Stoli Group’s Two U.S. Entities File for Liquidation

Stoli Group – once based in Russia, now in Luxembourg – said its two U.S. entities, Stoli Group USA LLC and Kentucky Owl LLC, on Jan. 15 filed a motion to convert their Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization plans into to Chapter 7 liquidation. Control of these U.S. entities will be transferred to a court-appointed trustee, who will oversee the liquidation process.

The two U.S. businesses filed for Chapter 11 protection in November 2024. The liquidation affects only those two units; all other U.S. and non-U.S. operations, including Louisiana Spirits, SPI Spirits (Cyprus) and global production facilities, are unaffected and continue normal operations.

For background: For more than 25 years, Stoli Group has been engaged in protracted legal disputes with the Russian state over brand ownership and control. The parent firm said those pressures intensified sharply in recent years.

After the company publicly condemned the invasion of Ukraine and voiced its support for peace, the Russian government designated Stoli an "extremist organization" in Russia. This was followed by the confiscation and nationalization of Stoli's distillery, an asset integral to the company's global production footprint

In early 2022, a month after Russia invaded Ukraine, the company changed the name of its flagship product from Stolichnaya vodka to just Stoli.

Soon afterward, Stoli was hit by a large-scale, sophisticated cyberattack that targeted its international operations and impaired systems vital to global distribution. Remediation efforts continue to this day.

“These geopolitical shocks, combined with a slowdown in the U.S. spirits market and a lack of support and flexibility from the group's finance partners, led Stoli Group to file for Chapter 11 protection in November 2024,” an announcement said. “Over the past 13 months, the group worked to construct a viable reorganization plan.

“Despite those efforts and extensive negotiations, the group was unable to reach an agreement with its senior lender on terms that would allow these two U.S. entities to emerge from Chapter 11 as a going concern.”

The global Stoli Group business continues to operate normally inside and outside the United States, with production facilities and distribution networks unaffected by this development.