The house
Havana Club is a Cuban rum brand with a complicated modern history. The name belongs to two separate rums, made by two separate companies, and understanding the brand means understanding how that came to be.
The Cuban Havana Club is a light, column-distilled rum in the Spanish-speaking Caribbean tradition, the style that carried Cuban rum around the world through the daiquiri and the mojito. It is produced in Cuba and sold across much of the globe. A second rum, also called Havana Club, is made in Puerto Rico and sold in the United States. This guide is mainly about the Cuban rum and its house style, but it explains the split plainly, because the two are easy to confuse and the difference matters.
A short history
The Havana Club name dates to the 1930s, and its story runs through the Arechabala family, the Cuban revolution, and a French drinks company. Each stage left a mark on the brand as it exists today.
The Arechabala family
The Arechabala family had been distilling in Cárdenas, on Cuba's north coast, since 1878, when José Arechabala established a sugar and distilling business there. The family launched Havana Club as a rum brand in 1934, taking the chance to sell into the United States after the end of Prohibition. Over the following decades Havana Club grew into a well-known Cuban rum, and the family business expanded alongside it.
Nationalisation
After the Cuban revolution of 1959, the new government took private industry into state hands. The Arechabala business was nationalised in 1960 without compensation, and members of the family left Cuba for Spain and the United States. The Cuban state carried on making rum, and from 1972 it exported rum under the Havana Club name, mainly to the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.
The Pernod Ricard joint venture
In 1993 the Cuban state formed a joint venture with the French drinks company Pernod Ricard to produce and sell Havana Club internationally. Run as a fifty-fifty partnership, it took the Cuban brand into new markets, and Havana Club became one of the better-known Cuban exports. The rum is sold in more than one hundred countries, though not in the United States, where the embargo on Cuban goods keeps it off the shelves.
Why there are two Havana Clubs
Two different rums are sold as Havana Club, made by different companies in different countries, and the right to the name in the United States has been contested for decades. The account below sets out the facts and the position of each side without taking one.
Two rums, one name
In most of the world, Havana Club is the Cuban rum made through the joint venture between the Cuban state and Pernod Ricard. In the United States, a separate rum called Havana Club is produced in Puerto Rico by Bacardi. The two are not connected. The Cuban rum is marketed as the rum of Cuba; the Bacardi rum is sold in the United States as a Puerto Rican rum.
The competing claims
The dispute traces back to the nationalisation of 1960. The Cuban state registered the Havana Club trademark in the United States in 1976, after the Arechabala family's earlier US registration had lapsed in 1973, and later assigned its interest to the joint venture with Pernod Ricard. Bacardi says it bought the remaining rights of the Arechabala family in 1994, and it began producing its Havana Club rum in Puerto Rico that year. Cubaexport, the Cuban state exporter, together with Pernod Ricard, holds and defends the US registration and treats the Cuban brand as the continuation of Havana Club. The Arechabala family and Bacardi describe the 1960 nationalisation as a seizure carried out without compensation, and argue that rights taken in that way could not lawfully pass to the Cuban state.
The legal position
The legal history is long and is still not fully settled. In 1998 the United States passed Section 211 of the Omnibus Appropriations Act, which limited the enforcement and renewal of trademarks tied to assets confiscated by the Cuban government. The World Trade Organization found against that measure in 2002. In December 2024 the United States enacted the No Stolen Trademarks Honored in America Act, intended to stop US courts and agencies from recognising trademarks confiscated by the Cuban government. The courts have nonetheless upheld the Cuban registration so far. In January 2025 a federal court in Virginia dismissed Bacardi's challenge to the renewal of Cubaexport's registration, and in June 2026 the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit rejected Bacardi's appeal, holding that the Patent and Trademark Office had acted within its authority in accepting the renewal. For now the US rights remain with Cubaexport, and the matter is not fully resolved.
How Cuban Havana Club is made
The Cuban Havana Club is a light rum in the Spanish-speaking Caribbean tradition, built on column distillation and patient blending rather than heavy pot-still character.
Molasses and the column still
Cuban rum begins with molasses, the syrup left after sugar is crystallised from cane. The molasses is fermented and then distilled in column stills. Cuban distilleries typically run two streams: a high-strength, near-neutral spirit, and a lower-strength, more aromatic spirit known as aguardiente. The aguardiente carries most of the character that will define the finished rum.
