Right, Angus, we've all got drums in front of us.
Yep. You know what to do.
Clap us in. Welcome to the Whiskey Stories
podcast. This is.
Actually my first time introducing Abaragi inaugural in
a tasting. And so this is really, really
exciting for me. Distillers, butlers and Blenders
for the last 2 1/2 years with the with the company, I've been
talking a lot about bottlers and blenders elements of business
and now we finally get to talk about the distillers part.
Absolutely and moving on. Moving on from sibling bullying
and burning hospitals. Cherished memories.
Whack along the whiskey stories. Blender, Bottler, Distiller,
Spotlight. I'm the rightful Angus.
Yep. And what you did and one take as
well there. We are.
We're getting good at. This absolute bro.
We're getting good. We've done it again, I guess.
We've managed to convince people to come along to a pub, we've
managed to convince a brand to bring some drams and we've
managed to get Chuck here on time.
Just about, yeah. Why are you Chuck?
I'm all right, man. I saw your brother downstairs
and he serenaded me in song about Conway Harvested.
I told him to do that. Second year in high school.
Yeah, there you go. So, yeah, but we are aren't the
first. That's a real end joke.
That is a real, I think three people who listen to the podcast
will probably get that. But anyway, we are, we're in
Diggers Leaf, the new Diggers Leaf.
That's fantastic. We've got some drams and we are
joined by Tam Cuthbert, who is What's your official title term?
UK sales manager UK sales manager Morrison.
Scotch whiskey distillers, Morrison Scotch whiskey
distillers, and tonight you're taking us through.
This is why tonight we're not just calling it an indie bottler
Spotlight because we're getting an indie bottle from Card Moor,
we're getting a blend from Old Perth and we're also getting now
Mctalla. Is that a single malt as well?
Yes, a single malt from Mctalla, but also the inaugural release
of the Aberdagy Distillery. Brilliant.
Well done. You guys are good at this,
right? We're not going to wait too long
before we get into the drums because it's Friday evening.
It's just gone. 7:00. Talk us through the 1st ram that
we've got in front of us. Yeah.
Absolutely. So the first Ram in front of you
is the forward DRAM and it's from I guess our potentially our
best known brand within the portfolio and our most
traditional independent bottling or bottler style.
So this is from Carmore. This is a liquid so a distillery
that probably people are familiar with from independent
bottlings across various brands. This particular 1 is a 2017
vintage. It is being finished or double
matured. I'm happy to argue either way.
In Tokai. So sweet Hungarian wine, 2017
vintage, bottled this year. 8 years old.
It's been in Tokai for quite a while.
Been in Tokai for sort of 6:00-ish years.
Single cask, 228 bottles, yeah. 51.2% so I think it's got quite
a lot of that kind of sweet wine wood influence I would say.
Well, Sanjar, cheers. Weekend DRAM roll calls now
open. That's it, we're on.
So Angus, last time we were actually in this room, we were
recording with a gentleman who's sitting across from us.
And actually it's the first time I've been in this room recording
and I can actually see them because it was pitch black.
We were. We say hunt.
And it was a liquid that Fraser brought along it.
Was yeah, we talked, we talked very highly about liquid.
Yeah, because it was. It's a drum that I've been
guilty of just leaving aside. Well, this is right.
Because it's so readily available.
It's it's well known as in the Flora and Flora and Fauna
series, but also it's been bottled by independent.
So many independent hawkers have done so many different things,
but I'm not sure I've ever had it in Takai.
No. And I think one of the things
that Fraser talked about or. Takaji as I used to call.
It Fraser talked about the fact that the the the the liquid that
comes out of liquid distillery can be so easily lent to so many
different finishes. So from your own point of view,
Tam, then when you when you do have a a brand like car and more
and you get a lot of access to liquid, how how easy is it when
you have something like a Linkwood to especially with a
different type of double maturation or yeah, or or or
finish like this? I mean, for us and I'll, I'll
listen to what what Fraser was saying about Linkwood and it's,
it's totally true that if you have something that's really
consistent and consistently really good kind of works in
anything, kind of works in various different styles,
various different tasks for us for car more, I mean, I used to
sell a lot of it behind the bar. It was one of them that if it
says car more on the label, it's a real box of chocolates, but
it's always high quality drams. Yeah.
And in terms of inventory, so on site at our distillery, we've
got kind of about 35,000 casks. So it's about selection of when
things are ready and the style of whiskey that we want to
bottle at any particular time. So that so just go sorry 2
seconds, that's 35,000 casks that are filled with different.
So that covers car more Aberraggie, Old Perth and
Mctalla, right. So our whole portfolio, I
wouldn't know the exact split. There's a lot of Aberraggie
there because we've been distilling since 2017, but we're
talking about a decent scale. I would say it's never going to
be the biggest of 1,000,000 and 1,000,000, but it's, it's enough
to select what we want to bottle at a particular time when it's
ready and in various different styles that we want that we want
to do. I think CAR more as a brand, and
we'd say this before I worked for the company, just puts
really, really good whiskey in a bottle.
Yeah. Sometimes distilleries that you
might know that are a cool expression of that distillery,
or sometimes ones that you might not know in a funky wood finish
or straight down the middle. Like we did a Klein Leash last
year, 11 years, 11 years old in bourbon, and it was just like,
yeah, absolutely perfect. And then you've got something
like the the Linkwood and Tokai, which is nice and fruity.
Nice way to start. I would say like a really pretty
easygoing drum. Chuck Linquid then talk us
through what your thoughts on Linquid is.
I mean, I think it's kind of been said already.
Great liquids predominantly used in the blending process, but
very versatile in cast maturation.
This would be the second Linquid I've ever had in Tucker.
The only other one I could think of is the fragrant drops one.
I think it was 12 years full maturation.
I think this is great. Like, clearly enough spirit to
hold up to like the sweetness that you're getting from a
dessert wine. You've terrified me, Chuck,
because I think I might have had that fragrant drops on as well
and I said I'd never had this and like took eye before.
So there you go. No one would have known if you
hadn't said. Anything.
No, I know exactly. I thought I'd just made my own
but I think. We we actually talked about it
last week or two weeks ago on the podcast.
We were saying about how, you know, with Lightwood being the
size of a discovery that it is sure.
And like what Fraser talked about was the fact that, you
know, there's so much Linkwood produced, but it's so good that
I just get hoarded by Diagio for going into their blends.
But a company like Diagio could easily say, well, we could put
it out to, you could put a 12, a 15 and 18, a 21 on the
marketplace. And Diagio with their route to
market and with everything that they've already got, they could
probably fill shelves and probably put it all around the
world, like probably a lot of their other Florida and Fauna
releases. But the fact that it is so
limited makes it a little bit more exciting.
A lot of time depending what's needed.
For the other product. You're absolutely blend.
It's so good. It goes into blend.
And that's it. It's always an interesting
choice for these foreign fauna ones that they do put out that
one expression and that's how you get it from source.
And then obviously through independent Bottlene.
So you can, you've got that ability to play with it.
Yeah. And you want as as an
independent baller, you want something that can be versatile,
right? You want something that can
lend, lend the spirit to various wood types, various kind of,
yeah, different styles of maturation, big cast, small
cast, like everything really. And you know that Lincoln's
going to going to be able to stand up there.
And that's quite interesting because that's probably
something we've not maybe touched on before when we talk
about a consistent product. That's something that, you know,
the big distillery, the big companies are looking for in
terms of blending, but also it's something that the independent
bottle absolutely clearly looking forward to looking for
because you're not wanting an inconsistent product or a some,
you know, this is a do you know what I mean?
Yeah, no, absolutely. I think like across across the
industry, apart from single casks, you're looking for
consistency. You want something that people
can come back to and pick up and become a fan of.
Like I, I love single cask independent bottles as much as
the next person, but you don't want to have to hang on to that
much liquid because that's all you're ever going to have again.
Like you want to have or you want to have access to that
stuff, but also have your, your daily drinkers and be able to
say, this is what I enjoy drinking and I can finish a
bottle and pick it up and, and kind of have.
And that's where the big brands have, have done so well.
You know what Glenfaric 12 tastes like?
You know what Johnny Walker Black tastes like because it's
the same and consistent all over, all over the world.
So talk, talk me through your car and more as a brand then,
because I'll be honest, you know, you see a lot of it.
I mean, we probably the majority of people in this room, we see a
lot of independent bottlers all over the place.
And there's the big ones that kind of people stick out to, you
know, you get your Thompson brothers and Gordon Macphails
and all these kind of things. But car and Moore's up there as
well. But at the same time, is it
where, where does car and Moore sell best?
Is it on on trade? Is it people that are buying up?
I mean, as soon as you put a lease out, do people just snap?
Because when it's an independent bottler, you've only got 200 or
300 bottles, sometimes less. Or is it international markets
as well? But both to be honest, like it's
funny because like kind of 10 years ago you would say maybe
car more G&M couple other like big independent bottlers.
But now that pie is the same size, but there's lots more
independent bottlers with with similar ish liquid.
But we sell a lot through traditional retail.
We don't do very much with the on trades, just a time
management thing for for for me and us.
We want to do more of course. And we're looking to put out
some really, really like really high quality, just different,
different stuff. Like we did a Ben Nevis in a
Klein leash last year. We've done a Kriegelke and Fino
along with this one, which you have the chance to try as as
funky like. I'd be interested to know what
people think of it. I think this is more of a just a
really, really well put together DRAM.
So something that I think everyone's going to enjoy and a
nice way to start. I think if you put various other
drams in there, you know we're going to have six drams.
So, but how, how, how old is the Carnmore brand then?
How long has that been going? About 10 years maybe just just
over that. It's gone through a couple of
rebrands in in that time as well.
It didn't always look like this. This, this label in particular
is is a new addition to us. So we've taken our printing in
house. So now we do all all of this
sort of printing. But that's interesting.
So it's only really been going as long as the distillery has
been going. Yeah, more or less.
Yeah. So I mean, when you talk about
the casts that are at your home distillery, that's always been
the case that that you know that the home of car and more
effectively is the yeah, Abaragi.
Distillery, and I like what we found out from it, was Carl
Crafts came on and talked about Arden Merkin and of course
Adelphi, the independent bottlers who are part are the
owners of Arden Merkin Distillery.
And one of the things that you said was actually it makes it a
lot easier when you have liquid coming out of spills, where what
you can do is instead of purchasing casks, you could be
trading casks for liquid. So yeah, it's doesn't, you don't
have to have that cask, that cask cash transaction and also
be chasing whether you can actually start having a bit of
power where you could be going to people and saying.
So I'm assuming something like that might have been going on as
well. As well for you guys with using
Talk Outcast first fills for Linkwoods and stuff like that
then that can then be utilised for the distillery.
Yeah, I mean our warehouses are full of every, every wood type
that you could, you could think of really.
