The Magic Number Hiding on Every Tequila Bottle

You are in the tequila aisle holding a bottle you don’t know. Is it good? Is it not good? Is it worth the money? Does it taste similar to what you like or don't like?

Somewhere on that bottle, usually in small type, are three letters and four digits. NOM 1123, NOM 1579, NOM 1414, for example. Type those four digits into Agave Matchmaker to find the distillery that controlled the production of that bottle, along with every other brand made in the same building.

Check those brands against a list you trust, like our list of the Top 150 Tequila Brands, and you have a very handy guide to identifying tequila that you might like.

NOM stands for Norma Oficial Mexicana, which is Mexico's system of mandatory regulations, and it covers nearly everything sold in the country. The Secretaría de Economía defines a NOM as a mandatory technical regulation that sets the specifications, characteristics, terminology, or labeling requirements applying to a good, product, process, or service.

There are NOMs for household electrical safety, for the contents of packaged goods, for textile labeling, and for the black warning seals on the front of Mexican grocery packaging.

The current regulations for tequila are NOM-006-SCFI-2012. In those regulations, the Consejo Regulador del Tequila - the regulatory group for tequila production - says the NOM is the “Authorized Producer Registration Number.”

So a bottle reading NOM 1414 is not citing a standard numbered 1414. It is naming producer 1414 (Feliciano Vivanco y Asociados), which is certified against the tequila standard, by the council authorized to do so.

The NOM number is important, required information. Some brands make it bigger and easier to find on their labels, but is usually quite small, often on the back, near the bar code. The other eight things a tequila label must tell you are covered in our article:

Almost always, yes. But the NOM number is more like a license plate than a street address.

The number identifies the producer responsible for the tequila, not the facility that filled the bottle. Bottling can happen at a contract line that has nothing to do with the four digits on the label.

Also, a single physical distillery can legally hold more than one NOM number.

Certified producers can also buy bulk tequila from each other, and then blend it together. That means a portion of what ends up in a given bottle may have been distilled somewhere other than the number printed on the label.

With those caveats extended, the overwhelming majority of brands sharing a number are made in the same distillery, by the same team, on the same equipment, and with the same production philosophy.

That is what makes the number useful.

NOM 1414 in Arandas in the Highlands of Jalisco accounts for 15 of the 150 brands on The Tequila Report's current Top 150 brands list.

Cascahuín at NOM 1123 in El Arenal accounts for eight.

El Pandillo at NOM 1579 in Jesús María makes seven brands that are on the list.

But having the same NOM doesn’t mean all the brands from a particular producer taste the same. Distilleries, especially smaller craft companies, use a variety of yeasts, waters, and production methods to vary the flavor of brands made there. However, it is rare to find tequila brands made by the same producer that are wildly different in overall quality and approach.

This doesn’t mean that you’ll like two brands with the same NOM equally, but if you like one you’re unlikely to loathe the other.

The NOM isn’t a flavor verdict, but strong directional evidence. The shared origin indicated by the number is a shortcut for finding a new bottle you’ll probably enjoy.

NOM 1414, Feliciano Vivanco y Asociados, produces 15 of the 150 brands on The Tequila Report Top 150. Fourteen NOMs account for 49% of the list.

Start with what you already like. Find the number on the bottle and put it in your phone in your notes app, via a picture of NOM number, whatever you can actually find later. Do that for three or four bottles you already trust and you’ve made yourself a free, portable tequila finder.

A liquor store is the best place to use this information. The bottles are usually within reach, and you can check many unfamiliar labels to see if they share one of your favorite NOM numbers.

Bars are more situational. If you’re sitting at the rail, most bartenders will gladly let you see the label and check the number, provided they are not extremely busy making drinks.

At a table in a bar or restaurant, floor waitstaff are not going to carry a bottle across a dining room so you can read the number. Better for you to approach the bar yourself, and kindly ask the bartender to see the bottle.

When you see a NOM you don’t know, looking it up on Agave Matchmaker is useful. (Just go to the website or mobile app and type the four digits in the search box.)

A producer you’ve not heard of might make several tequilas you do know. And a producer that doesn’t make any brands with which you are familiar is not a warning sign, but an opportunity to explore.

The lookup habit compounds. Every bottle you enjoy adds a number to your list, and every bit of research makes the next array less unfamiliar to you.

Because the numbers were handed out in order. They started at 1000 and climbed from there, one registration at a time, and they now run well into the 1700s.

That turns the number into a rough timeline you can read on sight. A producer carrying 1103 registered long before one carrying 1675. On our current Top 150 list, the numbers run from 1068 at the low end to 1662 at the high end.

Note that distilleries do go out of business or pause production, so while there have been more than 700 numbers assigned, there are just over 200 currently active NOM numbers.

The number always belongs to the producer, never to the brand. Brands change distilleries. In fact, more than a dozen of our top 150 brands have changed distilleries at some point in their history.

Most try to keep the flavor as similar as possible when they move. Same brand, same people signing off on flavor, but made in a different location, with different equipment. The number describes who produces the liquid now, not when the brand was born.