Portland Cocktail Week Highlights
Portland Cocktail Week brings the brightest bartenders in the industry together for education and networking. Now in its 10th year, the weeklong event has grown into a business-focused training curriculum tailored to the nation’s best bartenders.
This year, El Mayor® Tequila hosted a booth in the exhibition space for three days where participants could come taste each variant of the El Mayor brand family, including the newest addition, El Mayor® Cristalino. In addition, the brand hosted a Mash Up event, which brought together two well-known bartender crews from Hey Love and Broken Shaker bars to host an amazing party. Bartenders from these bars in Los Angeles and Portland came together to feature four specialty cocktails created with El Mayor Tequila variants. And that’s not all – over 350 attendees enjoyed hand dipped cigars, a custom photobooth, and an El Mayor ice luge. Throughout the night, more than 400 people came by the event and more than 1,000 cocktails were served!
Graciela Gonázlez, Fourth Generation Distiller at Destiladora González González, was also present at the events to share more information about her role in creating El Mayor Cristalino and to offer samples of this new product to attendees.
Limestone Branch Distillery’s new gin, Bowling & Burch, was also featured at Portland Cocktail Week. Bowling & Burch was featured at the official closing event for the week – the Bartender Showcase. Ten bartenders from key markets were tasked with creating their own cocktails inspired by their home market and using the new gin. More than 500 attendees were at the event, 1,500 cocktails were served and 60 bottles of gin were depleted! The showcase was the perfect way to launch this new brand to the trade community.
Cheers to a successful week in Portland!