And some of that I'll see, we'll see in in our official
bottlings, some, some you won't. But in terms of procurement, so
we're a family owned business. We're owned by the Morrison
family and they've got kind of five generations of of whiskey
history, I guess. And that's procurement,
distilling, bottling, blending. And certainly before Abirargie,
we, we still had a skin in the game in terms of procurement of
whiskey. So it was like we're as a family
business, we were still buying and selling whiskey.
So the inventory for car more didn't necessarily start.
With the distilleries. Yes, in terms of in terms of
buying and selling whiskey. And like we've like we've heard,
unreliable. Failed relationships.
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
So what we think, has anyone added water?
Yeah, No. What?
What we think with water is it? Yeah, I think I don't want to
start off with task strength. No.
Fair.
Yeah. I thought you told us you start
at 3:00 this afternoon. But yeah, because I mean, what
was what percentage did you say this was setting up for?
51. 51 So I mean, it's not yeah, mega punchy for a but at the
same time, like you say, it's the first DRAM.
And yeah, I'd be interested to make try a wee drop of water,
especially after this week's conversation with Gregor Kurt in
the corner there about that. The the what?
The addition of water to what? What can do to drams as well?
I've done what I tend to do at a whiskey tasting and just
absolutely tan the first drama. Any consideration to water at
all? That's a good, that's a good,
that's a good endorsement for. It Yeah.
But tell me Tam about your like your role then, because, you
know, pounding the streets and knocking on the doors and
getting these things sold. You've even mentioned the fact
that it must be a tricky balance to have because you're talking
about you know when you've got how many bottles or how many
releases will go in and out turn.
For example, you bring out six at the same time or or it'll
just be as and when it. Really varies.
So we'll probably like, on an average year, do 4 car more
releases and they could vary from 2 drams to six drams.
And then we'll also sprinkle in a couple of our kind of more
premium stuff, which is celebration of the cast.
So that'll be kind of single cast 20 years plus.
And then we've also got the option to do a family reserve.
So that's the kind of top, top level of probably like Glengira
or Contosion or Bulmore from the family days.
And then with like the likes of Mctalla, we'll do a couple of
releases as well and old Perth likewise.
And yeah, so the so the day's busy.
Yeah. I mean, because that's it.
And then like you said as well about the fact that when you do
bring out these releases, if there's only two or three
hundred or something less than 200 bottles at all, how, how,
what, how small and out town you'd look at doing.
But at the same time, from your perspective, perhaps spread that
across all these different places because there'll be
retailers you'll probably know that you could sell.
I bought like one run of this 200 odd bottles through just the
retail connections that you. Have in your game.
Which then means that people like us can't go into the
diggers and see it on on the back bar.
It's a relationship game as well.
Like it's like who who supports other other parts of our
business, Who do we want to be seen doing business with?
And also like getting it as as far and wide as possible is a
big thing for us as well because you can get quite Scotland
centric or you can get quite even Edinburgh centric.
But you want to have it you know as as far as possible.
And across the UK then, yeah, yeah, sorry.
Like so how far and wide does does the brand go?
There, so we do, we do a bit of work in London with the likes of
Three Greek St., formerly Milroy's, with the Whisky
Exchange as well and. Hello London.
Just what I say, Our biggest audience, our biggest audience
is now officially in London. So everyone 123.
Hello, London. So, so my eyes.
So Melrose is now 3 Reed straight, Yes.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean it's a very, it's had a
refurb, right. So the bars now on the other
side if you were ever in it before.
But that's how you do a refurb. Put the bar now.
Yeah, but it's a better use of space to be fair to them.
And they are are a really nice partner of ours.
They're a Metalla lighthouse, which we'll cover later.
So we work pretty closely with them on on pouring drams and and
also and also selling bottles as well because there are quite a
unique place where they have there a bar and also a retail
facility as well. Superb.
What's everyone's thoughts on the DRAM so far?
Anyone got any wanky tasting notes that they want to divulge
or get out? Anyone want me to come along?
I'll put the glasses on and I'll truck a mic under your nose.
Is everyone ready for that yet? No.
OK, right A. Couple people shaking their
head, Graham. Scared of me just now, right?
Well, what we'll do is because actually one of the one of the
great tips again, Gregor in the corner they gave us was I liked
it. Unlike Angus, who's very greedy
when it comes to pouring whiskey and also drinking his drams.
I like to leave a little bit so you can come back so that you
can you can check that so. But you've only got 2.
Glasses so don't we do your eyes so don't leave too much.
You've only got 2 glasses. But we will move on to the next
DRAM then Tam. So this is the exciting one for
me. What are we?
What are What's in our second glass?
Yeah, I mean, this is it's a long time in the making.
This is my first. This is actually my first time
introducing Abragi inaugural in a tasting.
So this is really, really exciting for me.
Distillers, butlers and blenders.
For the last 2 1/2 years with the with the company, I've been
talking a lot about bottlers and blenders element of the
business. And now we finally get to talk
about the, the distillers part and we have a distillery.
We began distilling in 2017. We built a distillery sort of
the year before. We're on a farm.
We're a farm distillery. We sit on 300 acres just South
of Perth just along the road from, from Bridge of Earn.
We grow barley and we make whiskey.
And that's quite, a, quite a simple, simple approach to it.
I guess the, the key part of, of Abirargi is being sympathetic to
our surroundings, sympathetic to our landscape.
So in the fields we grow specifically Golden Promise
variety of barley. Great, great variety.
Which if if anyone's had the chance to try anything Golden
Promise related, it's makes a really, really for me, texture
and structure are big things in whiskey and that is what Golden
Promise does. It really, really elevates it.
We support that with barley from other Morrison owned farms in
Scotland. So we grow Laureate, a more
commercial strain or a more kind of modern strain of barley.
Golden Promise is inefficient in the field, it's susceptible to
disease and yeah, it's just a bit of a nightmare to work with.
Joe. Yeah.
Shite yields. Shite yields and it's tough to
work through your distillery as well.
It is a little bit kind of volatile I guess and, and can
clog up your, your systems a little bit.
However, we, we feel it's, it's worth it.
So what we do at Aberraggy and what we've been doing since 2017
is that we produce 2 new make spirits.
So we distill lock laureate barley in the exact same
fashion. And then we distill Golden
Promise for a period. So that may be 3 months, three
months, three months, three months.
We mature them independently. We fill them into exclusively,
first of all bourbon and first of all Sherry casks and 2026 we
have 4, all four of those elements in a bottle.
So we have 52% Golden Promise spirit, 48% Laureate Spirit, 50%
Firstfill bourbon, 50% Firstfill Sherry.
For me, it's it's just got, it feels like a complete
representation of of the spirit that we want to provide the
mouthfeel texture. Yeah, 48.2% was our bottling
strength. This is our first ever ever
release, as I say, inaugural, but it should be a really nice
representation of where we feel our whiskey, why it's made like
this. You should be able to taste that
in terms of in terms of structure.
And yeah, we're delighted to share it.
Well, Sandra Martin cheers here. Inaugural whiskey, inaugural
tasting. Diggers Leaf.
Laurie, it seems quite old school barley variety as well.
Yeah, it's very like early 2000s.
Yeah, but this is interesting because you were saying it was a
modern variety and clearly, clearly John doesn't think it is
at all. Well.
I'm just going, I'm just looking from a producing perspective,
right? I remember I speak to my old man
about it and he was like fucking hate grown it.
Like. Heavy rains, it would just
flatten yields were bad. But then also after every every
year, when you keep on growing the same barley varietal you're
more likely to get infested by, you're more likely for your crop
to get infected. Just because of having it the
prior year, just because encouraging.
Stuff get more accustomed to it and pesticides don't work as
well if they're heavily used. So you are it's it becomes
harder and harder to produce over time.
Yeah. And you may be getting.
Smaller, I guess, and, and that's something that's really
interesting 'cause I'm right to say I'm you may, I may be
repeating what you just said, but your barley only comes from
about two or three different farms.
Is that right? Exactly.
All based in the same.
Area or are they all? No one in Aberdeenshire, one in
Ayrshire and E Lothian as well. So and.
And your, your farm is, it's in Perthshire, isn't it?
It's just outside. Five.
Yes, exactly. And there's No 5 barley in here,
Graham. No, no, you can keep that, but I
guess, I guess from a kind. Of tail, but it's very close to
being 5 barley. It's very close, but from a,
from a farming and agricultural point of view.
So our operations director, who also is our whiskey blender,
he's, he's a farmer by, by family and regenerative farming
is, is a big part of what we, we try and do.
So like we in the winter, we'll plant cover crops like turnips
and, and various other things. We get the sheep in, they graze
on them. They do what sheep do.
And then that gets some nitrogen into the soil.
So trying to kind of look after the land it, it should reduce
the need for, for pesticides and that sort of thing.
But just trying to look after, look after the land it, it
really is making whiskey and making booze is an extension of
farming. Really.
It's how to keep your crops from going bad.
But no, we're, we're and in terms of what we do on site.
So we grow the golden promise barley right in front of the
still house and, and on the surrounding 300 acres.
We then send our malt down to Simpsons who malt it for us to
our specifications. Bring it back.
We distill, we mature and we bottle everything on site.
And so we've currently got 2 warehouses, as I say about
35,000 cash capacity and they're almost full.
So yeah, we need to either sell some more or but no.
Or build some more in. Terms, yeah.
But in terms of like we want to, we want to have control.
So we want to say we can trace provenance of barley, of the
distillation, the every, every kind of element of it.
We want to we want to have some element of control and going
into the maturation side of things.
So we work direct with the guys over in the States to for our
for our woods. So we buy direct bourbon
barrels. We request that they are
unrinsed, unsteamed and shipped home.
So in terms of that provenance as well, it's like we want to
have the almost like the the best ingredients I guess.
And similarly over in Spain with with the guys over there, we
work direct and we and we ship all our cash hole And this is
all this is exclusively first fill and but I guess the top
line of Abargi is two different barley varieties probably cash,
Sherry cash. Yeah, Because you mentioned
everything is currently being filled into first fill.
Is that right? Is that something you'll be able
to sustain? Is that because you can then use
the casts and your other company?
You know your other products? So now we have Abargi refill
woods. So now, now that we've bottled
some, we can start that process of, of it being full Abra.
You're yeah. It's a case of starting with
first fill and then the refills come down exactly.
Yeah, because I mean we will talk about it's a non age
statement, right. But at the same time, we know
from what you've been just been, you know, if you're, if you're
good at maths, you'll know that. You don't have to be that good
at. Well, you don't, you don't have
to be that good at, but if you are, you'll know that you'll
know that this probably isn't just three-year old liquid
that's been that's been that's been put out.
There'll be a mix I'm I'm sure. But at the same time, there'll
be some liquid that's probably come from from some of the first
installation potentially. Yeah, I mean, if we weren't
recording Atkins. Yeah.
We could talk about that after the recording, but but my point
being is that it's not like what we know is that just keeping.
The specs already mentioned. No basic.
Basically. I'm extremely happy to share
what in terms of makeup is in this portal but not.
