Grand Marnier

Grand Marnier is the flagship brand of Societé des Produits Marnier-Lapostolle. The company dates back to 1827 when Jean-Baptiste Lapostolle founded a distillery in Neauphle-le-Château, around 50km west of Paris, to produce fruit liqueurs. In 1876 his granddaughter married Louis-Alexandre Marnier, the son of a winemaking family from Sancerre.

In 1880 Louis-Alexandre created a new liqueur by blending Cognac with the essence of Caribbean oranges distilled to a still-secret recipe. It was originally named “Curaçao Marnier” but renamed Grand Marnier at the suggestion of César Ritz. By the turn of the century it had gained international acclaim. In 1921 the company acquired Château de Bourg-Charente in the heart of the Cognac region, which is where Cognacs are selected and blended. The company is the fifth largest purchaser of Cognac in the world and is supplied by around 200 small-scale distillers.

Aside from the principal “Cordon Rouge” liqueur, the product range includes several other liqueurs featuring other fruits, and various limited editions. Cordon Jaune (Yellow Ribbon; not available in all markets) is made with grain spirit rather than Cognac. GM Titanium is a new liqueur with spices and citrus, which unlike Cordon Rouge contains no sugar. Within the Grand Marnier division,

Cognacs and Pineau des Charentes are also released under the Marnier label, as well as a Lapostolle XO Armagnac. The Marnier-Lapostolle group also owns the Casa Lapostolle wine estate and the Kappa Pisco brand in Chile, plus Château de Sancerre in the Loire Valley, which was founded in 1919 by Louis Alexandre Marnier in the region of his birth.