Beverage Data Network sold to ACNielsen.

ACNielsen (New York), a division of VNU and a provider of market research information, has acquired the assets of Beverage Data Network (BDN; Fairfield, NJ), a supplier of wholesale sales data to the wines and spirits industry. No terms of the deal were given.

BDN collects, validates and delivers product movement data, tracked from the supplier to the wholesaler to the retailer. With more than 30,000 active brand items from over 60 industry suppliers who ship over 23 million cases per month, BDN processes over 500,000 industry depletion records each month from over 850 wholesale locations, and more than nine million retail account records from over 370,000 on- and off-premises retail locations. Established in 1986, the company processes sales data representing more than 80% of spirits sales and over 60% of wine sales in the U.S.

ACNielsen said the purchase strengthens its ability to provide comprehensive coverage of the entire beverage alcohol industry, and complements its existing services for measuring retail sales of beer, wine and spirits. ACNielsen currently provides tracking of beverage alcohol retail sales across grocery, drug, liquor and convenience channels through its ScanTrack, LiquorTrack and ConvenienceTrack services; consumer-based information through its HomeScan consumer panel; and on-premise audits of a representative sample of more than 2600 restaurants, bars, nightclubs, hotels and recreational facilities in 26 major U.S. markets.