To go, yeah, I know, of course. But what I'm what I'm basically
saying is that what we know is that the distillery has been
producing spirit for longer than three years.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what we know is that this
isn't predominantly 3 year old, I don't know, I don't know, you
know 3. So how what I'm wanting to ask
from your point there, how long have you been working with the
business for? 2 1/2 years.
Right. So how, how often?
I mean, I suppose it'll be acknowledge to a lot of people
that you guys have been building a distillery and then
distilling. And so how many times when
you're having these conversations are you getting
people? Have you had people asking you
when are we going to start seeing single malt?
Yeah. Absolutely.
I mean, it's it's one of them that we've been pretty quiet
about it. Yeah.
And very deliberate on that front because we want we wanted
to time it so that you're not having too big of a like it's
coming, it's coming, it's coming, it's coming, it's
coming. And then ten years later or, you
know, however long later. So we only really started
talking about Aberraggy at London Whiskey show last year
where we showcased our two new make spirits, an expression of
Aberraggy and first of all bourbon, an expression of
Aberraggy and first of all Sherry.
But prior to that, it was more kind of like my customers that
were like when Zabaragi coming and it was the answer was when
it's ready and we weren't aiming for a specific vintage.
We weren't aiming for an age very much when we feel it's
ready to go. And that was a kind of keeping
an eye on the spirit as it as it were, and really saying, yeah,
we this is where this is the time to time to put it out.
That's presumably it's all completely unpeted malt.
Is there any peeted in any of your barley?
Is that peeted, I told you, do a peeted run or is it just all
completely unpeted, you know? It's.
I just always want to ask the question.
Mostly unpeted, mostly unpeted, No, The thing is like so.
So I guess in terms of Abaragi, these are for the four takeaways
and this is our first kind of showcased it to everyone.
And we want to know that. We want people to know that we
are about these four elements of first of all, bourbon or bourbon
Sherry, two different types of of barley variety.
Of course we have experimentation across the board
of everything you can think of. That's the benefit of having
your own distillery where you can say, yeah, well, let's,
let's see how that reacts or, or works.
And you know, in 20 years time or in 10 years time, you might
see something a little different.
But in terms of inaugural release, you want to have a
really strong house, house style or what you're what you want to
be known for. You don't really want to muddy
the waters with sure, this or that or, or something different,
even though it might be exceptional.
But it's it's about showcasing what we will be known for.
Yeah. And and so when you're talking
about like, not, you know, the whiskey will not go out until
it's absolutely ready, was that I mean, you start, you do have
to plan for these things. Like, you know, I think there
are people in the room who have been part of production and
distilling and putting out bottles and stuff like that.
And you'll know from yourself as well, from your background in
sales, you've got to make sure everyone is ready for it to come
out, albeit not be screaming and shouting saying we're going to
release this at 10 or so. Everyone's counting down the
days, but whatever. But it does take a wee while to
to get bottles ordered to get all this stuff ready, bottles,
labels, etcetera, etcetera. But how long from do you did you
know that this was coming out? At this point, probably this
time last year right, if not slightly before, it was a case
of working to get the the spirit kind of makeup correct I guess.
And that took up a while of fine tuning through different
prototypes. And I was lucky to be kind of a
little bit involved in that in terms of like getting to getting
to try some of the, the final samples and having having a
little, little say in that. We're a small company.
We're we're 16 people. Right, so that was that.
Was the one next we're our, our sales and marketing team is, is
five people including the managing director.
So it's, you know, I look after the UK, we have international
sales Gen. and and two 2 brand managers.
And so then are you, I mean, how exciting is it from your job to
go out and actually be selling a single malt?
So you're able to then chop on the doors of everybody, all the
contacts that you've already got, all the people who are
buying your car and more old pair from Metalla.
And now you're able to actually phone these guys up over the
last, well, over the last month, I suppose.
Just a couple of months. It's ready, Yeah.
Get your, get your orders. I mean, it's amazing.
It's, it's really not every day that a single malt distillery
launches its first product and, and to be involved in that as
mega and to, and to really, and for it to be so well received.
I don't know what people are thinking about, about the drama
itself, but it's, it's been extremely positively received in
terms of flavour profile, in terms of price point, in terms
of branding, everything. And yeah, the, the whiskeys,
we're, we're really proud of that.
And how much is the bottle of that sort of 65 pounds, 65 lbs
again? And like you said, there's a,
there's an element of there'll be a lot of people who have
bought that bottle, that, that bottle will remain unopened
because there's plenty of people who like to buy inaugural
releases and just keep hold of them and that's it.
They'll, they'll either be a sentimentality or element of it,
but it'll always be an element of someone going, this might be
worth about a Bob or two when, you know, in a few years time.
But one of the other things that we've talked about in the
podcast a lot over the over the couple of years is, you know,
with the how many new distilleries we're seeing
opening up. It's a really exciting time as a
as a consumer, as we've mentioned so many things, but
it's like it's, it's a great thing where there is nobody
alive today that sat in a room like this trying go ahead and
fit it or spring back or something good.
You know what, I can't wait to try that when it's 12 or 15
years old or anything like that. You know, it's literally so when
we the age that we live in now where the new distilleries are
opening and there's experimentation.
And one of the things that is probably is really interesting
with new distilleries, like what what you were talking about
earlier on is when you're a new distillery, we've we've spoken
to the guys at Port Leith and we've got Arden Mark and there's
plenty of new distilleries we spoke to.
The focus all has to be on production.
It all has to be on yeasts or barley or anything like that.
But I suppose that helps now that there's an age of whiskey
geeks that's right there. People actually do get excited
and barley varieties that are going in because that's the only
story you've really got to tell is such about the distillery,
you know, about the sustainability, the farming, the
heritage of that. Yeah.
You know, you don't have a 200 year history to go well back in
this, you know, but that's what you're doing is you're making it
interesting by adding those elements in.
Yeah. And not with not with this
specific distillery, but in terms of in terms of history,
family, family histories is has helped big time with, with the
Morrisons previously owning Bulmore and Glengarry and
Alcantosham. But this is our first kind of
showcase of a, of a new, new distillery like the other half
of the Morrison family has Clayside distillery.
But this is our, our side of the Morrison.
Morrison really nice. And I I'd like to ask another
slightly cheeky question which you might not be able to answer,
but it's more. Well, we'll have another. 1.
Let me ask Graham, you know. We can guess, you know.
Well, it's more, it's more the question is what can we expect
in the future? I mean, is there a core release
coming? How long we have to wait for
that? Or is that just yeah, wait and.
See, no, there's a core release. We want to get to a core range
product, but we've not rushed anything yet.
Sure. And we will.
We'll have a core release, yeah, in the future for sure.
But we want to spend the next. So the inaugural release has
been extremely popular and that's, that's great.
But you really want to, we want to follow up with telling the
story of, of everything that we do beyond one single bottle.
So in the next 18 months or so, you'll see the the journey of
Aberrargie towards a core range product.
Brilliant. Well, thank you very much.
What we'll do is we'll stop for a quick break, give us time to
finish what's in our glasses, then refill it with the next two
drums. But thank you very much, Tam.
That's absolutely fantastic. Cheers.
All right, ladies and gentlemen, already a rock'n'roll, right?
Let's see if I can get this right again.
Welcome back to the Whiskey Stories podcast, Winter Baller
Distiller with Morrison Distillers and *** Lead.
You can tell you always know once you've had the 1st 2 dramas
out of these everyone just so this is, this is quite exciting
Tam because you've we've now moved on.
So we've had the bottler element, we've had the distiller
element and now we're on to the blinder element.
So this is this is old Perth. Yeah, that's it.
And so we, we wanted to cover all bases in our portfolio when,
when we began the distillery and with our location with
Perthshire having such a rich history of, of blending, you
know, back in the day from, from grouse and Jews and, and various
others. Bells.
And bells. Yeah.
I mean, that's one. I always think it's anonymous.
Yeah, I mean, so, so blending, blending whiskey in Perthshire
goes goes way back. You OK in the back there?
Sorry, I just think we're only. We're only talking about a brand
of blended whiskey right now. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, so we wanted to be blending in Perthshire and Old
Perth is actually a brand that goes back to 19 O 8 started by
the Thompson family grocers kind of familiar story back from 120
odd years ago. But Old Perth in its in its
current form is a blended malt. So exclusively space side single
malts, exclusively mature and Sherry casks.
And yeah, I mean, some of the liquid that we've put out as as
Old Perth has been phenomenal. So it's like every, so just
confirmation there because I didn't know this.
Everything from Old Perth is blended malt, yes.
So there's no grain whiskey? Blended blended space side malt.
Yeah, yeah. So.
Its own Sherry, right? OK, fantastic.
So it's very specific. And we, we, we made the, the,
the, the specification of space side single malt so that we can
say that there's no Abargi in it because a lot of people would
assume that you just, yeah, yeah, like, okay, you've got a
blended malt brand. It's clearly got that in it.
But it's space side single malts.
A couple of our vintage collections are not space side
single malts like we did in McAllen Highland Park 21 last
year. Highland Park's not on Space
Shack, No. So, so you scoop up there.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. But, and so I, I just sorry.
So does that go all the way back to the beginning origins,
origins of Old Perth, or is that something that Morrison
Distillers decided to do exclusively?
There's something that Morrison Distillers.
Decided to do so. How?
How long have Morrison has had the brand now?
About. 10 or 12 years, something like that.
It's not always always looked like that.
It used to have a, a slightly different kind of branding to it
and you will see a couple of old pairs that might not be
specifically Sherry, specifically blended malt, but
in the last, you know, eight or nine years it's been Spacey
single malts, mature and Sherry casks.
I guess on on site our distillery again, we go back to
doing as much as we can on site. So we have 5, they're at least
70 year old Sherry bots that we bought straight from straight
from her F they were used in the drinking Sherry market and we
have them filled up with blended malt and we teaspoon a little
bit of that kind of it's it's pretty intense stuff into pretty
much everything that we do with Old Perth.
So it's just that kind of that DNA kind of running through and
commitment to Sherry cash maturation as well as authentic
as as we can be. So sorry, just so we go back to
that, you mentioned about the Thompson family.
So we're talking about, is that the Thompson family of Finn
Thompson? Exactly.
Yeah, yeah. So it's Finn Thompson's
granddad, our great, great granddad.
We're one of the grandparents. Yeah, they had.
So yeah. Because it's, it's funny when
you, you look, you look, I mean, on a larger scale, you've got,
you know, Famous Grouse being bought by Edgington and stuff.
But it's it's interesting when you look at buying a brand and
there's when you because we've heard stories about buying
distilleries and it was, you know, Ian MacLeod distillers
where the Russell family when they bought Tam do it was all
about, you know, you look at what inventory you're buying
with that. Yeah, I take it when what's the
situation when you're buying a blend?
Can you buy inventory or are you literally just buying the brand?
Yeah, I actually. Don't know about the the
procurement side of of old pairs in terms of that.
