Aldi’s Oliver Cromwell London Dry Gin, which retails for £9.97, won gold in the dry gin category at the International Wine & Spirits Competition, an award judged by industry experts from across the world.
Experts awarded second place to Foxhole London Dry Gin, which sells for £39.99, and describes itself as “velvet textured with violet notes”.
The Oliver Cromwell London Dry Gin beat Foxhole London Dry Gin, which sells for £39.99. Picture: Aldi
The British-made Aldi dry gin also beat Beefeater London Dry Gin, M&S London Dry Gin and Bleu d’Argent London Dry Gin to win the category.
Aldi’s spirits earned 20 medals at the competition in total. The German discount supermarket also won the Supermarket Own Brand Spirits Range of The Year category, beating Marks & Spencer, Waitrose – and rival discounter Lidl.
The retailer, which is the UK’s fifth largest supermarket, has won 158 medals in total for its alcoholic beverage range across beers, wines and spirits in 2017.
A surge in recent gin sales has seen the spirit earn more money for the Treasury than beer for the first time.
Gin sales have increased by 12 per cent over the past year with a total of 43 million bottles sold across the country, according to the Wine and Spirit Trade Association.
Earlier this year, the Office for National Statistics reintroduced gin to its annual “inflation basket” of regularly bought goods for the first time in 13 years.
Tony Baines, joint managing director of corporate buying at Aldi, said: “Receiving medals for our spirits is a fantastic achievement and it is great to see our spirits range being priced so highly by experts.
“Being awarded a title such as ‘Supermarket Own Brand Spirits Range of the Year’ is something that not only reflects the quality of our products but also the hard work that our UK based buying team put into drinks retailing every single day.”
