All about Havana Club distillery

It is common knowledge that there are two major Rums that are sold under the notorious name Havana Club.

The brand we are referring to here is the Havana Club brand created in Cuba in 1934 and owned by Corporación Cuba Ron and Pernod Ricard.

Havana Club is one of the most well-known, best-selling Rums in the entire world. It was originally produced in Cardenas, Cuba by family-owned facility Jose Arechabala S.A., in 1878.

The brand was nationalized after the Cuban Revolution of 1959. The Arechabala family consequently left Cuba and stopped producing Rum, allowing the Cuban government to register the mark in the US in 1976.

The facility was later renamed Jose Arechabala S.A. in 1977, and manufacturing was moved to a new plant in Santa Cruz del Norte.

The brand was then assigned by the Cuban government to Pernod Ricard in 1993, and in 1994, Bacardi obtained the Arechabala family's remaining rights in the brand.

They started producing limited amounts of Rum exclusively in the United States, using the Havana Club name.

This situation is the source of a longstanding notorious litigation concerning the rights and ownership of the Havana Club label.

Pernod Ricard’s Havana Club is currently produced in Cuba and sold globally, excluding the United States, and distributed by Havana Club International, under the split ownership of Pernod Ricard and the Corporación Cuba Ron.