I don't know if there was a there was a liquid deal as well,
but it was a case of taking old path and, you know, specifically
blended in percher again and making it as high quality as we
can. So single malt from space side
is is high quality thick. People understand that Sherry
cask is high quality thick. So hopefully those elements
because blended whiskey gets gets a tough wrap.
But if you have high quality single malts and you have them
in high quality Sherry casks, then you can create something.
And speaking to your gentleman here, like putting recipes
together of different makeups or spirits is, is very hard.
If you're working with one spirit, you know, fine.
You understand what that's going to react to in one specific cast
once you put, you know, grassy or nutty or malty or whatever it
is, and then put them together and, and how they're going to
react. It's it's proper art of
blending. Yeah.
Absolutely. I mean and, and what we're
probably going to do. Sorry, what did you ask?
What's the first one we. Got well, I was just going to
say what we're going to do, I think is we're going what we're
actually going to do is we're going to have these side by
side. So because they're because
they're both old Perth. So what are?
What are the two that were so I guess.
The one, the one that was in front of you might be to your
left or right now is our Old Perth double Sherry wood.
So I guess goes back a little bit to what I was saying about
consistency. And this is part of our core
range. So we've currently got 4 drams
in our core range of Old Perth with various different makeups,
various different Sherry types. This is our most recent edition.
We added it in 2024 in the summer of and it is a
combination of all the Russell and Pedro Hammond and Sherry.
So double Sherry woods 48.2% alcohol for me.
This is just a nice soft, easy going space either like it's
yeah, something something for everyday, a little bit
chocolatey. This is kind of 45 quids a
bottle, something like that. Again, with blended whiskey or
blended malt whiskey, you have to price it accordingly because
it's got the B word on it, but. Where is your blending site
then? You mentioned it's in Percher,
is that in your? On site.
On site at your decelerator. Yeah.
So in terms of warehousing, we warehouse all of our old Perth
here. In terms of discouraging so
emptying cask we do everything on site and in terms of bathing
and blending we do everything on site as.
Well, and what's the second? What's the second RAM?
Sorry. Then and the second one, so this
is part of our core range and then we have a limited edition
that we did last year last August.
We, we released this and we'll do limited editions kind of
throughout the year to showcase different cherry styles or
showcase just different kind of elements of what we do with old
Perth. This is old Perth bodega and
it's a combination of three different sheddies.
This one. So we've got all Rosso PX and
Paolo Cortado. I think that the PX element is
absolutely there. You can see by the colour of it.
It's, it's, it's pretty strong. Paolo Cortado really lifts it
and gives it a bit of a bit of vibrancy from for my palette.
And this is 52.4. I think this drinks ridiculously
easy at 52. Yeah, for any Sherry tarts, I
think is the is the term. Yeah, I used to be one of them,
apparently. Where's the girl?
Apparently now you're pretending to light beated whiskey.
Yeah, I mean, Tammy, when you're talking about blending on site
and everything being done on site now you're obviously going
to have and I'm assuming a master blender for the for the
single malt. Yeah, somebody who is nosing
casts and signing them off for going into their car and more
probably working with whiskey and spirit for your metallic and
then of course blaming Old Perth.
Is that one team of people that does all of that What?
Or is there a particular person that's that's sort of sole
responsible or is that split as like there's a car and more
team, the Abargi team, the Old Perth team in the Mcallity?
As I mentioned, we're pretty small operation, that's almost
one person's job. Yeah.
So our operations director, Graham, Graham Mckerry, he is in
charge of kind of what eventually goes into bottle.
He'll work with our managing director in terms of cast
selection for specifically car more, but also for Mctella and
Old Perth as well in terms of where, what direction we we want
to go in and presenting options. And then, and then it's a kind
of team decision from there in terms of the Graham and and Neil
as well. Occasionally with, with the
likes of car more, you know, we'll get as a, as a sales team,
you know, what do you, what do you think of this?
Will this work? Because we're, we're a little
bit closer to what's out there as well.
And in terms of in terms of presenting different stuff, but
in terms of liquids, putting it together to be presented to go
into a bottle, it's, it's one person.
Because that's an interesting thing you just mentioned to
bring it slightly back to car more because it's just a
question I thought of. There is we've maybe spoken to
other independent bottomless and maybe off the record they said,
oh, we might keep that back because somebody else has
released the Linkwood this year. So we might wait six months and
then put it out. Is that, is that the kind of
things you're feeding back to your operations director saying,
look, look, there's a few Linkwoods out right now.
Maybe we we wait six months. Yeah.
And I mean you've got to you've got to have a look at the market
in in general as well. It's not, it's not a kind of
insular like, oh, let's just, we're definitely going to do
what we're going to do. It's about about reaction as
well. And because we're a small
operation, we can decide what goes into a bottle more quickly
than our operations director would like.
You know, it's like we could say, let's, let's do this or
I've got a customer who, who, who would like this and that.
And because we're all on site, it's like we can be quite
dynamic with that. Of course, we have a plan of
this is what's going to happen. This is what we would the what
we would like to happen in terms of bottling, specifically for
car more all Perth and metals are slightly different.
So all Perth is like this is what we're we're going to do
regardless, because it's quite AI mean.
It's it's a smaller category in terms of it's not just oh,
there's there's link without their orders, you know, XY and
Z. And to have as an independent
bottler, as a blender, to have a core range product or core range
force core range products is is tough going.
Yeah, you know, and making sure these are always consistent.
They go across the world and they're always of of the same
quality. Well, you, you mentioned the B
word, right? And we've talked about it so
many times about about blinds Now, first of all, you know,
people are listening to podcasts.
Well, no, we always talk up blinds and things like that as
well. In fact, I'm very close to, you
know, filling a 60 litre VAT that I bought and I'm trying to
find the home for because Ken, if I've said categorically
you're not allowed to have it. Down in the basement and ***
bonded is it? It's not.
Bonded, yeah, No, but the thing about it is, I mean, I think we
had it with Simon Smith and it's funny when you look at the blend
category because you can have blended Scotch, blended malt and
blended grain. Yeah.
And one of the things that we've we've said is that people just
see blend and just think, right, it's a blend.
And so automatically what they do is they switch off a lot of
the time. Whereas we would have spoke
about Gregor's episodes out this week as we're recording it.
Greg's job at one point was blinding for, for, for Whiskey
Row and then other products. Glen more spirits.
But you know, Greg coined the phrase and the first episode is
on. You're creating flavour.
Yeah, that's what that's what's cool.
And, you know, to be able to sit there and we've done a blending
experience with Jake as well on a single mop front.
And so when people see that you when you get different flavours
in front of you, you get the opportunity.
I mean, for interest. Has anyone in here done a
blending experience, a distillery or or or so you guys
have done one of you. What?
No, thank you. Strath Isle.
Yeah. Brilliant.
So because it's good fun if we've done it and.
It's, well, it's good. It's good fun until you get.
It's good fun until you get Jake to try your blend and.
Then he just slaughters it. But no, it is good fun.
But then there's the other element that the fact that so
many and I was guilty of this, I used to genuinely think that the
blend category was one particular category of whiskey.
Well, that's it, So. Then when you actually say well,
when so when you get an opportunity to say to people,
no, hang on a minute. This is this is because I think
it was we talked about with Simon Smith and we said, can we
start to can we start to campaign against a far blended
malt to have its own category in terms of I think we call it
multi multi malt. Multi malt is what we said
because or because or the pure malt as woven brought out as
well. But because there are so many
people that would just turn their nose up at a blend.
But when you actually speak and say, well, see that single malt
that you like the Glenfed F-12 for example, in fact, there is a
master blender who picks out what casks are good enough to
put into a VAT that then puts that so the bottle that you get.
So that is effectively batting and blending that's going on.
But this old perf and other blended malts like that is an
opportunity to go hang on a second here.
We could just pick single malts from all over.
So we don't we're not just restricted to 1 distillery and
1, you know, 1 spirit style and and within within that to be
able to go space side as well and share it.
That is niching it down. But at the same time.
There does seem to be a move into like artisan blends almost.
I think Woven very much takes that category.
Not whiskey society. They've done some really, really
small batch blends. I'm assuming the old person kind
of. Especially with the limited
releases and special releases, you are doing small batch
blends. Yeah, I mean.
Maybe making a flavour profile and then filling that out with
the acquired liquid you have in your own?
Would that be safe to say or? Yeah, I mean that bodega or this
bodega one that we did last year, that's about 1200 bottles.
All right, so it's worldwide, so that's pretty small.
We'll occasionally do an annual release that might creep up to 3
1/2 thousand, something like that.
Pretty small, yeah. Yeah, Well, I guess in terms of
categorising, and it's had a tough life.
Blended malt, it used to be vatted malt and as you see,
people don't really understand it.
But to categorise a whole thing and be like, that's what I don't
what I don't like or what I do like, it's, it's, it's crazy
because with blended whiskey, you know, sometimes it can be
harsh because of younger grain. But with, with blended malt,
don't have that element in there, of course.
And you mentioned about one of the ones you mentioned about one
of the ones where you can say it's literally got Macallan and
Highland Park in it. Yeah.
How open can you be with the Old Perth to be able to say now
you're able to say to people that space side and it's Sherry,
Sherry, whiskey. But are there are there Old
Perth releases? Where are are current ones that
we're drinking? Are you are are is the consumer
able to access more information on where the the liquids come
from? Absolutely.
They're all from space, right? Yeah, and they're all mature.
They're sharing. An extension of that question or
maybe is are you sourcing the casks yourself and filling
spirit with that, or are you sourcing casks and spirit
externally and then it's just getting blended?
No, we're we're maturing the spirit and we'll buy a lot of
new make spirit specifically for old Perth and we'll get to
Mctalla as well. But I'm I'm mixture of we're
buying new make spirit and aged spirit to kind of keep that
maturation going and we're it's not so that binding.
That means you've been in charge of the whole wood management
side of things from when you've received the bulk and you make
and then filled it yourself into aged it yourself and then
blinded. And it's not.
It's not like a, it's not like we have all these single malts
together and then we just blend them and bottle them.
No, it's like these are, we've got blended malt sitting in the
warehouse that will be old Perth in the future.
And it's kind of like, OK, it might need a bit more of that
grassy element or it might need a bit more of nutty or, or, you
know, whatever it is. So it's, it's keeping that blend
moving. So that's why we don't get as
granular as. This is exactly what is in this.
Course. Well, once you start to do that
becomes difficult because suddenly.
From a consistency. Point.
Yeah, exactly. Maintaining consistency.
And I would challenge anyone to ask why would you like to know
that? No, of course, from a sales
perspective, I suppose that is the sad thing about it is you
can say to somebody, this is a blended mole and people will go,
all right, it's a blend. But then if you were to say to
somebody, well, it's got it's it's it's Highland Park and
McAllen. Do you like Highland Park?
Yes, it's a great distillery. Do you like McAllen?
