Aperol Is Carrying Campari's Weight as Wild Turkey Stumbles in a Broken Bourbon Market
There was a time, not so long ago, when bourbon could do no wrong inside a corporate spirits portfolio. A bottle of Wild Turkey on the balance sheet was a license to print money. Premium American whiskey was the category that outran recessions, survived market corrections, and minted billionaires out of Kentucky farmers and distillers alike. That era is over, at least for now, and the financial results coming out of Milan's Campari Group tell that story with uncomfortable clarity.
Campari reported modest organic sales growth of 2.9% in the first quarter of 2026, with strong performances from Aperol and key international markets supporting the numbers. On the surface, that looks like a clean bill of health for one of the world's most diversified spirits conglomerates. Dig one layer deeper, though, and you find a company navigating a significant structural fault line: its aperitif empire is compensating, quarter by quarter, for a bourbon business that keeps losing ground.
The Numbers That Tell the Real Story
The Milan-headquartered company's sales for the first three months of 2026 reached €643 million (approximately US$757 million), down 3.4% on a reported basis compared to the same period last year when sales totaled €666 million. That reported decline, however, is largely a product of foreign exchange headwinds and the deliberate shedding of non-core assets — factors that distort headline numbers but don't change the underlying competitive reality.
Among Campari's brand houses, the agave portfolio grew 4.9%, cognac and champagne advanced 3.5%, and aperitifs increased 2.1%, while whiskey and rum declined 5.0%. That whiskey and rum division is the only segment in the entire portfolio to post a contraction, and its underperformance stands out against a backdrop of growth elsewhere. The division's brands include Wild Turkey Bourbon and Jamaican rums Appleton Estate and Wray & Nephew Overproof.
Performance in the division was partially offset by targeted inventory optimization in the U.S., supply phasing on Wild Turkey, and a weak cognac market affecting Courvoisier. The inventory optimization language is corporate shorthand for a market where retailers and distributors have more American whiskey on the shelf than they can sell at current rates — a reality familiar to anyone who has walked into a well-stocked liquor store lately and noticed the price tags that haven't budged despite softening demand.
What Is Actually Happening to Wild Turkey
Wild Turkey's troubles didn't materialize overnight in Q1 2026. The brand has been bleeding market share and volume for more than a year, part of a broader unraveling across the Kentucky bourbon establishment. Among Kentucky's most recognized brands, Brown-Forman's Woodford Reserve, Old Forester, and Coopers' Craft sales slipped 5%, Campari Group's Wild Turkey fell 8%, and Diageo's Bulleit dropped 7%. These are not rounding errors. An 8% decline at Wild Turkey represents a meaningful erosion of volume for a brand that, through its Russell's Reserve expressions and its flagship 81 and 101 bottlings, had built a devoted following among serious bourbon drinkers over decades.
The overall U.S. whiskey market saw a decline of roughly 4.9% by volume and 5.1% by revenue for the twelve months ending July 2025. Wild Turkey, then, is actually performing worse than the already-declining category average — a sign that something specific is hitting the brand beyond macroeconomic headwinds. Behind the numbers is a confluence of factors: inventory left over from pandemic production surges, shifting consumer preferences, and the combined economic sting of tariffs and inflation.
The tariff dimension is particularly punishing. Since March 2025, American products have been banned from Canadian shelves due to trade tensions, which directly impacted Campari's Wild Turkey Bourbon and Skyy brands. Canada was not a marginal market for American distillers. Canada was once a roughly $250 million export market for U.S. distillers before the trade dispute. "Since Liberation Day, it's unfortunate to report that our industry has lost over 70% of our exports to Canada because many provinces have decided not to carry American spirits," said Chris Swonger, DISCUS president and CEO.
The Kentucky Barrel Glut Problem
Compounding the tariff damage is a supply-side crisis that has been building for years. According to the Kentucky Distillers' Association, Kentucky distillers currently have an all-time record amount of aging whiskey in stock, with a glut of 16.1 million barrels in storage. That barrel surplus is the product of an industry that spent the better part of a decade expanding production to meet what everyone assumed was insatiable demand. Warehouses were built. Stills were added. Rickhouses went up across Bardstown, Lawrenceburg, and Loretto. Then the demand curve flattened, and the barrels kept accumulating.
