ROUSTAM TARIKO

I was proud of my Soviet country, of wearing Young Pioneer uniform, bombarded by my mother's Communist propaganda.

My biggest entertainment in Moscow was to go to the subway and watch people. When American students visited, I watched them; I learned English from them.

There are a lot of people who are trying hard to sell themselves as Russian vodkas.

I believe there is not any big difference between any consumer business, whether it's a bank or insurance or vodka or chocolate, whatever it is.

I don't believe in public companies... I would prefer to risk my own money, make any necessary changes fast and grow as quickly as possible.

I had dreams about working for a big foreign company.

From the country with limited hope to grow your own business and express your own personality, Russia has become the land of significant opportunity.

Lots of businesses built in the early 1990s were not very transparent, not only by Russians, but also by foreigners.

I do not separate my job and my personal life; therefore, I never work and never rest.

I don't very much distinguish when I'm working. I do what I like to do: the time changes and my activity changes.

I launched Imperia at the Statue of Liberty because I wanted to use something symbolic. I like American society because it always wants to do something new and better.

I own 100% of everything because I like to control what I do.

I would prefer myself to own all of my brand, where everything I am responsible for myself.

Considering that Americans are now moving away from whiskey, moving away from brown spirits in general, I believe that they will all join Russians who drink vodka straight. They will sip it like cognac.

Wherever I am, I start my day, it's the same. I'm not an early bird. I'm not waking up at five o'clock, six o'clock; it's usually seven-thirty, eight o'clock, and I will then read the newspapers, emails from around the world and make phone calls.

Money is always an indicator of a job well done.

You need to be honest and always see new opportunities coming. So I call it intuition, innovation, execution - these are my working principles.

A lot of people offered me to go public, but I have always rejected it.

I always wanted to work on the consumer market; I always wanted to work with people.

I had English grammar book and started to teach myself. I read 'Catcher in Rye,' in Russian. I was amazed at freedom in 'Catcher in Rye!' Freedom to have those perceptions of life!

If you do things you like to do, then your life will be easy.

What's my expectation in the U.S.? I would like to replace Grey Goose.

Russians really needed a product that would be not as strong as vodka and not as feminine as cheap sparkling wine, so Martini was a good solution.

What I'm primarily responsible for is products. Everything is developed with my personal involvement. Second is client communication. Everything to do with product and consumer is my primary focus. I also deal with everything which relates to investment and partnership. Distribution, finance, administration, I don't do.

We buy the most expensive grain available growing on the best part of Russian land called black soil. We also play close attention to the purity of the water - we get it from Lake Ladoga. We store it ourselves to specific conditions. We carefully manage distillation at my distillery in Moscow.