Yes. Well, what we've done is we
blended the two of them together.
So that is like the Uber DRAM for you.
But I mean, it's wrong because like what most people will say
is that flavour LED conversations is what's better.
But at the same time, we all know that actually the general
consumer also looks towards the brand name as well.
That's there. So it becomes and it's just a
trickier job from a sales perspective.
Because we've luckily we have this and we've done quite a lot
of space size with this. Yeah.
So suppose I'm in a scene warehouse.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Fair, Yeah.
So yeah, like not I'm talking about Carmore, sorry,
specifically not maybe not Linkwood, but if you look at
Carmore's back catalog, you know that's there's lots of space
like single motes that we've done there.
Yeah. So people can't.
Yeah. Has the brand done?
Anything. I mean, obviously Old Perth
you've stated is all space like it's all Sherry cast mature,
yeah. Has the brand done anything
deviating from that in a blend format?
Have you done the bourbon maturation or is it?
Pure, not anytime recently, right, OK.
And no, because we're we're really trying to showcase even
the flavour within that. So we've done Manzania, we've
done Paolo Cortado, we've done a Monteado, we've done PX, we've
done kind of lots of different Sherry cast maturations that
offer very, very wide flavour profiles.
If you can imagine Monteado next to PX, it's it's.
Well, we know from Ross that Monteado is a sexy Sherry, so he
says. Yeah, check.
Check his Internet. Check his hard drive.
But and time then going away from just the old Perth because
the history associated with the brand, but also it wasn't until
you actually mentioned and again, I'm not heard of research
on the podcast. Angus says no, but I wasn't it
wasn't until you mentioned that, you know, the Morrison families
and the ball Moore connection. Suddenly there was a penny drop
for me and suddenly went, Oh shit, that's that's the same
people. So, so the history of that, the
family then what's, what's the story behind the Morrison family
and where where they went and where they are now?
Yeah, I mean from, from a buy and sell and whiskey point of
view, it goes back five full generations.
The most famous family history is ownership of Bulmore
Distillery in the mid 60s. And then we, we, I say we as a
family. So that the Santori in the mid
90s, we also had Akin Tosh and and Glengiri in our portfolio.
It was, I mean, it's a crazy time in whiskey between the 60s
and the 90s, but Bulmore is one of those distilleries that is
just worldwide recognition and a being on Isla is, is just that
more special in itself. So that was Jamie Morrison,
who's our current owner, his grandfather, Stanley P He he
procured or bought all more distillery in the 60s and and
owned and operated it like pretty close to the operation
until, until the 90s. So that's the that's the family
history of that's the more history side of the history, I
guess. And then and then Abu Argue came
along in 2017. It was the sale to to Santori
was never planned to get out of the whiskey game.
It was just. Well, I mean, when you think
about the yeah, I mean, buying, buying distilleries in the 60s
and selling them in the 90s, especially to a company like
Santori, they probably did. All right.
Imagine so because you know, and like what we've said, when
you're in that, when the family holds that name, that can carry
because like you said, there'll be there'll still be people on
the island and Iowa and they'll be.
They built the swimming pool. Didn't they?
There you go. But there'll be even plenty.
Every time you go for it. Yeah, famously heated by this.
Yeah, heated by the distillery. Right.
I didn't even know that I did not.
Know that the swing is more than the swimming pool, Yeah.
It's right next to the. Distillery.
Oh, I'm going to have to go for a swim.
On the other side, you've got the sea, so you know, you make
the decision because. I mean, yeah, I suppose, you
know, being able to the Morrison family, you know, they'll walk
on the island and there'll be people on the island who still
remember the family. Oh, absolutely.
But then also there'll be plenty of people in the industry who
still remember the family. The element of I've done, you
know, I've done the no, we do. There were people who were
saying I, I, you know, I did work with your granddad or I did
work with, you know, I know your family and that carries, you
know, you look at the Urquhart and the Rankin family for Gordon
Macphail and there's plenty of other family businesses that,
that around the industry where suddenly all right, they don't
own the distilleries anymore, But those relationships will run
pretty deep, particularly with cast procurement as well.
Oh. And I mean, there's a wash back
with in Bulmore, that's a Morrison wash back.
And if you go into any of the warehouses, you know, there's,
there's Morrison Bulmore casks lying about all over the place.
That's, that's the Morrison family.
It's, it's not, it's a connection.
That's that's mega. He's a big guy that.
Yeah, it's a big. I mean, it wasn't until you,
like I said, I've not done my research too much today, but it
wasn't until you mentioned earlier on, but in the first
part. But what do we think of the
first two drive these two drums in?
Is there, because we're doing it side by side.
Is there a particular favourite that stands out?
Yes. OK.
What about yourself? Bodega is beautiful.
Bodega. Yeah, we're getting that.
Yeah. Good.
Anyone else want to? What else?
I've got the roving mic. I'm going to come at you for it.
You're sitting quiet in the corner.
Too quiet. Here it comes.
Right. What are we thinking for it?
The bodega. The bodega?
OK, anyone not.
What would be the first one? The other.
The other one. Number one.
You like #1? Fraser.
I prefer #1. Why?
Because I do like. There we go, Jake.
You are nodding frantically there and ask if there's a
particular favorite. Which one do you like?
Yeah. Is there any particular reason
behind it? Just that you like it?
Yeah. Well, we were going to say
something else then what are you going to say?
I. Think number one's a little bit
sulphur. I think it's got a bit of a
couple casks in there. OK, brilliant.
There we go. Greg, you like?
You like them all? Yeah.
Really like the bodega one, really well balanced, good
complexity on it. Good.
Are we going to get a wanky tasting note?
Oh, we've got one from. Chuck.
Right.
Come on, Chuck. I don't need to give you the
mic. You've got one.
But the not the bodega one but the other one which is probably
my favorite. The two it's just like caramel
Coco pops. So the first one.
So the first one you like? Yeah.
Double cherry, Double cherry, caramel, Coco pops.
Anyone getting me? Exactly.
He's definitely done wanker. It's made at home, Chuck.
Chuck would rather have a bowl of caramel.
East Cocoa bottle. Yeah, yeah.
I think the Bodega's got kind of cocoa bottle vibes as well,
yeah. I think it's, I think it's more
of a kind of nutty thing with the second one.
I I really like that. So, so Tom, you mentioned the
price of these good. What's the price of these ones
again so? So the double Sherry wood is
about 45 lbs depending on where you buy it from.
And I think as a, as an everydayer and just an easygoing
DRAM for less than 50 for £45, it's, it's a lot of whiskey.
The bodega again, we was a limited release that we did last
August. If you can still pick it up
it'll be 5253 quid something. And and when it comes to for
again, selling it, because this is what's interesting from your
perspective is you, you're the guy that has to actually go out
and punt it. So where, where again is it
straight into retailers? Are you are you looking at bars
as well? From us a lot, a lot into
retail. We've got some real old pair
supporters. I mean from good work by myself,
but you know people, people who really bought into the brand
understand the liquid proposition in terms of how good
it is and how like fair fairly priced it is, I would say.
And like we've got original double Sherry, cash strength and
12 year old in the core range. And we've got, you know,
customers who pretty much on on order every X amount of time.
We're like, Yep, we need more original, we need more double
Sherry. We need more 12 because their
their customers want something that's that's the same and
consistent. They come in every month for
their bottle of double Sherry or, or whatever it is.
So yeah. Does it do?
Well, in Perth. Well, well, our Dunk, Dunk L
whiskey box. Yeah, there's.
Docks a lot. Which is in Perth, sure.
Yeah, and. And I was in there a couple of
weeks ago and it was, yeah, I saw a lot of old.
Perth, yeah, so and Carlmore, it'd be interesting if old Perth
were like, Nah, we like the new Perth like.
Yeah, most most of the spirits in Perth also.
And JL Gill in grief, I guess. And does this travel around the
world or is it mainly? Yeah, so there's 20.
Five different markets. Wow.
Yeah. And see from your own personal
point of view, because we've had you on the podcast before.
We've had you twice actually. There was you had a dedicated
episode and then we also had you on for the roasting of Ross Bar,
which was his, which actually. Should be every every week.
Well, let's think back. It could be arranged.
Because that was his wedding. He was over in America getting
married. And we, we all decided to get to
Diggers. There's quite a few of us and we
just slaughtered him for an hour and a half and he wasn't even
there to defend themselves. So it was, it was quite good
fun, but your own personal story because you're, you're, you're
in sales pushing whiskey, but you come from, you know, you
worked. Did you work with Chuck as well?
No. So you chat with colleagues.
Pat, that's Scotch. Yeah, don't we help their
customers to fuck? Look.
At sounds like Chuck too. Yeah, I've spent the next few
years undoing all that good work, Chuck.
Me too. No, exactly, but I mean, it's
I'm a whiskey fan at the end of the day, so I like I like
promoting whiskey in general. I like if people are drinking
more whiskey, they're drinking more of our whiskey.
Yeah, exactly, Yeah, stands to reason and like getting into
drams and and chatting, chatting to like minded people as much as
possible hosts and tastings is is one of the one of my favorite
bits of the job with you get to, you know, come along with a bag
of drams and you have people's undivided attention for couple
of hours. Yeah.
And to and to get feedback and say what you know, what do you
like and what what don't you like and and to tell the story.
And with our portfolio, it's I mean, we could do, I could do a
car more tasting, I could do an au pair tasting.
I could do a Mctella tasting. The Aberrargue one at the moment
would look like probably 2 new make spirits, 2 cat samples and
inaugural. But you can still do that sort
of thing, in fact, in time in time.
Because you, you guys, do you have a brand ambassador or is it
literally sales? Sales are part of the brand team
as well. Exactly.
Yeah, we. Don't we, don't I, I, I came
into the business as a brand ambassador and was doing a lot
of, of UK sales and we still, I still support like the, the
European festivals, like I was over in the Netherlands that
last month. I'm going to Germany in April
because we are such a small team.
It's like. Marketing in sales of one
department. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.
But still Whiskey festival in Germany.
I'm at Lindberg. Yeah, it's good fun.
I've done it. I've done it once before.
And that's proper. Like what angle are your line
arms? And that's.
Well when Giri has a crazy line arm which is was popped up that
that that came up with family. Oh yeah.
Yeah, that. Was that was one of our seven.
Can't measure the angle of it too.
Sick of going to German whiskey festivals and talking about it.
But Tammy, because it is interesting when you're when
you're talking about when you're a sales.
Now look, we, we had, I think when this goes out last week,
Tim Walker on the podcast, who you know, he, he holds the he's
the luxury account manager for William grandsons.
If you haven't listened to that episode, give it a listen.
We were very spoilt. Probably the most expensive
hangover I've had for a long time.
You paid for it, did you? No, I paid for it the next day.
But but you know, Tim, Tim was very open about it and he said
like he got into the job and he's in sales and he said I
didn't like whiskey. He got to like whiskey.
And he understands it. But there is an element of, you
know, you can work in sales and you can sell.