Ageing, filtering and blending
The aguardiente is aged in white oak barrels, then filtered through charcoal and blended, and the blend is returned to cask for further maturation. This cycle of ageing, filtering and re-casking can be repeated, and it is what gives Cuban rum its clean, rounded profile. All Cuban rum is aged for a minimum of two years. The work is overseen by the maestros del ron cubano, the Cuban rum masters who hold the house styles and select the casks for the older expressions.
The style in the glass
Cuban Havana Club is built to be light and dry rather than rich and sweet. The younger rums are clean and lightly fruity, with soft notes of vanilla, sugarcane and light oak, and a dry finish that suits mixing. The aged expressions keep that lightness but add depth: polished wood, dried fruit, tobacco and a gentle sweetness that does not turn heavy.
This is the profile that made Cuban rum the base for the classic Havana cocktails. A light rum sits back and lets lime, sugar and mint do their work while still holding the drink together. It is a different idea of rum from the dense Jamaican style or the grassy French-island agricoles, and it is worth tasting alongside them to see where each sits.
Key expressions
Havana Club's Cuban range runs from young mixing rums to aged sipping rums. Three expressions show the span of the house style.
Añejo 3 Años is a light aged rum, blended from rums held for at least three years in white oak and then filtered back to a pale colour. It is the daiquiri and mojito rum, dry and clean, made to mix.
Añejo 7 Años is aged for at least seven years and was introduced in the 1970s as the first aged Cuban rum presented to the world as a sipping rum. It shows the darker side of the house style, with wood, dried fruit and a touch of sweetness.
Selección de Maestros is bottled at 45% ABV and built from casks chosen by the Cuban rum masters, with a further period in fresh oak. It is the most concentrated of the three, aimed at drinking neat.
Havana Club in cocktails
The Cuban light style exists in large part to serve cocktails, and two drinks define it.
The daiquiri
The daiquiri is the clearest test of a light rum: rum, lime juice and sugar, shaken hard and served cold, with nothing to hide behind. A young Cuban-style rum such as Añejo 3 Años gives the drink structure and a dry backbone while the lime leads. If you want to understand why Cuban rum is made the way it is, make a daiquiri with it.
The mojito
The mojito uses the same light rum with lime, sugar, soda and mint. Here the rum is a support, holding the drink up under all that freshness rather than dominating it. A heavier rum would fight the mint; the Cuban style steps back and lets it through. For a fuller run through both drinks, follow the linked cocktail recipes.
Havana Club's core Cuban expressions at a glance.
Añejo 3 Años
Añejo 7 Años
Selección de Maestros
| Expression | Style | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Añejo 3 Años | Light aged white rum, aged at least 3 years | Dry and clean, the daiquiri and mojito rum |
| Añejo 7 Años | Aged sipping rum, at least 7 years | Wood, dried fruit and gentle sweetness; introduced in the 1970s |
| Selección de Maestros | Cask-selected, 45% ABV | Concentrated, finished in fresh oak, made for drinking neat |
Frequently Asked Questions
Why are there two rums called Havana Club?
The name is used by two separate companies. In most of the world, Havana Club is the Cuban rum made by a joint venture between the Cuban state and Pernod Ricard. In the United States, a different rum called Havana Club is made in Puerto Rico by Bacardi. The right to the name in the United States has been disputed for decades, and this guide sets out both positions without taking one.
Where is Havana Club made?
The Cuban Havana Club is distilled and aged in Cuba. The separate Havana Club sold in the United States is produced in Puerto Rico by Bacardi. They are made by different companies from different rum.
Can you buy Cuban Havana Club in the United States?
No. The US embargo on Cuban goods keeps Cuban Havana Club off American shelves. The Havana Club sold in the United States is the Puerto Rican rum made by Bacardi, not the Cuban product.
Is Havana Club a light or a dark rum?
The Cuban range is built on the light, column-distilled Spanish style. The younger rums such as Añejo 3 Años are pale and dry for mixing, while the aged expressions are darker and made for sipping, though still lighter than a heavy dark rum.
What is the difference between Havana Club 3 Años and 7 Años?
Añejo 3 Años is a young light rum aged at least three years and filtered pale, made for daiquiris and mojitos. Añejo 7 Años is aged at least seven years, darker and richer, and made to be sipped.
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