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Two hundred million bottles of Johnnie Walker in a year. It's the kind of success story you could raise a glass to.

The people of Kilmarnock claim it as their own success story, dating back to 1820 - and that's the source of the of the Ayrshire town's bottling and packaging plant.

But beyond that controversy, it's worth noting . Two months ago, that was the first act of Diageo's financial year.

The year before had begun with five strong months, motoring ahead as the global drinks giant had been doing for several years. Then in November, as global confidence collapsed, sales plummeted.

That's why the company is nervous about reading too much into this year's profits holding up fairly well in the circumstances.

The current financial year doesn't benefit from that strong start. Instead, the company's heading into those recessionary 'headwinds' beloved of market analysts.

With such brand and geographic diversity, the latest figures paint a mixed picture. Guinness may no longer be good for you, but it's looking good for Diageo, particularly in Africa, where sales are up 18%.

Whisky gone wrong

Smirnoff vodka, Captain Morgan rum and Jose Cuervo tequila have been doing well, Tanqueray gin and Diageo's wine cellars less so, while Scotch whisky has been doing worst.

Sales are down 3% by value, and 11% by volume. Johnnie Walker, as Diageo's main premium brand, was down 6% by value: J&B by double that.

What's gone so wrong for whisky? Several factors.

A key one is de-stocking - that is, offloading stock without replacing it.

That helps explain HM Revenue and Customs figures showing a 19% drop in whisky exports in the first three months of this year.

There's also been a problem with third party distributors. With a crunch on their bank credit, they have held off buying stock, or Diageo has itself pulled back on credit to its trade customers.

The company cites a sharp, recessionary drop in business entertainment budgets as well as passenger traffic through airport shops and duty free.

Cheap spirit

Johnnie Walker suffered in particular because it is the premium brand from which people trade down.

The most expensive versions, such as Blue Label, suffered most, so the company re-directed marketing effort to Black Label, which was down 7%.

Often, the trade was down to a cheaper local spirit, and more often than that, it was to trade down from going out to staying in. Asia's pubs and clubs lost custom, which had been a reliable source of demand.

Spain's acute economic contraction, with sharply increased unemployment, hit it particularly hard, with sales of all Diageo products down by a fifth.

Scotch whiskies had been doing spectacularly well with a young Spanish customer base seeing a dram as the cool drink of choice at late night bars.

Johnnie Walker was also the big seller for Diageo in Russia - another country where consumer spending has been harder hit by recession.

But then, another market growing in a similar way has bucked that trend. Helped with a marketing push, Greece's whisky business didn't have such a bad year at all.

Growing markets

And nor did Britain. It was "a robust Christmas", Diageo recalls, particularly for Bell's whisky and Bailey's liqueur.

It's getting beyond the UK market that the company's chief executive, Paul Walsh, wants the Scottish campaigners to keep in mind.

The future of Scotch whisky, he told me, is in growing markets such as China, Vietnam and Korea.

They have cheaper options, distilled locally, and it's against those producers that Scotland's whisky has to compete.