If you're good at sales, you can sell anything really.
You're going to get the core points and understand and no.
And sometimes even if you're selling to retailers, the person
that you're speaking to a major retailer isn't going to sit
there and go. I don't care what the mouth feel
is like. I just care if it's going to sit
on my shelves and shift and but at the same time from you know,
with the fact that car more is an independent baller.
So you're you're always looking at smaller batches.
Truck used the term artisanal as well.
So there is an element of that the artisanal element with the
distillery and also all Perth. It means that from your
perspective, being able to go and speak to a retailer, you're
speaking to people who are probably passionate about
whiskey. So being able to actually, if
you're buying could we've talked about the, the phrase people buy
for people. And I think that if, if, if
you're a whiskey person and the person who's selling you the
whiskey is able to actually speak to you about the whiskey
properly and has a background and understanding in it, then it
makes it hell of a lot easier to go, yeah, I get it.
I'll buy that and then I'll be able to pass on what you've just
said to me. Yeah.
And I mean also like kind of getting an understanding of my
customers business, it's like, OK, well what what goes well for
you, you know, because they're not going to buy something that
doesn't go well. And like, OK, we're selling
loads of, I don't know, insert brand or distillery here.
I'm like, OK, well, you might like this out of our portfolio.
I'm blessed because I've got such a wide range of of drams
that there should there should be something that will that will
work for yeah anyone retailer and we go back to relationships
as. Well, so it's basically like
working at Scotch again. No.
Somebody, somebody's saying, oh, I like this.
You say, well, why don't you try this?
Yeah, a little bit. And, and also we'll go back to
like, OK, you can support me with with doing this.
And it's, it's a relationship piece as well.
It's like, OK, I, I know, I know these people personally and, and
I try and make, make it work for everyone in terms of like you, I
want to sell as much whiskey as I can.
But if it's just going to sit there, that's not really a sale.
It's like, how do we manage the after sales?
How do we manage the push pull through?
And that's, that's a kind of wider activation piece and, and
branding piece as well. But yeah, it's yeah, I like
selling whiskey. Of course, and we've mentioned
Asti already with the Arbor argue.
But I suppose going back to that question in the sense of you'll
have accounts that are probably really, really good at just
saying give us everything that you're bringing out car more
yadda, yadda, yadda. But there'll maybe there'll be
other accounts that were a little bit OK, we'll see what
you've got. We don't know if it'll shift,
but do you have to do you have to prioritize people now that
you have a a a like a a single malt because suddenly you might
be an accountant that goes, you know what?
Maybe we won't take so much old power.
Maybe we won't What? We want their car more, a little
bit more than that. Yeah.
But suddenly it's like, give us as much abarrage as you can.
You can give us and now. You can my week well.
Yeah, yeah. So can you.
Now you can go back and say, listen guys, we've got to
prioritize for people who have been good to us in the.
Past a a little bit I would say again, it's about it's about
reach and distribution as well but I mean people who have
supported Opeth and Mctalla and car Moore from the start yeah
they'll they'll get Abargi and and we we appreciate that Also
worth saying that car Moore Opeth and Mctalla are not going
anywhere it's not like OK these these guys have allowed us to be
very patient with this and bring it out when it's ready I say
these guys these brands and we spent a lot of time and money
building them and putting really high quality drums in a bottle
there's. Well, let's say you wouldn't do
that to then just get. Rid of?
No, you're not. Going to do Mcgourne Mcfailed
it. You say that's it.
We're going to shut our doors as an independent bowl, right?
What we'll do is we'll stop there for these.
We'll finish these two drums. We'll go around and reload this
for the last two drums of the evening.
Cheers, Pam, thank you very much.
Cheers, right. I guess clap us in.
I didn't clap you in before. Welcome back to the whiskey
stories. Baller blinded a star Marcy to
Sellers ending as Lee. That was even better the first
time. No, I'm glad you did that.
I was waiting for you to mess up to make a mess of.
That, Well, no. But what I do have to say is I
do have to. I want to put on public record
an apology. I've been contacted from a
representative of Gordon Macphail.
Want to just clarify they have not closed their doors.
I say that I. Was.
I'd had a DRAM or two. I was wrong in what I said.
What actually has happened is that, I mean the stock that
those guys have will continue for long into the future.
We'll probably out see the two of us I guess.
Almost certainly and. Here's hoping they do because
they're a cracking bunch of labs and ladies.
Thanks. That's it.
There we go. So that's it.
Don't say, don't say. We never retract.
But what I was saying before I forgot to hit the record button,
there was Mctalla. I'm excited for this.
The room does smell a little bit smokier I guess.
It does. There's a nice rugged Isla smell
to the room. There's a.
Few in the air, you can say that, but but actually Tam, you
brought in sample bottle on the episode that you came in and it
was a Mctalla phase release. And I can remember just being
like, oh, God, Because at that point I wasn't pretending to
like, I wasn't pretending to like, peated whiskey.
You're pretending to dislike. It, well, I wasn't pretending.
I just didn't like it. Actively disliked.
I've spoken about it plenty of times before and you know
actually, well and I'm not just saying this to blow peated smoke
up your backside, but that's good.
Yeah, I did actually enjoy it. Now whatever happens and Ross
may listen to this and he'll just sit there and no matter
what happens now, anytime I'll taste beated whiskey and I enjoy
it, Ross will go, Nah, you're pretending, you're pretending
because I'm so averse to it. But I'm excited for this.
So we again, I think what we're going to do with these two drums
is we're going to do them side by side like we did with the old
Perth. So talk us through the 1st drum
that was poured, which I believe is probably the less and the the
clearer one, the the the less, yeah.
Yeah, there's a big colour difference between these two.
Probably the two easiest to tell apart of, of the evening.
It's, it's funny you say about, about peat whiskey in general.
Like for me, it's, it's not simply peat or unpeted.
It's, it's a real scale. Like it's, it's not, it's, or
it's not just peated whiskey. It's, it's a scale of lots of
different factors. And that's, it's like, you know,
saying you don't like the whole category of, of wine or beer or
whatever. So Mctalla is all about a
journey of, of flavour across Isla.
We mentioned Morrison connection to, to Isla with, with Bulwar
distillery. Now we're no longer tied to 1
distillery or one style. So we are looking to showcase
variety, showcase diversity and hopefully between this two DRAM
tastes. And you can see what Mctalla is
all about the the lighter colour one is Mctalla Mara.
So Mctalla means echo. So it's the Morrison family.
EEE shocking. Terrible.
We weren't recording. So with our core range, and I'll
go back to core range because I think it's really important of
being able to produce something as an independent bottler.
We buy new make spirit from various Isla distilleries.
We mature it ourselves. Each Mctalla is an Isla single
malt, various different styles and and flavour profiles across
the range. So Mctalla, Mara, Mara, be in
the sea. This is at cash strength, so
take care. My guess it's 58.2%.
And for me, it's like really salty, really citrusy, doesn't
drink like 58.2. Yeah, like just like bright kind
of salt. The caramel vibes for me, very,
very typical from Isla, I guess, however you categorize that,
whether it's 11 style or the other.
But yeah, full bourbon cash maturation, believe it or not, I
guess across the range, if you couldn't tell, we don't chill,
filter or add colour to anything that we do.
So this is full bourbon, cash maturation, nice and salty, nice
and citrusy, and of course a little bit of smoke in there as
well. Yeah.
So everything from Mctalla comes from Isla then.
Exactly. I'll always be an Isla single
malt, an Isla single malt and pitted as well.
Because one of the things like you've just said is, I mean,
I've mentioned it plenty of times that the, the opening was,
it was the hard beg when we went to, in fact, Vicky, Vicky, you
were there, Vicky Elliott, you were there that day for the
Whiskey fringe. And we were, we got early
access. You were, you were hanging
because you'd be at whiskey privacy this Sunday and Vicky
was holding the camera for us. But we, we got there and, and
basically the first the, the we got there early doors.
I was at half ten. We had a coffee, we did a bit of
chat and then we got in and the first access that we were given
was our begged area. So it was like 11 Sunday.
Yeah, 11. O'clock on a Sunday morning and
the first 3 drams that we were going to be drinking.
Graham was scared that Whiskey Fringe was about to be ruined
for him. Yeah, I genuinely was.
But when it was broken down and it was just like what you said,
damn. It's like there is a scale of
peat that you can have and there's softer, gentler peat.
There's there's, there's heavier smoky, there's the TC.
Everyone always goes to Isla. And then for people, what I
would used to say is just smells like iodine or TCP.
But actually what we do know is that now if I'm opening up,
there's bonfire smoke, Smokey bacon, there's loads and loads
of different. Because I mean, people ask me
because I would say, you know, Russell wax lyrical about my
pizzas. Oh wait, he's not here to go.
But I don't actually like pea and whiskey, so I always ask
Angus. I know.
Yeah, exactly. But I would say I I.
When it's almost like it's in the room, it's almost.
Like, but I would say I placed myself somewhere in the middle
and I kind of prefer like medium pizzas.
I don't like the kind of optimores, the kind of really,
really strongly beated. I'm a lot turns me off a little
bit, but equally I like a little bit of something there but.
I'd almost argue that ultimately is less pity than like the frog,
yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think that's supposed to be cuts, but like, yeah, I am.
I am on the same view. Like the frog I've described as
like, sibling bullying. Yeah, like.
Like, and I have to admit as well, the frog.
Always comes with my dad. But if you're the bully.
Lefrog isn't. Lefrog isn't a choice making
again that that heated that TCP. Isn't very much like, like very
Tokyo drift and burning hospital vibes.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. God, I'll do these side by side,
so we might as well introduce a second drive as well.
Absolutely and moving on. I'm from sibling bullying and
burning hospital. We've all.
Got our cherished memories. So, so this is I brought these
two drams. It could have been a various
different Mccalla's I guess this is full bourbon cash maturation.
This, as the name suggests, Mccalla PX.
This is our 2026 limited edition.
So we'll do an annual release that kind of showcases a
different style of of Isla whiskey.
This is full Pedro Jimenez Sherry maturation, combination
of butts and hogs heads and probably a little more gentle on
the on the smoke, to be honest. Definitely.
And Sherry. Sherry and smoke.
Or Sherry and Pete and whiskey. Or Isla whiskey.
For me, it's just a combination. Yeah.
Made in heavens. Yeah, I see.
It's interesting because I would go the other way and my oh,
preference, I mean it's. You prefer the bourbon and.
Bourbon. And smoke for me, that sweet and
smoke element, like I'd beg 10 for example, because I would
disagree with you, because I I would go, I would always go with
the fight, fight, fight, fight. Because for me, I've mentioned
on the pod Kahomensen egg was a big gateway DRAM me that Pete,
that Sherry altogether fantastic.
But this is slightly more dialed down on.
The software What's AB on the PX52?
It's still cast. Well, it's still over 50.
