This year’s global bar luminaries
The world’s most inspiring bartenders and industry leaders are charting new paths for the sector – through innovation, education, advocacy, and heart.
*This feature was originally published in the November 2025 issue of The Spirits Business magazine.
The bar industry only takes steps forward because the people in it are taking action. From those making space for all voices in the sector to people sharing their skills and knowledge, here are nine leaders making real change in the bar world.
Priyanka Blah, Bar Convent Berlin
As director of education for Bar Convent Berlin (BCB), Priyanka Blah is helping reshape how the global bar industry learns and connects. Under her guidance, the world’s leading bar-trade show has evolved into a platform that reflects the diversity and dynamism of modern hospitality, placing collaboration and inclusion at the heart of its programming.
Since taking on the role, Blah has worked to broaden the show’s educational focus beyond Europe, curating speakers and discussions that represent a wider range of cultures and perspectives. From grassroots initiatives to indigenous spirits, she has ensured that BCB’s stages celebrate the full spectrum of the drinks world. “I want people from all aspects of the industry to be able to tell us about their work and tell their story,” she told The Spirits Business this year.
Alongside her work with BCB, Blah is the founder and editor of The Dram Attic, a digital publication dedicated to spotlighting the people and ideas driving cocktail culture. She also serves as academy chair for both Asia’s 50 Best Bars and The World’s 50 Best Bars.
Jack McGarry, The Dead Rabbit, The Irish Exit, and San Patricios
Few people have done more to redefine the Irish pub than Jack McGarry. Since co-founding The Dead Rabbit in 2013 with fellow Belfast native Sean Muldoon, McGarry has built a New York institution and taken it nationwide, with an Austin outpost now open, and another to follow in Washington DC. Also in 2013, he was named International Bartender of the Year at Tales of the Cocktail – the youngest ever recipient of the award.
The Irish Exit followed in 2023, offering travellers in New York’s Moynihan Train Hall a taste of modern Irish hospitality. This year saw the launch of San Patricios, a bar celebrating the shared heritage of Ireland and Mexico, and highlighting the role of immigrants at a time when they are too often maligned. Each concept reflects McGarry’s mission to move Irish hospitality forward – rooted in tradition yet unafraid of change.
Equally defining, however, has been McGarry’s openness about his struggles with alcohol abuse and mental health. His willingness to speak candidly about recovery has made him a leading advocate for wellbeing and vulnerability in the bar world, helping to break down stigma in an industry that too often chooses to bury its head.
Rocky Hair and Jenna Hemsworth, Sorry Not Sorry
There are, unfortunately, many people in the on-trade with horror stories about former employers. In recent years, the industry has become more vocal about inappropriate behaviour, and how we can create safer bars for both employees and customers.
In 2024, Rachel ‘Rocky’ Hair and Jenna Hemsworth went public with allegations of sexual assault and harassment during their time with the Swillhouse group in Australia.
A court case is still ongoing, but in the meantime, Hair and Hemsworth created Sorry Not Sorry. The organisation is part bar takeover, part panel discussion and part support group, with the team touring globally to encourage more frequent discussions about harassment.
For now, Sorry Not Sorry is focused on solidarity and visibility. “We can’t action anything immediately,” says Hair. “But it’s cathartic to be able to sit in a room full of people who have experienced the same thing and say: ‘Oh, yeah, this fucking sucks.’”
Before launching Sorry Not Sorry, Hair made history as the first woman to work for many Sydney venues, as well as winning Time Out’s Hot Talent Award in 2016, while Hemsworth’s accolades include being the first female recipient of Australian Bartender Of The Year, in 2018.
Minakshi Singh, Yangdup Lama, and Vikram Achanta, India Bartender Show
Despite being a country with a population of nearly 1.5 billion people, India isn’t always respected on the world stage when it comes to bars. When people think of Indian bars, they usually think of New Delhi’s Sidecar, or The Brook, and Cocktails & Dreams Speakeasy in Gurgaon. Minakshi Singh and Yangdup Lama are the duo behind those bars but this year they managed to push Indian on-trade even further.
Speaking to The Spirits Business this year, Lama explained that the duo had asked themselves: “How do we now take our learning forward and make it fruitful, constructive, and meaningful for the industry as a whole here in India?”
Partnering with Vikram Achanta, the founder of beverage-education platform Tulleeho and 30BestBarsIndia, Singh and Lama spearheaded the India Bartender Show (formerly India Bartender Week), a first-of-its-kind platform designed to unite the country’s top bar professionals.
The inaugural edition was held in February, focused on the trade, rather than consumers. Through panel discussions, bar takeovers and masterclasses, the trio set out to celebrate Indian talent on a global scale, creating new opportunities for skill-building.
Giacomo Giannotti, Paradiso
Most bartenders would call it a day after being crowned The World’s Best Bar – but not Paradiso’s Giacomo Giannotti. The 2022 title was less a finish line than an invitation to keep pushing the boundaries of what a cocktail bar can be.
