Hennessy

The Hennessy cognac distillery was founded by Irish Jacobite military officer Richard Hennessy in 1765, who had served in the army of King Louis XV. The Hennessy family's seat was Killavullen near Mallow, and was closely related in County Cork to the Nagle, Burke and Roche families. He retired to the commune of Cognac, and began distilling and exporting brandies, first to Britain and his native Ireland, closely followed by the United States. In 1813 Richard Hennessy's son James Hennessy gave the company its trading name, Jas Hennessy & Co. He was also responsible for choosing Jean Fillioux as the house's Master Blender. A member of the Fillioux family has occupied the role ever since, a business relationship that has lasted eight generations and more than 250 years.

Hennessy became the world's leading exporter of brandy in the 1840s, a status it has never lost. By 1860, it represented one out of every four bottles of cognac sold internationally. Hennessy also instituted several of the conventions now used across the cognac industry. It was one of the first marques to sell bottles rather than casks of cognac, a process that helped it survive the Great French Wine Blight in the mid-nineteenth century. It was also the first cognac house to use star ratings, and the gradings V.S.O.P. and X.O., which are today used by most other cognac producers.

The V.S.O.P. designation was first applied in 1817, when the Prince Regent (later King George IV) of Britain asked Hennessy to create a "very superior old pale" cognac, a description that had previously been applied to sherries. Maurice Hennessy, the grandson of Richard Hennessy, then introduced a star-based classification of cognac qualities in 1865 (a system simultaneously adopted by Hennessy's competitor Martell), which remained the industry standard of cognac age designation until the 1960s. Maurice Hennessy also created the X.O. ("extra old") designation in 1870, for cognacs which had undergone prolonged cask maturation.

A branch of the Hennessy family moved from France to England in the early 1900s. It established itself in the Army and in English politics, eventually earning the title of Baron Windlesham. Although family ties are alive, the English branch is no longer involved in the cognac business.

In 1944, Kilian Hennessy, a fifth-generation direct descendant of Richard Hennessy, began assisting his cousin Maurice Hennessy in running the business. Kilian Hennessy had intended to be a banker, but instead went on to position Hennessy as an international brand, travelling to Ireland, the United States and Asia to promote the brand. He first visited China in 1946, and the nation has since become the world's second-largest cognac market. In 1947, Hennessy's business relationship with Martell also came to a close, after the death of Maurice Firino-Martell.

Hennessy has also become a key part of major luxury conglomerates. In 1971 Kilian Hennessy spearheaded the company's merger with Moët & Chandon, to create Moët Hennessy which eventually went public and thrived financially. Moët Hennessy then announced a merger with Louis Vuitton, which already owned champagne brands, in 1987, creating the world's largest luxury brand conglomerate, LVMH.

In 1988, a management crisis led to the group's takeover by Bernard Arnault, owner of the haute couture house Dior, with the support of the Guinness brewery group. The so-called "LVMH affair" was so controversial in France that French president François Mitterrand referenced it in a televised address.

Kilian Hennessy remained on the company's advisory board until his death in 2010 at the age of 103. An eighth generation representative of the Hennessy dynasty, Maurice-Richard Hennessy, acts as one of the brand's global ambassadors. He had originally trained as a farmer before entering the family business.

Marketing

Hennessy holds the largest collection of cognac eaux-de-vie in the world, with more than 470,000 casks in its cellars. Through a process of blending and maturation of varying lengths, it makes several distinct gradings of cognac. As well as its V.S and V.S.O.P. gradings, which make up the majority of its sales, Hennessy is known for expensive specialist cognacs, some of which are still blended by the Fillioux family.

Limited editions of Hennessy can contain more than one hundred different eaux-de-vie, some of which can be centuries old; they are traditionally accompanied with luxurious trimmings such as custom-made boxes and hand-blown carafes. A bottle of Richard Hennessy, for example, is priced at around US$7,000, and comes in a Baccarat crystal decanter with matching glasses, a fusil, and a tray, all designed by the architect Daniel Libeskind.

Since 2009, Hennessy has released a number of collectible editions to mark anniversaries, special occasions, or collaborations with artists, designers and organisations, such as the NBA. It has collaborated with Zhang Enli, Les Twins, Refik Anadol, Kaws and Marc Newson among others.

Hennessy is also used as an ingredient in cocktails and mixed drinks, and is commonly served in nightclubs and bars. The company has launched a number of new products aimed at this on-premises market, including Pure White, Hennessy Black and Fine de Cognac, and promoted them accordingly. The rapper Nas has worked as a brand ambassador for the brand.