Yeah, absolutely. But The thing is like this as a
2 DRAM, these are very, very individual styles of Violet
whiskey. They're very different.
And this is much more of that coastal.
The PX is, is a little bit of that kind of softer, softer
smoke. And with the Sherry integration.
And again, we buy these as new make spirit and we take them
from full kind of lifespan into into bottle, which we do on site
as well. So it's about how we create
flavour through different vintages together, different
cast types, different, you know, all sorts of different things
that we do to create metallic, to make it make it.
A lot of these bottlings, vattings of younger spirit and
older spirit to find like the right point.
Yeah. I mean a little bit that's why
we kind of do non age statement mostly because we allows us that
flexibility to put in older stock, a little bit younger
stock to to kind of get that get that balancing act.
And when it comes to it, so this is the thing we we kind of put
me in my place when I was asking you about the old Perth, about
giving him more information. Yeah.
We've spoken to Mike Brown from Ian MacLeod is Stiller to
Smokehead, you know, one of the brands that he works with,
Smokehead brand. What's great is after a few
drums and once the camera's off, he always tells us where
Smokehead comes from. Once we've applied the
thumbscrew, no. No, just for clarity, he doesn't
but but in terms of does it make it less complex that like when
it comes from as new make spirit.
Yeah, and you're doing what you're doing to it yourselves.
It means that there can't be people that can distinguish it
makes it hard to distinguish, you know, very few people.
There's how many how many distilleries are on Iowa and I
what we're talking 12 distilleries on Iowa.
So it it there definitely will be people who could identify it
potentially, but there. But you then have to be dealing
with people who are so familiar with spirit style that we'd be
able to drill all the way down to whether or how old this is.
We don't know. But at the same time, you know,
once it's been sold to you guys as Spirit, put in your own wood
management program, then batted as truck saying with older stock
to then be put out and occasionally with.
And Peter and Peter spirit from the same place, yeah.
So it would be almost. Hard, you know, like some, some
Halo distilleries spirit is inconsistent.
Yeah. So like there's that.
So yeah, I mean, and also that would also rely on me telling
them where it's from after the guest, correct?
Which I won't do. No, but I I think I just think
it's interesting when you're looking at don't guess.
Yeah, no, but it's just when you talk about the old Perth and you
look at how many distilleries are in space site.
Yeah, you can't. You would if anyone was able to
narrow, especially in a blind. Impossible.
Yeah, I'll put it out there. That's impossible, right.
But then there will be people who will drink Metalla and there
will be people that drink Smokehead that will try really,
really hard and will be convinced, but they are
absolutely certain where that spirit is coming from.
Yeah, but at the same time, when you actually break it all the
way down and you go, you think yourself even an island, there
only been 12 distilleries. It shouldn't actually be that
difficult. But it just goes to show that
with spirit character added into another brands wood management
program and that would almost make it semi impossible as well.
Or the type of people. Yeah, I mean, we're not trying
to make it impossible in terms of like, OK, like that's not a
it's not necessarily a guessing game.
It's it's we want it to taste how we want it to taste.
We want it to be Isla single mole.
It'll always be Metalla will always be Isla single mole.
It'll be a journey of flavour across, across in terms of of
makeup and in terms of what what's in the glass, like even
from A2 DRAM taste. And you can kind of be like, OK,
these are quite clearly very different drams.
It's not just the same one done in different ways, very
different ways or different vintages or etcetera.
And then sometimes it'll be, you know, people keep keeping people
guessing as well with like, oh, this is doesn't taste anything
like it. It is.
But for me, it's a perception thing, right?
So if I tell you this is I don't know, inserts tell you this is
Port Ellen, then you have a. Or lagging Bay.
Whatever the two distilleries is definitely not.
You have a you have a perception of what it should taste like.
And also when you own a distillery like boom or you have
an obligation to say this has to taste like a boom.
Yeah, this is what people expect.
But we have not not that obligation to say this has to
taste a certain way because it has this on the label.
So it gives us a bit of flexibility to say we want to
make really good either single malt whiskey done in a variety
of ways. Because that's probably quite
freeing as well, like taking the spirit from XYZ distillery and
then just maybe more blending it and maturing it for a flavour
profile rather than to. Stay spirit character.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. But I'd say that's quite, again,
it's quite freeing because you're not selling this
distillery or that disorder, you're selling Isla.
This is Isla, absolutely. And this is what it's, you know.
So like for for we also do a phase aisle or a face release
every year, was that? A rum cast when?
You brought in, was it? We had a rum cast.
Yeah. So it was.
It was 10 years in bourbon and then five years in first fill
rum. Yeah.
Or four years, 11 months and two weeks.
And that was a beauty. And then we said Amaroni last
year, which read Italian red wine.
And the last two years that we've done Isla Whiskey
Festival, we go over like call it work because.
What do you do for that because you don't have a base?
Exactly. So we in terms of activation
last year we did, we lent into Italy to Isla with Amaroni.
So we did. Pizza matched with drams, so we
did 6 slices, 6 drams, like just just a really, really, really
fun taste. And we also did a a walking
tour. So we want to celebrate the
landscape of Isla Mara being the sea, we have Terra strata and
flora. So we want to celebrate the the
landscape of Isla. We don't have a distillery base,
so we want to. So we did a walking tour.
So we had one of the guys, Dougie, who's a local, he's a
walking tour guide and we went all around the island and, and
had a drama and, you know, on the beach in the, in the woods
and like really, really fun thing to do.
Like really interactive, like not just a distillery tour like.
You celebrate, you say it's a fun thing to do, but I, when I
went to Isla, I, I, no, I went to, I went, I went to, I went,
I, I took the current wife, the then fiance to a cast strength
Lagavulin tasting at 10 AM and then in the and then after that
I drove up and we went for a walk on the cliffs.
I wouldn't recommend it, no. Yeah, it was.
Well, it's funny. Because you also, I also
couldn't see beyond my arms because of the fog.
Again, I know, I know. It's funny because we did it two
years in a row. The first year was like
tropical, like I was wearing shorts, T-shirt, like it was
about 20°. It was gorgeous.
The second year we did it, we were on like ferry watch to see
if we were going to make it to Isla in the 1st place really.
And the morning of the The Walking tour, it was sideways
rain like, and I was like, no one's going to turn up for this.
Full house, completely full house ponchos on like.
And it was, it was just as good. Like people were like this feels
authentic. And yeah, I look, it was great.
I've always like felt because like with Angus and myself, you
know, when we started drinking whiskey and started talking
about whiskey, I can remember it was actually, I can remember an
afternoon of us going to Diggers and it was one of the first
times we'd actually ever gone to diggers.
And it was like I was purely like Sherry, as heavily Sherry
as you could possibly get, space side sort of in the 40% region
and you were drinking. It was Cohoman and you gave me a
chance. In fact, I remember somebody
actually coming over. I was good.
I could smell that DRAM from here.
And I could remember this and I'd.
Just be like no I. Can't you buy you buy me dramas?
I was going, that's incredible, really, really nice.
And I'd buy you a drama. You go.
And I always felt a lot and then I could see like you saw brands
like Mctalla or Smokehead coming up and you see this when
someone's into peated whiskey and Smokey whiskey, there is
this like. Fanatical element.
There really is this. Is like Iowa's world worldwide
famous. Yeah, and then you're watching
what's the Parks and Recreation and what's.
His name? What are Ron?
Swanson, Ron Swanson and the lag of and you suddenly and you see
all these people that are absolutely obsessed with Smokey
whiskey. And I genuinely always felt like
on the outside looking in being like, what's the big deal?
I don't get it. And then starting to understand
it a little bit more than getting into it.
And I really do enjoy it. But it's, it's, it's funny
hearing or interesting here. What you're saying is the fact
that I always picture people having like you see the ARD Beg
fans and they have the ARD Beg embassies.
You've got a massive collection of ARD Beg, haven't you?
I mean, how many ARD beg bottles have you got that you're willing
to share with the audience? How many you've got?
7070 bottles of ARD Beg. Yeah, see, that's insane.
So you get that element, then there's that's.
Because you love our big style, right?
Like the spirit character? Yeah.
And that's so I've always looked at it from that perspective that
when I so when you get a brand like Mctalla that go, we don't
say what we are. Yeah.
But when you hear yourself talking about the code, we're
actually just here to celebrate whiskey from the island.
And so it is there some releases that are hits and some releases
that aren't as big a hit or is it always a hit across the
board? I mean, the variety in releases
is really, really broad. Like this is actually the second
PX that we've done. We did one for Phase 2023, I
think totally different DRAM to this.
But again, it's, it's, it's about having that variety.
We did virginal last year, which was on the softer side.
I guess the Super heavily peated stuff does better because that's
what is expected, I guess for my ma.
But that's we're not just here to do what is what is expected.
We're here to celebrate. Everything.
Diversity and variety and you
say everything we've not, not everything that we've done is
peated like we've done one or two unpeated.
Releases. Oh, interesting.
Yeah, yeah. And what have you got planned
this year from Phase? Our release.
No, but I mean what are you doing?
What are you doing in terms of are you doing any events on the
Ireland? Pizzas available.
Well, it's, it's funny because like with with Abaragi and I say
that we're, we're a pretty small team.
We'll be at the Independent Whiskey Festival on Isla, and we
might sprinkle in a couple of other things, but over the last
four years we've done Isla big, really, really big.
Like full team over events, tastings, the lot.
Luckily, with Aberragi kind of coming alive, this has taken up
a lot of our time. And not to say that Mctalla is
not, it's not a big part of that, but it's just time
management if. You need anyone to go over,
We're free. Yeah, OK.
We're we're happy to help. How are your references?
Yeah, we're good, but we do OK. No, no, we'll be we'll be on
Isla for assurance in some capacity.
It's just yeah, it's it's a big year for for Morris and
distillers with Aberrargi and yeah, the the drum for for face
this year. Keep an eye out for it's a It's
a beauty. And in terms of from from an
audience point of view, then what?
Because we've got 2 very sort of completely different drums here,
1 heavily peated bourbon. What are we thinking?
Which one do we like better, the first one or second one?
What we've got? PX is gorgeous.
PX gorgeous. Yeah.
Anyone else want to challenge that or everyone in agreement?
The. One that's not PX.
It's got that lovely smoked mackerel.
Yeah, absolutely. My grand question do all Iowa
whiskies get their malt from Ireland?
So because there's Island peaks and there's mainland peak which
are quite different. Yeah, they're Pete or they're
Malt. Sorry, the.
Malted barley, is it all for the peak?
For the malted barley are they all getting from Port Charlotte,
which I presume is all the peak? I mean there's Port Charlotte
Maltings is it get all its peak from the island?
Port Island. Port Island I would.
I would, I would. I don't know the answer but I
would argue like financially it would make more sense to not
ship it off the island to get smoked rather than do on.
I think because I said Port Ellen only services a few of the
distilleries on the island and then you.
