According to the sources of the online magazine Proekt, Putin has received a share of the sales of Putinka vodka from the beginning.
12:10•Updated 12:15
President of Russia Vladimir Putin has been able to make up to 500 million dollars, or about 471 million euros, with his Putinka vodka in the years 2004-2019, says a Russian investigative journalist Proekt web magazine (you switch to another service) in an article published on Tuesday.
In Russia, Putin is a personal brand whose name and image are used to sell, for example, clothes, mobile phone cases and chocolate. Putinka vodka went on sale in Russia in 2003 and by 2005 it was number one in the sales statistics, selling 40 million liters annually.
The co-owner of the Winexim alcohol store that developed vodka contacted a Russian oligarch who was part of Putin’s inner circle to Arkady Rotenberg and through this got permission from Putin to use this name.
In return, Putin and Rotenberg got a share of Putinka’s brand and sales revenue, say the magazine’s sources.
Russia tightened the alcohol policy, but Putinka got a discount during the elections
During the 2012 Russian presidential election, when Putin was a candidate, Russia’s largest retail chain, Pyatyorochka, began selling Putinka at a 27 percent discount. The bidding campaign lasted until election night.
In 2015, during Putin’s presidency, the price of vodka in Russia was lowered to 185 rubles, at the current exchange rate to around 2.31 euros, although the country’s alcohol policy had otherwise been tightened in previous years.
According to the project, the decision especially benefited cheap products like Putinka.
In 2014, the brand rights were sold to the Russian subsidiary of Ermira Consultants, a company registered in Cyprus. According to the project, Putin himself practically owns Ermira and circulates his money through it.
According to the newspaper’s report, Ermira has also been one of the financiers of the “Putin’s Palace” built on the Black Sea, worth more than a billion euros. Rotenberg himself registered as the owner of the palace in 2021.