Record production levels in Kentucky, coupled with slowing demand, suggest a potential oversupply that could further depress prices, especially in the contract whiskey market. For a brand like Wild Turkey, which competes squarely in the mainstream-to-premium tier, the oversupply creates shelf competition from smaller distilleries and private labels that are willing to discount aggressively.
A Generational Shift in the Glass
The tariff and oversupply narratives are legitimate, but they risk obscuring a deeper shift in who is buying spirits and what they are drinking. By far the most troubling headwind is the fact that U.S. alcohol consumption declined in 2025 to a 90-year low in drinking rates, a sociological trend no one in the industry anticipated. Younger consumers are drinking less than any generation before them in nearly a century. Health consciousness, GLP-1 medications, cannabis, and a general recalibration of lifestyle priorities are all pulling in the same direction.
Even among those who do drink, brand loyalty is fracturing. "While people used to say, 'Bulleit is my brand, Wild Turkey is my brand, or Jim Beam is my brand,' and they would buy that exclusively, you kind of see the new drinker being more curious and wanting to explore different expressions from different distilleries — not just in Kentucky, but also across the U.S.," observed Ryan Cecil, a master blender at Louisville's Pursuit Spirits. Curiosity-driven purchasing is good for the category in the long run, but it is brutal for legacy brands that depend on habitual repurchase to sustain volume.
Aperol and the Aperitif Empire That's Keeping the Lights On
While Wild Turkey navigates the worst stretch in its recent commercial history, the Italian half of Campari's portfolio is doing the heavy lifting. The company's aperitifs division, which includes Aperol and the namesake Campari bitter and accounts for 45% of revenue, was up by 2.1%. That figure is not explosive, but it is growth — real, organic growth in a period when many spirits categories are contracting.
Aperol showed solid growth in Europe, supported by the introduction of new formats such as its canned Aperol Spritz To Go cocktail, and was also highlighted as a growth driver in the U.S., Brazil, and Australia. The brand's American performance is particularly notable given the general softness in spirits sales domestically. Aperol has managed to plant itself in a different cultural moment than whiskey — it's the drink of rooftop bars, outdoor dining, and social occasions that skew younger and more urban, demographics that bourbon's core audience does not perfectly overlap with.
The company also introduced a redesigned Aperol bottle while maintaining the iconic recipe, alongside the Campari Spritz ready-to-serve format, both aimed at expanding consumption occasions and geographic reach. These product and packaging moves are deliberate competitive investments — Campari is betting on convenience and accessibility to pull new drinkers into the aperitif occasion rather than waiting for them to discover the category organically.
Espolòn Tequila Punches Above Its Weight
Another quiet hero in the Q1 2026 results is Espolòn, Campari's Mexican-made tequila brand. The agave arm, which is led by Espolòn and represents 9.4% of revenue, saw growth of 4.9%, with Espolòn Blanco highlighted for a strong showing in the U.S. as well as double-digit growth in Australia for both bottle and ready-to-drink formats. Tequila continues to be the great beneficiary of bourbon's stumble, capturing palates and shelf space that American whiskey once held with little competition. Espolòn's growth in the U.S. is Campari capturing some of that migration in real time.
Campari's Strategic Response: Fewer, Bigger Bets
Faced with an uneven portfolio performance, Campari's leadership under CEO Simon Hunt has settled on a philosophy built around discipline and concentration. The buzzword internally is "fewer, bigger bets" — a strategy of doubling down on the brands with the clearest growth trajectories and cutting loose the ones that dilute focus without delivering proportionate returns.
Campari Group CEO Simon Hunt called the company's start to the year a "solid performance," and after navigating a challenging 2025, told investors the group would bet on its core brands. "We started 2026 with a solid performance in our smallest quarter by executing our new strategy of fewer, bigger bets," Hunt said of the company's Q1 performance.
Hunt noted that "despite the challenging operating backdrop, we gained market share in nearly all our key markets globally, especially on our priority brands," adding that the company "made good progress on our more focused brand investments and innovation pipeline ready for our peak season."
