Delhi Drinkers Pick Indian Liquor by a 20x Margin

Delhi’s government-run liquor shops sold nearly 18.61 crore bottles across categories in the past two financial years, and the data points to one clear behaviour: consumers default to Indian brands. RTI numbers accessed by PTI show total sales rose from about 9 crore bottles in 2024-25 to roughly 9.61 crore in 2025-26, with Indian Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL) pushing far ahead of imported foreign liquor (IFL).

The nearly 20x gap

In 2025-26, IMFL sales reached about 4.47 crore bottles, while imported spirits stayed at around 23.3 lakh bottles. That is the kind of gap that cannot be explained by price alone. Consumers repeatedly picked familiar Indian labels across 233 shops and more than 1,000 brands, while imported spirits remained a thin niche.

Behavioural science calls this familiarity bias: when people buy quickly, socially or with limited attention, they reach for what they already know, trust and can judge. Imported beer did relatively better—roughly 1.14 crore bottles in 2025-26—but imported spirits remained the smallest major segment.

Climate and cultural calendar shape buying

The data shows category demand follows weather and ritual. Beer peaks in warm months; July 2024 recorded the highest monthly beer volume, 48.5 lakh bottles, and July 2025 added another 42.4 lakh through off-shop outlets. Spirits, by contrast, climb around celebration. November IMFL sales jumped from 26.6 lakh bottles in October to about 42.3 lakh, coinciding with Diwali and other festivals. June was the biggest overall month in 2025-26 at roughly 93.9 lakh bottles.

Even without a premiumisation story, there is clear year-on-year expansion. Beer grew from about 3.51 crore bottles in 2024-25 to 3.76 crore in 2025-26, a rise of around 25 lakh bottles. Between October and March, beer volumes of 1.98 crore bottles outpaced the 1.78 crore sold in the same period a year earlier. April and May also posted strong gains, with combined sales roughly 83.5 lakh and 80.3 lakh bottles respectively against 69 lakh and 68.7 lakh a year before.

• Indian spirits outsell imported spirits nearly 20 to 1, not by a small margin.
• Beer is the hot-weather default, while spirits follow the festive calendar.
• Occasion shapes the basket more than the total number of brands available.

What brand builders should do

Marketers should treat demand as occasion-led. That means planning inventory, campaigns and launches around summer beer peaks and festive spirit spikes instead of treating the year as flat. It also means using familiarity as a strategy: lead with local defaults, ensure distribution and shelf presence, and position imported premium as a high-margin niche rather than chasing volume. The winner is usually the brand that comes to mind first for a specific occasion.

Source: ETRetail.com