Diageo

Founded in year
1997

How many employees
20,000

Where they Operate
Diageo products are sold in around 180 markets

Number of brands
14 strategic brands in addition to many others

Key brands
Baileys, Captain Morgan, Guinness, Johnnie Walker, Jose Cuervo and Smirnoff

Introduction
Diageo is a global alcoholic beverage company with its head office based in London, United Kingdom. It is the world’s largest producer of spirits and a major producer of beer and wine. Its brands include Smirnoff (the world’s best-selling vodka), Johnnie Walker (the world’s best-selling Scotch whisky), José Cuervo (the world’s best-selling tequila), Baileys (the world’s best-selling liqueur) and Guinness (the world’s best-selling stout). It also owns 34 per cent of Moët Hennessy which owns brands including Moët & Chandon, Veuve Clicquot and Hennessy. It sells its products in over 180 countries and has offices in 80 countries.

Its primary listing is on the London Stock Exchange and it is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. It has a secondary listing on the New York Stock Exchange.

Fairfood’s role
We began our dialogue with Diageo in 2007 by approaching them for information on the level of sustainability in their supply chains. Diageo informed us of their Supplier Performance Management (SPM) programme involving a 4-stage assessment process and score cards for managing social and ethical risks in their supply chains. We recognised this as a positive step. However, only a limited percentage of suppliers are audited and this information is unavailable to the public. As transparency is central to our approach to sustainability, we hope that the auditing information will be publicly available in the future.

Diageo has also identified four priority sourcing materials on which to focus their sustainable agriculture strategy: sugarcane, cream, malting barley and sorghum. Fairfood commends Diageo’s commitment in 2011 to source all sustainable cream. Although the standards and extent of these commitments are still unclear, we were pleased to see clear public commitments from the company. With regards to sugar, we support Diageo’s joint membership of Bon Sucro Better Sugarcane Initiative. We recognise this initiative as a viable sustainability measure and, we encourage Diageo to become a full member. We look forward to Diageo issuing measurable commitments for sugar and the other priority sourcing materials.

Current status
We are awaiting measurable details about the sustainable cream programme from Diageo and their principle supplier, Glanbia. We also continue to engage with Diageo on the tax policy they recently made public. Finally, we look forward to Diageo formulating sustainable sourcing commitments for their key agricultural materials in 2012.

Link to Wikipedia and other pages relevant to the company
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diageo
http://www.diageo.com

News updates
To Diageo! (15 september 2011)