Since opening the Barcelona bar in 2015 with his wife, Margarita Sader, Paradiso has gained global renown, with outposts following in Dubai and Ibiza. The bar has its own lab, where Giannotti and the team can experiment. He is also the founder of Galileo, a ‘cocktail bistro’, and Monk, a hidden bar tucked inside an unassuming supermarket, both in Barcelona.
Perhaps Giannotti’s most disruptive move, however, was his decision to launch the Paradiso Sustainability Summit in 2022. Created as an open forum for bartenders, brand leaders, and environmentalists, the summit aims to move sustainability beyond marketing and into measurable action.
Each edition brings together voices from the global drinks industry to share ideas, research, and innovations that can make bar operations genuinely greener – from waste reduction and energy use to ingredient sourcing and water management.
Next year, the event will be called Barcelona Cocktail Fest, reflecting its expansion beyond the bar where it was born.
Chockie Tom, Doommersive
It’s disappointing when fresh evidence of the on-trade’s race problem arises – but few people are confronting it as powerfully, or as creatively, as Chockie Tom. An Indigenous bartender, writer and educator, Tom has spent more than two decades pushing the industry to examine its relationship with culture, history and representation.
A Californian native (more literally than most), she began her bartending career in LA, honed her craft in New York, and is now in London. Proudly Numu (Paiute) and Pomo, Tom brings her heritage to every part of her work, using hospitality as both a creative practice and a form of cultural storytelling.
Most in the industry are now aware of the dark side of tiki, but Tom spearheaded this movement with the founding of Doommersive (formerly called Doom Tiki), a project that challenges the colonial legacies of tiki and explores how drinks culture can evolve with greater respect and inclusivity.
In 2023, she launched The Cornsilk Road, an all-Indigenous bar takeover series that debuted at Little Red Door in Paris – the first all-Native, Indigenous, American takeover in cocktail history. She’s also worked with Campari Group, Thomas Henry, Diageo, and more to spread her wisdom on cultural and environmental sustainability and frameworks for ethical foraging and collaboration.
Jeffrey Morgenthaler, Pacific Standard
While anyone can technically become a bartender without formal qualifications, the reality is that a lot of mixology education remains out of reach for newcomers. Most people learn on the job or through expensive courses – and if your bar isn’t inspiring, your best hope is to move somewhere better.
Jeffrey Morgenthaler, however, has spent his career changing that. Based in Oregon, he built his reputation not just behind the bar but online, creating a website filled with free, practical tools – from carbonation and pressure calculators to dilution and ABV charts – that bartenders worldwide have used to refine their craft.
He’s also been outspoken about the treatment of on-trade staff, using his blog and public platform to call out big brands that fail to credit bartenders, and to advocate for fairer, more respectful working conditions across the industry. Through his writing, talks, and books, Morgenthaler aims to demystify the mechanics of bartending, offering advice grounded in real experience. He’s achieved all of this while putting Portland on the world mixology map, first with Clyde Common and Pepe Le Moko, and now with neighbourhood bar Pacific Standard.
Kaitlin Wilkes and Kristine Bocchino, The Ada Coleman Project
How many bar takeovers or trade show panels have you attended and noticed an all-male lineup? Too many, we imagine. Kaitlin Wilkes and Kristine Bocchino are hoping to change that through The Ada Coleman Project.
Named after one of history’s most pioneering female bartenders, The Ada Coleman Project engages with show organisers, bar operators, and brand owners to identify parts of the industry where women are under-represented. Identification is nothing without action, which is why Wilkes and Bocchino have also created a global database of talented women and non-binary people in the drinks industry – meaning there’s no excuse for not diversifying your events.
Wilkes cut her teeth at The Savoy in London, as well as other renowned cocktail bars like Blue Bar at The Berkeley and Sweden’s Corner Club. Bocchino leads global business development for bar and brand consultancy The Compound Collective. Both are making space for women in the drinks industry, and will often be found sharing their insights with the next generation.
Tiffanie Barriere, The Drinking Coach
It was an airport bar that helped Tiffanie Barriere’s reputation in the on-trade take flight – more specifically, One Flew South, named Best Airport Bar in the World in 2014. But it’s her dedication to education that has made her a household name. Since going freelance in 2016 and adopting the moniker The Drinking Coach, Barriere has built a reputation for making drinks – and the culture around them – more thoughtful and inclusive.
“We love to drink but some people don’t know how to drink,” she previously told The Spirits Business. “That is always my question – why we like it or why we don’t like it. I like to figure out why and educate ourselves on why.”
Her open-minded approach has bagged her accolades including being inducted into Tales of the Cocktail’s 2020 Dame Hall of Fame, as well as a Tales’ Visionary Award in 2023. It came as little surprise, therefore, when the organisation announced in 2025 that Barriere would be the US chair for its Spirited Awards.
Beyond her work as a consultant and educator, Barriere uses her platform to spark conversations many in hospitality still avoid – from the historical ties between slavery and cocktail culture to the ongoing need for greater equity in the industry.
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