Constellation Brands, holding company of Constellation Wines, previously known as Canandaigua (still the name of its new york wine subsidiary). Based in Fairport, New York, Constellation Brands is a leading international producer and marketer of virtually all forms of alcoholic beverage. Thanks to consistent acquisition, it became the world’s largest wine business in 2004. In 2006 it acquired Canada’s biggest wine company Vincor and remains the dominant player there. But in 2011 it refocused on its American roots and sold off all of the Australian, South African, and UK interests it had so recently acquired, including hardys, to what would become accolade. Constellation claims carefully to be ‘the world’s leader in premium wine’ whose 100 brands, in 2014, included Robert mondavi, Clos du Bois, Rex Goliath, Ravenswood, Black Box, Simi, Wild Horse, Mark West, Franciscan Estate, Toasted Head, and Mount Veeder in California; Manischewitz (America’s best-selling kosher wine) in New York; Jackson-Triggs and Inniskillin in Canada; Kim Crawford and Nobilo in New Zealand; and Ruffino in central Italy.
