"Thought It Was Premium Liquor, But It Was Fake"... The Truth Behind the '1980s Vintage' Baijiu

Employees at the distillery of the premium baijiu brand 'Shuijingfang,' located in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China, are mixing the fermented raw grains well.
(Photo by Bloomberg News).

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A group in China has been caught by authorities for disguising alcohol made from edible ethanol as premium liquor and selling it under false pretenses.

The State Administration for Market Regulation announced on the 19th that, through a joint crackdown with local authorities in Shaanxi and Sichuan provinces, they had uncovered an organization manufacturing and distributing counterfeit and substandard baijiu.

According to the investigation, the group mixed various food additives with edible ethanol to produce the liquor, then affixed labels of well-known brands to sell the products. Some of these products were falsely labeled as having been produced between the 1990s and 2010s, and in some cases, they even claimed the liquor was a vintage "Laojiu" from the 1980s.

Essentially, they passed off cheap alcohol as premium, long-aged spirits in the distribution market.

Authorities confiscated approximately 20,000 cases of counterfeit baijiu in this operation, with the total scale of the case estimated at 260 million yuan (about 56 billion won). Two individuals involved have been handed over to the prosecution.

Meanwhile, trademark infringement issues continue to occur in China. According to official statistics, more than 30 such cases were detected between 2024 and 2025, including 11 major cases with damages exceeding 100 million yuan (about 21.5 billion won) each.

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