The portfolio pruning has been visible in the asset sales Campari has executed over the past year. In its 2026 outlook, Campari Group said it would continue to focus on portfolio streamlining; last year, the company offloaded non-core brands including Cinzano vermouth and Italian liqueurs Amaro Averna and Zedda Piras as part of that strategy. Shedding established but low-priority labels frees up marketing dollars and management bandwidth to concentrate on Aperol, Campari bitter, Espolòn, and the premium end of the Wild Turkey family — the brands most capable of generating genuine long-term value.
Full-Year Guidance and What It Signals to the Market
Looking ahead, the group maintained its 2026 forecast of 3% growth for the year — which it called an "industry outperformance." "This solid start means we are confirming our guidance for 2026," Hunt said. The confirmation of guidance, even against weaker-than-analyst-expected Q1 revenues, was the key message Campari needed to send to investors. In a market environment defined by volatility, simply holding the line on full-year expectations qualifies as a form of reassurance.
Assuming a challenging but stable operating environment with no further deterioration, Campari Group expects to achieve industry outperformance with the pace of 2025's full-year underlying growth of approximately 3% expected to continue in 2026, while facing the headwind effect of U.S. tariffs in the full year, with EBIT-adjusted margin expected to deliver contained organic accretion with a skew into the second half of the year due to front-loading of advertising and promotional investments.
Gross margin will be supported by moderate cost-of-goods tailwinds, but offset by an estimated full-year tariff impact of approximately €30 million based on current tariff levels. That €30 million tariff drag is a concrete, quantifiable burden sitting on top of organic business challenges. It is not hypothetical risk — it is already baked into how management models the rest of the year.
The U.S. Market in Specific: Outperforming Where It Matters
In the U.S., Campari reported ongoing outperformance across all channels, especially in strategic on-premise and NABCA accounts, driven by solid growth in aperitifs and tequila. The on-premise channel — bars, restaurants, hotel programs — is the arena where Aperol and Campari bitter have their most potent competitive advantage. Bartenders who learn to build a proper Spritz or a Campari Negroni become brand ambassadors at no additional cost to the company. That cultural embedding is something a bourbon brand simply cannot replicate with an Italian bitter.
The group's sales in the U.S. for 2025 were flat overall, with the market affected by the "ongoing challenging backdrop" caused by the impact of tariffs, while local brands in the U.S. declined and there was "brand softness" in Skyy vodka. The fact that Aperol and tequila are now actively pulling U.S. performance forward while Wild Turkey, Skyy, and other domestic-facing brands drag it back is a revealing snapshot of where American consumer tastes are drifting.
The Broader Bourbon Crisis: Context Beyond Campari
Campari's Wild Turkey situation does not exist in isolation. The entire edifice of American commercial bourbon is under pressure in ways that have no modern precedent. The announcement by the giant Kentucky bourbon producer Jim Beam that it would pause operations at its main distillery for an indefinite period beginning in January 2026 sent shock waves through the liquor industry, not only because of Jim Beam's heritage dating back to 1795, but because for the last two decades bourbon sales had been soaring.
Kentucky Owl owner Stoli Group USA filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in November 2024, citing geopolitical tensions, tariff-driven headwinds, and weaker demand for high-end bourbon. At the super-premium end, where the margins are richest, buyers who once paid $100 or more for a special release are reconsidering. The super-premium-and-above segment is expected to face "increasing pressure" as consumers seek value, and price reductions could backfire by devaluing the premium perception.
During 2025, Kentucky whiskey exports fell 15%, according to U.S. Census data. Export markets had been one of bourbon's great growth stories of the prior decade, with European, Asian, and Australian consumers developing a genuine appetite for Kentucky-made whiskey. The tariff environment has complicated every one of those relationships. The trade war with Canada saw U.S. spirits removed from Canadian shelves — their second-largest export market — a move that Brown-Forman CEO Lawson Whiting described as "worse than tariffs."
The industry's problems are structural enough that even deep-pocketed distillers are pulling back on production. A Heaven Hill spokeswoman said bourbon output would be lower this year than last as the company "paces production" after a decade of booming growth, but declined to provide an exact figure. When Heaven Hill — one of the most conservative and disciplined producers in Kentucky — publicly acknowledges it is dialing back the stills, that is a statement about where the market stands.
