Usher becomes the New Face of Belvedere Vodka

By Mr. Hollywood
JR Staff Writer

In 1996, Belvedere was introduced to the United States and was touted as the top vodka. The brand was soon endorsed by Jay-Z and his crew. However, soon he began rapping about Cristal and later Patron. Belvedere, however, has remained highly popular.

Last year, Diddy created his own line of vodka with his Ciroc brand. Over the past few months, the brand has grown in popularity. While there are many other rival vodka brands, it is the Ciroc brand giving Belvedere the biggest competition. The older brand recently hit back.

Diddy, a hip hop figure, creating his own vodka brand has made the hip hop community embrace Ciroc. Belvedere recently made a power move when they added Usher to their advertising campaing. Not only will he be doing promotion for Belvedere, Usher will become the face of their 2011 promotional campaign.

Half of all of the profits made from Usher will be donated to help HIV/AIDS in Africa. The partnership will be made official when Belvedere sponsors Usher's performance on Sunday night after the Grammys.

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Diddy sparks a Vodka War

Credited as one of the first true hip hop moguls, Sean "Diddy" Combs has done it all. He began his career as a background dancer. Combs was able to stick around long enough to prove himself as a record producer. Soon, he would land a deal with the defunct Uptown Records. It would not take long for Combs to land an executive role with the label.

Because of his strong personality, Sean Combs would not last with Uptown. But, his career was far from over, as he would create his famous record label, Bad Boy Records. It did not take long for his label to be a success. Following the music, he expanded into clothes, fragrance, and other small businesses. Aside from  the music and the clothes and fragrance, Diddy has made his claim to fame with his television works.

Most recently, Diddy has expanded his business interests to a new line of vodka. While his Ciroc brand has been around since 2007, it did not gain fame until recently. Because of the newfound popularity of his brand of vodka, Diddy referred to all of the competing brands as "pee pee." His rivals took offense to this and they vowed revenge on Combs. They informed him that they would bring a large toilet full of their vodka to his Manhattan offices and they have done so earlier today.

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