El Jimador Tequila, owned by Brown-Forman, relaunched in India on September 18, 2026, introducing a redesigned bottle and two 100% Blue Weber Agave expressions, Silver and Reposado, according to the company's release.
The reintroduction is built around a campaign called Sip For Yourself and followed launch events in Mumbai and Goa on September 8 and 10 that brought together 140 beverage industry professionals, including bartenders and bar owners, according to trade outlet Spiritz and the Press Network of India.
What Launched, and Where
El Jimador Silver, an unaged expression, and Reposado, aged for two months in charred American white oak barrels, will initially be sold in Maharashtra, Goa and Karnataka, according to the company's release as reported by Spiritz and PNI. Approximate retail prices, subject to local taxes, are 4,200 rupees for Silver and 4,600 rupees for Reposado in Mumbai, 3,900 rupees and 4,300 rupees in Goa, and 3,900 rupees and 4,200 rupees in Karnataka. Brown-Forman said the brand will expand into additional Indian markets in the coming months.
Gaurav Sabharwal, Brown-Forman's managing director for India and South Asia, described tequila as the fastest growing spirits category in the country and said the brand's positioning centers on the credibility of its agave sourcing rather than trend-driven marketing, per the company statement carried by Spiritz.
How el Jimador Is Made
El Jimador is produced at Casa Herradura Distillery in Amatitán, Jalisco, a facility the company describes as more than 155 years old, according to the release. The brand itself launched in 1994 as a companion label to Herradura. Brown-Forman states the tequila is made from 100% Blue Weber Agave, double distilled, and fermented naturally using wild yeast drawn from citrus trees around the distillery, per the company's own brand materials.
The brand's agave content has not been constant throughout its history. Difford's Guide, an independent spirits reference, documents that el Jimador launched as a 100% agave tequila, was reduced to a mixto formulation during the industry's agave shortage around 1999 and 2000, and returned to a 100% agave recipe starting in 2009. Drinks writer accounts from that period, including a 2009 Alcademics post on the broader agave crisis, describe the same reversal across several tequila brands that shifted composition and back again as agave supply tightened and then eased.
Why Brown-Forman Is Pushing Into India Now
The India relaunch lands weeks after Brown-Forman reported first quarter fiscal 2027 results on September 2, 2026, showing its tequila portfolio under pressure at home. Net sales for the Tequila segment fell 12%, or 13% on an organic basis, with Herradura down 17% and el Jimador down 10%, the company said in its earnings release. Management attributed el Jimador's decline to lower net pricing in the United States even as the brand gained ground within the 15 to 30 dollar price tier, moving from the ninth largest tequila brand in that segment to the fourth, chief executive Lawson Whiting told analysts, according to a transcript carried by Investing.com.
Emerging international markets, by contrast, grew 9% organically in the quarter, led by Mexico and the United Arab Emirates, the company reported. That international emphasis follows comments Sabharwal made to Reuters in March 2026, as reported by Storyboard18 and The Drinks Business, that Brown-Forman intended to introduce el Jimador, Herradura and the Scotch whisky Benriach in India over the next two to three years. At the time, Brown-Forman sold around ten brands in the country and India was not yet among the company's top ten global markets, Sabharwal said.
What to Watch Next
This is a company betting on category growth abroad while its core tequila business softens in the United States, and the India rollout is one piece of a stated multi-year plan that also includes Herradura and Benriach. El Jimador does not currently carry a published TW Score in Tequila Watch's database, so no comparison to other bottles on composition or quality is offered here. Whether pricing near 4,000 to 4,600 rupees builds share against entrenched competitors in a market IWSR expects to keep growing is not yet established.