J. A. Baczewski

The factory, dating back to the late 18th century, was based in Lwów (Lviv) and until 1939 was one of two most popular Polish export goods.

[1] In 1810 a small, local spirits factory was inherited by the founder's son, Leopold Maksymilian Baczewski, who moved the firm to another of Lwów's suburbs, Zniesienie.

The liqueurs, rosolises and vodkas produced with this technology were much more smooth and clear than most of other brands, which gave the company large popularity, not only in the city, but also in other parts of the Austrian Empire.

He also started to export Polish spirits to other European countries, including France, United Kingdom, Italy and Germany.

To distinguish his vodkas and liqueurs from other brands available to Europeans, he ordered all export spirits to be sold in crystal carafe rather than bottles.

The former was a graduate of the Chemical Faculty of the Vienna University and took over the production while the latter was a lawyer and continued their father's active marketing strategy.

When Poland regained her independence in 1918, the company had a well-established name and the brothers decided to stay with their father's name rather than change it to include their own name.

The popularity of the spirits was so great that in many Polish books and poems of the epoch, the brand "Baczewski" was used as a synonym to "vodka."

To promote the most luxurious of the products, Stefan also signed contracts with two of the Polish trans-Atlantic ocean liners, the M/S Piłsudski and M/S Polonia.

Baczewski company were labelled with the brand and a small slogan saying that "the only vodka of comparable quality is produced by Pierre Smirnoff of Russia.

After the city was seized by the Soviet Union, the remnants were levelled to the ground and an emery paper factory was built in its place.

Its popularity was maintained by many notable writers and poets of the epoch, including Marian Hemar and Feliks Konarski (Ref-Ren).

The reconstituted company continued to specialize in quality alcoholic products for domestic consumption in Austria and for export to various countries in various continents, to include Australia, Africa, Asia, Europe and North America, most notably the United States.

Its centuries old reputation and record of quality led to its being selected as the only representative of the Austrian liquor industry at the International World Fair in Chicago in 1950.