Champagne Spirits and Cognac

Moët Hennessy brings together all the LVMH Champagne Spirits and Cognac brands, which are sold through its extensive international retail network. These distinctive brands, symbols of the world of luxury, distribute exceptional products worldwide and make Moët Hennessy the world leader in Champagne Spirits and Cognac. The business group also develops high-end prestige sparkling and still wines from the world's most renowned wine-growing regions.

In 1765, Richard Hennessy, an Irish Catholic serving in the French Army, founded a company in Cognac. His son Jacques rapidly ensured the continuing success of the company. Since then, the name of Hennessy has always been firmly associated with the history of Cognac.

Today, Hennessy sells over 3 million cases of Cognac world-wide every year. An entrepreneurial spirit together with a constant search for the highest quality lead the company to become the leader among the great Cognac houses and to establish the greatest reserves of old cognacs available in the world.

The company places great importance on the most prestigious cognacs: V.S.O.P. (Very Superior Old Pale), X.O. (Extra Old), F.O.V. (Finest Old Vintage) much appreciated by the Chinese, Paradis, and "Richard Hennessy", created in 1996 in homage to the founder of the company.

The company is equally very keen on encouraging new ways of drinking cognac, more tonic and refreshing ways of consuming the product, in a bid to satisfy new consumers, particularly the young.

The Abbey of Hautvillers was born in the 7th century of a dream that came to Saint Nivard.
Ten centuries later, Dom Pierre Pérignon gave this heritage its most dazzling interpretation. The extraordinary quality of the wine he devised and produced in the secrecy and religious fervour of the Abbey makes him the spiritual father of Champagne and one of the greatest visionaries of modern wine-making.

The Abbey of Hautvillers is to this day the custodian of the memory of the wine, touchstone of its past as of the vintages still to come, timeless guardian of the spirit of Dom Pérignon: home of a unique inspiration.

Not content with the painstaking selection of only Pinot Noir and Chardonnay grapes, and over and above the exclusive choice of plots offering the very best soils and perfect exposure, Dom Pérignon categorically insists on choosing only the best harvests and thereafter, on a long, slow ageing of the wine on its lees. Harvests that lack the potential to fully express the elusive Dom Pérignon style, will be left out.
Each vintage offers thus a new aspect of Champagne Dom Pérignon, reflecting an assemblage that is a unique act of creation for the wine maker Richard Geoffroy. In its constant quest for the ultimate balance between Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, the Dom Pérignon style traces, vintage after vintage, a complex structure made up of aroma and sensations, silky smooth, light as air and full of sensuality.
Here, the assemblage is far more than a standard procedure: it is an exciting challenge which gives its uniqueness to each vintage of Dom Pérignon...

The infinite care and attention lavished on Château d'Yquem's outstanding terroir, consolidated over the centuries by the ancestors of Count Alexandre de Lur Saluces, earned the estate the unique rank of Premier cru Supérieur in the 1855 classification.

Producing wine at the top classified growth in Sauternes is always an extremely demanding proposition.

The selection process takes place every step of the way at Yquem, from the vineyard to the bottling line. The best example of this is the meticulous way the grapes are harvested, in several waves. Pickers select only individual grapes (rather than whole bunches) attacked by Botrytis cinerea every time they go through the vineyards. Thanks to a wonderful sort of alchemy, this microscopic fungus adds special aromas and flavours to the wine, utterly transforming it.

This philosophy of extremely careful selection carries over to the cellar, where the wine is aged for three and a half years in new oak barrels.

In the last analysis, yields amount to just one glass of wine per vine. This infinitely complex and long-lived nectar can only be made in years during which nature cooperates with man.