How Asia's drinks brands are winning over Western markets
I grew up in Asia and learned about brands long before I knew what branding was. There was Hello Kitty and everything else Sanrio made, instant noodles eaten cross-legged on the kitchen floor, and whatever seventies American television happened to be on that afternoon. Without realising it, I was learning that a brand can give you a way into a culture you are curious about. I have spent my career in drinks watching that same instinct play out commercially, and it has rarely been as visible as it is now.
For a long time, Asia's drinks brands reached the West as curiosities: an unusual bottle on a back bar, or something picked up once in a specialist grocer. That period is over. Jinro has been named the world's best-selling spirit for 25 consecutive years by Drinks International, and in the UK, 77% of its sales now come from non-Asian drinkers, compared with 30% in 2015. In the US, Lotte's soju brands grew 700% by volume in the year to March 2025. These brands were built at home and exported with real intent. The way they did it is worth studying for anyone looking to launch a drinks brand in a new market, wherever that brand starts.
Lower the barrier and let curiosity do the work
Suntory could have presented Yamazaki and Hibiki to Western drinkers as connoisseurs' whiskies and stopped there. What changed its thinking was a research trip to New York in 2010. Its team found the city's bartenders mixing Yamazaki 12 into cocktails, a flagship single malt that now retails for US$160 to US$175 a bottle. The appetite for Japanese whisky behind the bar was clearly there, but the price was wrong for the way bartenders wanted to use it.
Toki was the response. It launched at under US$40 and was designed from the outset for mixing, sitting in a price bracket Japanese whisky had barely occupied before. Alongside the 2016 US launch, Suntory offered bars Toki-branded highball machines, which put the serve itself in front of drinkers. The highball also removed much of the ceremony that makes whisky intimidating for newcomers. There was no debate about neat or rocks, water or glassware, just whisky, ice and soda. Suntory has since carried the same logic into ready-to-drink cocktails, which will be many people's first encounter with the brand.
For premium spirits branding, the lesson is that the flagship does not have to be the front door. An accessible first step, priced and designed for the way people actually drink, builds the curiosity that eventually leads them to the premium bottles.
Arrive on a wave that is already moving
Soju is a clear Korean spirit, usually somewhere between 16% and 20% ABV, traditionally drunk alongside food. In the West it arrived on two currents at once: a generational shift towards lighter drinking, and the global reach of K-pop, K-drama and Korean food. Lotte's soju marketing team credits K-pop and K-dramas with much of its growth, and says its first task in the US was simply explaining what soju is and how it differs from sake.
Familiarity with the culture earned soju attention, but it took distribution to turn that attention into sales. Lotte's soju brands were largely confined to specialist Asian retailers in the US until Spirit of Gallo took on distribution, with the aim of moving them into mainstream channels. The growth that followed is as much a route-to-market story as a brand one. Jinro's UK performance tells the same story from the retail side. The brand reported a three-year compound annual growth rate of 73%, crediting it in part to festival sponsorship and listings in Sainsbury's, Costco and Morrisons.
Give people something to take part in
The brands with the most staying power offer new drinkers a way to take part in a culture they already find compelling, rather than a product they first have to learn about. Ramune, the Japanese lemonade sold in a glass bottle sealed with a marble, is the clearest example I know. Opening it means pressing the marble down into the neck, and that small ritual has become as recognisable as the drink itself. The bottle is the Distinctive Brand Asset, and it gives a simple soft drink a point of difference no flavour could.
Bubble tea, which travelled out of Taiwan, works the same way at far greater scale. It is customisable, visual and made to be shared online, and in Australia, Gong Cha and Chatime built their growth around exactly that format. In the US, 2022 trade data showed tapioca pearls had become the country's biggest food import from Taiwan. For non-alcoholic drinks branding in particular, the liquid rarely carries a brand on its own. A ritual built into the pack or the serve can do the work that provenance does for a spirit.
Know what to translate and what to protect
Travelling well does not mean becoming culturally neutral. The brands that do it best know which parts of their drinks brand identity earned their success at home. They protect those carefully and flex everything else. With Toki, the highball ritual and the Suntory name travelled intact, while the product itself was conceived for the cocktail bar channel, because bars rather than izakayas are where Japanese whisky is mostly drunk outside Japan. Midori
Language is where that line is easiest to misjudge. Jinro accepted a breach of the UK's Portman Group code over a bar sign at a London music festival, which the complaints panel judged inadvertent and the brand attributed to differences in expression between Korean and English. It was a small incident, but it shows why naming and tone of voice need testing against a new market's culture and advertising codes, as well as translating for meaning. The Spirits Business
Culture opens the door, and commerce keeps it open
What these brands share is an understanding that cultural relevance can arrive before the product does, creating familiarity long before a bottle reaches the shelf. Relevance alone rarely creates lasting demand, though. Every brand here paired it with commercial execution, whether that was the right price tier, the right distribution partner or the right retail listings.
For any drinks brand heading into a new market, whether that is Japanese whisky finding its way into New York bars or Australian wine building a following in Asia, the work starts with the same question. Which parts of the brand story will resonate as they are, which need translating, and which should never be touched? The brands that answer it honestly tend to travel well. Those that skip it risk ending up where Asia's drinks brands started, as a curiosity on someone else's back bar.
Denomination is a global drinks branding agency with studios in Sydney, London, San Francisco and New York, working across wine, spirits, beer, RTD and non-alcoholic brands. If you're taking a drinks brand into a new market, get in touch.
Ellie Hansen is Managing Director & Chief Growth Officer at Denomination's Sydney studio.
This article was first published in Branding in Asia on 16 September 2026.