The Consumption Cliff That Nobody Predicted
Trade policy and inventory overhang are tangible problems with tractable solutions. The longer-term challenge is the demographic and behavioral one. Liquor consumption has been falling from steep pandemic-era highs as the cost of living soars and some younger consumers drink less, while tariffs and inflation have pushed up input costs and punctured demand overseas. These forces are not acting independently — they are compounding each other in a way that makes it very hard for any single brand to grow its way out of the problem without taking share from a direct competitor.
U.S. whiskey sales volumes dropped 1.2% in 2023 — the first decline since 2002 — and further declined by 4% in the first nine months of 2024. Those numbers were supposed to represent a temporary correction. Instead, 2025 brought further deterioration. For Campari, the implication is not that Wild Turkey is a failing brand in any permanent sense, but that it operates in a category facing a generational reset — and that reset will take time to work through regardless of how smart the marketing strategy is.
What This Means for Bourbon Enthusiasts and the Category's Future
For the serious bourbon drinker, Campari's portfolio dynamics are worth paying attention to precisely because they reflect corporate priorities. When a company like Campari — which owns Wild Turkey and all its acclaimed expressions, including the Russell's Reserve single barrel releases that command genuine collector interest — starts trimming non-core assets and concentrating on "fewer, bigger bets," it raises real questions about where Wild Turkey's premium tiers sit in the investment hierarchy.
The Russell family legacy — Jimmy Russell, the longest-serving active master distiller in the industry, and his son Eddie — remains among the most respected in bourbon. Their distillery in Lawrenceburg, Kentucky, continues to produce whiskey that enthusiasts regard as among the best value propositions in the category. But brand-level love from connoisseurs and corporate revenue growth are different animals, and right now they are moving in opposite directions for Wild Turkey.
Despite overall volume declines, the high-end and super-premium segments of American whiskey are showing some resilience, indicating a consumer preference for quality over quantity. That is where the opportunity lives for Wild Turkey's higher-end expressions. Much of the recent growth in annual revenues has been attributed to rising demand for premium and super-premium varieties of bourbon. The question for Campari's management team is whether they lean into that premium positioning aggressively enough to offset the volume losses in the mainstream tier — or whether they take a more conservative posture and wait for the broader market correction to stabilize.
Meanwhile, Aperol's continued march across American back bars and restaurant cocktail menus is a reminder that the competition for discretionary drinking dollars has never been more intense or more global. An orange Spritz in a wine glass is not competing directly with a pour of bourbon neat — but it is competing for the same occasion, the same check, and increasingly the same consumer. The fact that Campari Group's Italian bitter is growing while its Kentucky bourbon is shrinking is one of the more telling data points in American drinks culture right now.
Looking Ahead: Second Half and the Road to Recovery
Management confirmed its 2026 outlook across multiple dimensions, maintaining expectations for continued industry outperformance and margin expansion despite near-term headwinds, with Campari expecting to continue outperforming the industry at approximately 3% underlying growth pace, assuming stable operating conditions. That stability assumption is doing significant work. A further deterioration in U.S.-EU trade relations, a new round of retaliatory tariffs on American spirits, or a continued slide in overall alcohol consumption could all put that 3% target out of reach.
The Italian group said it had generated broad-based growth across its brand divisions and regions, with 18 countries in growth including core ones, as well as targeted inventory optimization in the U.S. on non-priority brands. The geographic breadth matters — Campari is not purely dependent on either the U.S. or Europe, and its developing market exposure provides a genuine buffer against region-specific disruptions. Brazil, Australia, and growing Asian markets give the company optionality that a purely domestic bourbon play simply does not have.
For Wild Turkey and the bourbon segment specifically, the path back runs through two things that take time: inventory normalization and consumer sentiment recovery. The barrel glut will clear, but slowly. Consumer confidence in American spirits exports and domestic spending will return, but only as the tariff environment stabilizes and inflation eases. In the interim, the brand is well positioned to maintain its core audience through quality and heritage — assets that market conditions cannot depreciate overnight.
For now, Campari Group is a company that is frankly getting by on the strength of an orange Italian liqueur while its Kentucky bourbon rebuilds. That is not a crisis — it is a portfolio at work, with different divisions performing their designated roles at different points in the cycle. The real test will come in the second half of 2026, when the peak drinking season puts genuine volume behind every brand in the portfolio and makes clear whether Wild Turkey's headwinds are cyclical — or something more permanent.
