Dave Wondrich Best New Product: Bols Genever World’s Best Cocktail Menu: Merchant Hotel, Belfast Best American Brand Ambassador: Simon Ford, Plymouth Gin and Pernod Ricard Helen David Lifetime Achievement Award: Peter Dorelli, London
2009 Standout Seminars & Events
- Cocktails of the Tales
- Drink Italy
- Cocktails that Made Gin Famous
- Stop Talking . . . Go FRESH!
- How Good is your Palate?
- Cocktail Legends
- Hollywood Cocktails
- Jazz, Cocktails and Storyville
- Christmas in July
- Cask Strength 1:1
- The Molecular DNA of Classic Cocktails
TALES OF THE COCKTAIL EVENTS INCLUDE:
- Seminars
- Tasting rooms
- USBG Competition
- Spirited Dinners
- Tales of the Cocktail Spirit Awards
- Cocktail Hour
- Tasting Rooms
- Collaborative Cocktail Blog Reception
Trails of the Cocktail Recipients
In 2009, two candidates from the Cocktail Apprentice Program were selected, Mike Ryan and Eric Simpkins. They will receive a trip to Cointreau Maison and Distillery in Angers, France. When they return they will present their global cocktail experience at Tales of the Cocktail 2010.
Tales of the Cocktail Tidbits
100,000 5-ounce Tales of Cocktail acrylic green cups · 12,000 bottles of Fiji Water · 640 cocktail recipes · 48,921 items in the Swag Speakeasy · 25 Spirited Dinners at New Orleans Restaurants · 10 partner hotel properties · 4 full time Tales of the Cocktail Staffers · #3 Event for the Carousel Bar’s beverage sales · 2,325 seminar surveys collected · 40 outstanding Cocktail Apprentices · At 83, Brian Rea is the oldest presenter
Media Outreach
MEDIA STATISTICS
- 300 Credentialed visiting media, writers, journalists, editors
- 1,143 Feature Stories Written
- 1,027,344,969 Media Impressions
- 17,764,987 Ad Value generated
- Over 700 articles mentioned Danny Devito's participation
- Nearly 80% of all search-based traffic was from directly searching on "Tales of the Cocktail"
- On TalesoftheCocktail.com over 35,000 unique visitors
- 97.6% of attendees used the Tales of the Cocktail website
SOCIAL MEDIA
- 1,147 Facebook Fans
- 730 members of the Tales of the Cocktail Facebook Group
- 73.7% of attendees followed Tales of the Cocktail on Facebook
- totc, TalesoftheCocktail Twitter has 1,547 followers
- 48.6% of attendees surveyed follow Tales of the Cocktail on Twitter
- 32 of the top cocktail bloggers participated in the Talesblog
- 12,682 visits of the Talesblog came from 101 countries
- 31.7% of Tales of the Cocktail attendees followed the Talesblog
- 2,518 photos tagged talesofthecocktail and 2,222 photos tagged totc09 on Flickr
- 39.5% of attendees based their attendance on information they received via social media
2009 MEDIA COVERAGE INCLUDED:
Saveur Magazine · Vanity Fair · Vogue
Foodnetwork.com · CNBC · New York Times
Washington Post · LA Times · USA Today
In 2009
"Tales of the Cocktail is essentially a week of hot New Orleans Nirvana for spirits and cocktail lovers. In just 45 minutes spent in the lobby of the Hotel Monteleone this year, I enjoyed tastes of never before seen Scotch, Bourbon, and Mezcal; planned Francesco Lafranconi's DrinkItaly session involving 5 fresh cocktails, 24 separate spirits, and an appearance by Danny DeVito; took pictures with Godfathers of Bourbon Fred Noe, Tom Bulleit, and Bill Samuels Jr.; received two job offers; and planned trips to both France and Scotland to visit distilleries. It was one of the best 45 minutes in my life!"
Kyle McHugh,
The Boozehound and Cocktail Apprentice
"Boundless Quaffing + Timeless Classics + Endless Parties + Sleepless Nights = Boundless quaffing of timeless classics at endless parties over sleepless nights. Less is so much more at Tales!"
Franky Marshall,
Cocktail Apprentice
"Tales connected me with some of the most talented, passionate, insightful people in this industry. I have never experienced the type of energy that defined the atmosphere of Tales prior to last July. I won't consider another year with TOTC in my agenda"
Corey Bunnewith,
Cocktail Apprentice
"The intensity and pace of the Apprentice Program was brutal to say the least, but ultimately rewarding. The access to knowledge was absolutely unparalleled."
Jason Littrell,
Cocktail Apprentice
"Mingling with the Who's Who drinking What's What. A definite Must' Must for any serious Cocktailian."
Darby Kelly,
Cocktail Apprentice
"Just when I thought it couldn't get any better. . . they brought us another round."
Darby Kelly,
Cocktail Apprentice
"Tales of the Cocktail is a high-speed, non-stop adventure in all things cocktail and spirit! I've never slept so little and been so enlightened. The TOC Apprentice Program was a great experience to learn from and work alongside the luminaries in our industry while creating countless cocktails for all the attendees."
Brian Matthys,
Cocktail Apprentice
"Tales of the Cocktail is the world's most intense 5-day beverage industry event...whether you're a producer, consumer or hospitality industry professional if you're there... it's because you care!"
Francesco Lafranconi,
National Director of Mixology & Spirits Educator, Southern Wine & Spirits of America Inc.
"Tales was the best yet in 2009; the international bar community was represented like never before and the organization was superb this year."
Dale DeGroff
"Tales of the Cocktail is the spearhead convention of a new movement for craft cocktails. If you ever wish you could have been at the Continental Congress during the revolution, this is the equivalent in the cocktail world replete with the greatest proponents of craft cocktails, spirits and better drinking. Viva la revolution!"
Derek M. Brown,
bartender, beverage consultant and drinks blogger for the Atlantic
"Tales of the Cocktail was a great help in exposing my brand to some of the best names in the business. Unlike trade shows and conventions, Tales is an intimate gathering of a likeminded, cocktail loving community."
Eric Tecosky,
President of American Mixers, Inc, www.DirtySue.com
"Apprenticing for Tales of the Cocktail has been an honor and a blast. So much so I did it twice. It's a great reminder of why we're in this industry - to learn, meet great people and have a great time. If you love your work, it's not really work anymore is it? I would do it again in a heartbeat and I suggest the program and the event to anyone I know that has an honest passion for our trade."
Kimberly Patton-Bragg,
Cocktail Apprentice
"Tales of the Cocktail has become one of the highlights of our year. There's no other event that gives us the opportunity to introduce Catdaddy and Midnight Moon to mixologists, writers, consumers, bar owners and distributors all under one roof. In addition, Ann & Paul have designed Tales to create a 'level playing field' for major brands, as well as small distilleries like us, so that we can make an impact at Tales and not get lost in the shuffle. Last but not least, Tales is ton of fun and really educational – Not only do we have an opportunity to promote our spirits, but we also walk away with new friends and knowledge of emerging trends within the cocktail community."
Sarah Leroy,
Piedmont Distillers
538 Louisa Street | New Orleans, LA 70117 | Office: 504-948-0511 | Fax: 504-948-0514 | info@talesofthecocktail.com