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BACARDI RUM

The Bacardi Bat:

The BACARDI Bat Device appears on every label of every product carrying the BACARDI family name. According to Family lore, it originated in 1862 when Don Facundo’s wife, Dona Amalia Lucía Victoria Moreau, suggested employing the Bat as the trademark for their new rum.

Upon entering the first BACARDI distillery, Amalia noticed a colony of fruit bats living in the rafters. Bats had great significance in Dona Amalia’s world. As a lover of the arts, she knew that Cuba’s extinct native people, the Taínos, regarded bats as possessors of all cultural goods. And she knew from local lore that bats were popularly thought to bring good health, fortune and family unity.

Her suggestion also was hardheaded and pragmatic. Because of the high rate of illiteracy in the 19th century, a product needed a memorable graphic logo -- a trademark -- to become identifiable and sell. Reports quickly flew across Cuba of Don Facundo’s choice new charcoal-mellowed rums: the carefully aged, rich, dark sipping rums and a miraculous new light rum that was smooth, civilized and astonishingly drinkable. But the bat mythology also helped. Word of Don Facundo’s Bat spread side-by-side with word of his smooth rums. The Bat, local storytellers attested, brought good fortune and added magical powers to his rum.
From the Official Bacardi Website: http://bacardi.com