Alex Johns has the unique distinction of being related to three England cricket captains. Peter May, Harold Gilligan, and Arthur Gilligan are all former England skippers who Alex can call family, and so naturally, he aimed to follow in their footsteps.
While Alex didn’t, ultimately, ever get to lead his country out at Lord’s, connections in the cricket world soon set him on a different kind of journey – a journey involving cocktails, the Caribbean, and a quest to reinvigorate a great British brand. The brand in question? Nicholson.
Founded in London in 1736, Nicholson is a historic producer of premium spirits and cocktails. The company’s Founder, William Nicholson, also helped fund the creation of Lord’s Cricket Ground. It is here, at the intersection between sport and spirits, that Alex found himself in 2016.
“I first heard that Nicholson might be up for sale through my cricket network,” Alex recalls. “I’d sold a business in 2010, spent eight to ten years consulting, and I was looking for something to acquire. Eventually, it all came together, and we managed to acquire this brand with bags of authenticity and history.”
A new strategy
As Alex suggests, Nicholson is not short of history. The brand is often credited for several pioneering achievements, including the creation of the first London dry gin and sparking the invention of the British pub. The challenge for Nicholson’s new CEO was not going to be the past, but the future. 
“When we picked up the business, there was one product,” Alex reveals, “a very famous, but somewhat dusty, London dry gin. In a world with thousands of London dry gins, we decided that focusing on another element of Nicholson’s history – cocktails – might be a better strategy.”
From the Savoy Hotel to the Waldorf Astoria, Nicholson spirits have long been enjoyed in some of the finest cocktail venues in the world thanks to their reputation for quality. With demand for pre-batched cocktails on the rise, Alex and his team saw an opportunity to build on Nicholson’s mixed-drink heritage.
“Sales of ready-to-drink cocktail cans were growing, and bars were starting to introduce cocktails on tap, so we thought this would be a great place to focus our efforts,” Alex explains. “Over the last 24 months, we have been committed to liquid innovation at Nicholson. What can we do to make the best pre-batched cocktails in the world? How can we pour cocktails faster and more sustainably?”
Innovation Island
To help in answering these questions, Alex decided Nicholson could use some blue sky thinking. It just so happened that the blue skies he had in mind hung above the rainforests and coral reefs of the tropical island of Antigua.
“Nicholson might be a very old brand, but we were almost approaching it with the mindset of a start-up,” Alex says. “We focused on the UK in our first twelve months, but the environment is massively competitive. We needed somewhere we could experiment and innovate. The cricket link led us to Antigua.”
With Antigua positioned as the company’s “Innovation Island”, Nicholson was able to research, develop, and test new products in a dynamic, and more cost-effective, environment. For instance, the company trialled its tapped cocktails during the 2024 T20 World Cup, serving thousands of customers a day over the course of nine matches. Nicholson also found a place for its products in luxurious resorts like Jumby Bay Island.
“It’s been a superb test case,” Alex declares. “We’ve brought out new products, worked with big retailers, and it all cost a fraction of what it would have done in the UK. Importantly, it has also kept us away from the prying eyes of the competition.”
Nicholson’s Caribbean legacy continues today in the shape of a research and development hub headquartered on Antigua, and the company’s very own cocktail bar trialling new innovations. At present, the venue sustainably pours 35 cocktails, all on tap, and is an example of Nicholson’s pre-batched expertise in action.
“To do on-tap cocktails well,” Alex notes, “you need three things: the liquid itself, the technology to pour it, and the ability to deliver a quality product. We’ve invested in the best technology for pre-batched cocktails, and we’ve used our distilling heritage to ensure that the liquid coming out of the keg, bottle, or can is exactly the same as if a highly trained bartender was mixing the drink at a bar.”
Tapping into the market
Thanks to its work on the ground in Antigua, Nicholson is now confident of transforming the UK market when it comes to serving top-quality cocktails fast. The shift to tapped cocktails – as well as tapped spirits and wine – will also provide bars with numerous sustainability benefits.
“We recently worked with a wine brand in Antigua that allowed us to tap their beautiful high-end rosé,” Alex remarks. “We can now deliver 28 bottles of their wine in a single keg. It’s a far more sustainable way for bars and events to operate.
“This is even more true for cocktails, which are the trickiest things to serve sustainably. Each cocktail might have six different ingredients, meaning six different bottles and six different deliveries. Our on-tap cocktails can change all that without sacrificing taste. Better still, we can serve ten of them in a minute!”
Though export activities and interest from America may also play a role in the company’s future, Nicholson remains committed to the UK and is set to relaunch its historic brand in retail, as well as at British music festivals and sports events beginning in June 2025. As it embarks on a new and exciting phase of its history, the company is not so different from the one launched in the 1700s. From William Nicholson’s first London dry gin to a perfect tap-poured espresso martini, Nicholson has always been at the forefront of liquid innovation.
“In order to relaunch a very old, authentic brand, we have tried to remain true to the original Nicholson identity,” Alex confirms. “Before we did anything, we said to ourselves, ‘would the original founders have done this?’
“Nicholson hasn’t changed: our core liquors are still out there, we still have a place serving our Original G&T, and we are the number two pour of London dry gin in Nicholson pubs, now owned by Mitchells and Butlers. However, this institutional British brand, with nearly 300 years in the business, is now bringing out a range of amazing new liquids too.”