Have, but I know, I know, Simpsons do different
specifications for. The earlier whiskey gave us from
Simpsons, now Simpsons, yeah. But my understanding is that it
means that they have is all mainland peat.
They also do peat at like multiple different
specifications. All right, So what they'll do is
sell, so they'll they'll, I'd imagine.
Because they do a lot of stuff internationally as well.
Yeah. So they'll if peat at malt is
needed in Australia or sorry, they won't.
Get the peat from. Australia.
No. No.
No peat it. Here and then ship it to because
what? I'm saying, is that the peat
from Ila? Very specific, very different.
Peat from the Yeah, from the North Harbor, yeah.
Your base composition is going to be completely different.
So I think that, I think I mean, so basically, I don't know if
anyone here knows. I was actually in India
recently. Yeah.
I knew.
You weren't worried. What?
Were you doing over there? Why were you in India?
Like I just took it to. You like an hour and a half of
a. I know, but I know you've done
very well. I went, I went to find myself.
But what did you find? But what I would say is Paul
John, for example, Paul John import Scottish P from the
Scotland Scottish Highlands to India to give to their mobsters
in Rajasthan. And that's where they, so I'd
imagine, and maybe there's people in the room who know a
little bit more about this than I do, But I what I do know is
that Port Ellen malting service some of the distilleries that
are on the island and then other malt barley, malted barley comes
onto the island. But I'd imagine that the peat
comes from Isla. And like what Chuck was saying,
like someone like Simpsons would be able to actually malt to
specific. I mean, they'll malt to
specifications for most people. They'll say if they've got big
contracts with big distillers. For everyone, yeah.
For everyone, certainly. From our point of view, yes.
Yeah. So they'll say to our argue,
what do you, what is the multi, what do you want to go to that
specification. So I'd imagine that there'll be
a process where Pete is actually moved from and that'll be
stockpiled. It won't just be a, you know.
That'll be, I guess. That was my question.
They can do the specifications. For the PPM yeah yeah but the
Pete that they'll whether. The Pete actually, clearly,
actually Pete. Yeah, I would, I would argue
maybe with if they're doing industrial drying on that scale,
it might be Pete provided by customer and by the.
Fraser Market and Fraser as soon as has a point to make here.
Hang on. Just to try and ask the question
here. So I was at a.
Couple years ago. So grew a lot of their barley.
I think if you just start off I think you'll find.
I think you'll find. I'd like you to so so.
Brick Laddie grew a lot of the room.
Barley but don't have the the place to be in the room
mountains. So they send it over up to the
north of Aberdeen, right? So it's used in Aberdeenshire
peat. So grown an Isle of Barley, put
mature, both peated with Aberdeenshire peat and then
brought that to Ireland. So it's not one set way for each
distillery. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, they've got a malted
facility, not 100% malted. But I suppose I help, I suppose
it helps with the fact that there can be so many different
flavour profiles coming from the peated side of it.
Like when we did that, when it was the guy Mungo, his name was,
and he showed us the paediotic table that beg.
And it really did. And they're talking about how
they can break down the phenols of every like the flavour
profile of every single phenol that comes out as a phenol being
an element of the smoke. The smoke sits on the husk of
the, of the, of the grain of barley when it's peated.
And then that get when it's when it turns into flower and what
have you, that's where you get, But at the same time, you can
suddenly go from this, we can get the smoky bacon phenol and
the salty phenol. And that is what goes in there.
And if you're only getting your peat from one source, that would
probably with 12 different distilleries, that might
actually make it a little bit tricky.
That's a good question. I mean, I think what we can
safely say is it's all distilled on Isla, but everything else is
1. You know, one size doesn't fit
off. And I actually think taking it
back from my personal my opinion, I much prefer the PX
DRAM. Not much prefer I actually
slightly prefer the PX DRAM, but that tasting though of that
smoky mackerel. I'm that's exactly what I'm
getting from that first time. It's like it's like it's like
smoke mackerel with macro party on an oat cake.
Yeah, if we're to take it to the wanky level.
No, no, To finish off the wankiness, can you tell us where
you are when you're eating the oat cake?
Just. In the bath with some tea lights
because it's smoky. There you go.
Brilliant. Tea lights smoky.
How is your relationship with your siblings at this point?
Well, with Alex. I would say with the with the
Mara, like it's easy to say something that's cash strength
and it's booze forwards. Yeah, I would say that this is.
No different. Pretty well integrated with
alcohol working with spirit working with wood type to have a
bit of pepperiness like you know you're drinking it but it's not
not just a slap in the face with with ABV could.
You pass on somewhere. Yeah.
Because does that, does that affect you then Sam, when again,
when you're, because look, we, we're often we've, we've had a
lot of discussion on the podcast over the last few weeks about
consumerism and who is ultimately right when it comes
to whiskey. And you know, ultimately
there'll be people in the room that will say, we should have it
at 46% non chill, filtered, no colour, all this kind of stuff.
But then you, you're, you've got a foot in two camps, haven't
you? Because you're ultimately
you're, you're somebody who is very, very keen and passionate
about whiskey from your background and stuff like that.
But at the same time, you're also somebody that knows what,
what will sell, where the market goes.
So ultimately, you know, we know that slapping an age on things
can sometimes sell things a little bit easier.
We know that giving more information about certain caste
structures and caste types can make it easier.
But how does it balance for yourself then?
I mean, strength is a, you're never going to please everyone
with strength, like ever. For me, if the strength is
thought out, that's one thing. And if it's and if it feels
correct, if it's caste strength, like we've got kind of batch
strength here with the PX and with the Bodega and we've got
kind of bottling strength for the double Sherry wood in the
abargie. And these feel very much thought
out like they've been putting a bottle at that strength
deliberately. And some people want everything
at cash strength. I understand that as well
because. There's always an argument, you
know, with cast strength. You can always take it down and
you'll get some people. But you will you will absolutely
change the risk sale when you bring.
It If you're selling something at 43 percent, it's like, well,
you're just charging me for water, you know?
Oh yeah. And I and I get that as well.
And but sometimes you just won't whiskey in a glass.
And it's that it's that balancing act of OK, let's let's
have something at cast strength versus let's have something that
we've felt like it was an appropriate bottling strength.
But you will never please everyone with strength.
Ever. And I suppose like, you've got
the range, like you, you. You'll never please everyone
with smoky whiskey. You'll never please their own
single cast whiskey. Yeah.
But then what? You'll never please everyone
blind the whiskey out of the lineup tonight.
You know, when you look at the brands that you have in front of
you when you've got the car more the Aberrargate, the Old Perv
and the Metalla is there one? And I suppose Aberrargate has
maybe got a wee asterisk beside it because it's so new and it's
exciting just now. But is there one of the brands
that you see selling more in the market than than others?
We've had great success with Mctalla specifically because
we've we've grown a really nice following of people that
understand it and people that can appreciate that we take it
from spirit to to bottling. We do it all on site and that we
have done a lot of various different stuff with it and with
various different celebrations of, of Isla.
Again, we've got 4 products in the core range, which are all
very different. Like if the well this could be a
Mctalla tasting quite easy where we go through the four core
range and our 2026 limited edition, everyone would have a
different favorite DRAM. And so that's, that's we're
doing something correct with Mctalla in my, in my opinion and
we've seen it growing across. Does it do well?
Yeah. I was going to say, does it do
well in particular markets? Yeah, I mean France has, France
has done really well with with Mctalla.
Germany again really, really good growing in the UK as well.
But yes, it's about kind of getting the message out.
And you mentioned our big embassies earlier.
We've got a lighthouse programme where people can go and do a bit
of a discovery of, of Metalla where, you know, it's not a paid
for partnership, It's not here's lots, lots of money.
It's like we're working with these people where they are
passionate about Metalla. We are passionate about Metalla
so people can go and discover it there.
Yeah. So I mean, really.
I mean, we'll go through the room then.
I mean, it's quite interesting what it might do is we'll go.
I'll tell you what we'll do. Let's try this first old pair
for Mctalla. What what do we see on that one?
If you're a picker, A picker favorite of the bra of the drums
that we've had before, we go through our favorite drum.
If you're a picket down old Perth Mctallas are our favorite
for for for show me how show hands for old pair.
Just enjoyable and just idea brand everything, everything
mixed into one, everything mixed into one for tonight, for
tonight as well. So we'll start old Perth, just
say. Just say liquid.
I think that makes sense. Right, You enjoy the old Perth,
Right. OK.
And then the Metalla then from that fry.
OK. So yeah, OK, good.
And in terms of in terms of people who drink peated whiskey,
is there a few people in the room who enjoy a smoky DRAM
then? So yeah.
Yeah, quite a few people there. Right.
Well, we'll go through from Statford.
I'll ask Chuck first. Chuck, what's your favorite of
the night? What's the old Perth?
The basically the double sharing, that's the favorite.
OK, very good. Angus will be yourself.
I'm going to go, I'm going to stick with type and say I
really, I really like the PX metallic.
I really like the. PX I'm going to say from my
point of view, I've actually really enjoyed the Mara, which
is going to really piss Ross off, but there.
So let's say a show of hands for the car more the the Linkwoods,
let's say show of hands for that favorite further.
OK, very good. Good, strong start there for the
first one and and then the Aberlarge on the single malt.
OK, we've got 3-4. Yeah, OK, that's fine.
Right. Then we've got the old perf,
which was the double cherry, double cherry, double cherry,
old Perth double Cherry and then the Bodega.
Enjoying that one, the Mara, Mctalla Mara.
Yeah, good. And then the last one, the
Mctalla PX, going for a second vote there.
Yeah, that's fine. Everyone's making up as we're
going on. I feel in a way, like Pete and
Sherry Berman and Sherry, there's only one way to find out
what's best. Let's just fight.
I think, I mean, to be honest, we've had, we've had quite a
few, we've done these indie bottler spots, We've done a
distillery spotlight. We've never done the Blinder
bottler and the stellar Spotlight event, and I think it
really does show you, like Tom said, he said it two or three
times. We could be doing a tasting for
almost every single. Individual brand, and in a way
it's that it's probably the hardest tasting to pick a
favorite because everything's so different.
I would. I would totally agree with that.
That's what I was. Going to say, you know that when
there's a category, yeah, when we've had other independent
bottlers and it's like right, here's 6 independent bottled
ABCDEFG. Whereas this is like, right?
Well, this is a single cask whiskey.
This is AG7 by the way, G7. We do actually have a
malpetition in the room. Sometimes, sometimes we do get 7
drafts. Only watch 6.
Drafts. I like what you're saying, I
guess, but I suppose it's it's very good for a brand, I suppose
time to have that scale. It must be, you know, to be able
to get so many like there's there hasn't been a single drama
in the room that no one's had their hand up for.
There's been some drams in the room that most people have had
their hand up for. And there's been drams that have
been voted for along the way as well.
So it's it just shows you. The well, yeah, there has been
the drama. Just Chuck it as that.
But I mean, but I would say Chuck's hands were probably 10
people's hands in this room, you know?
I. Mean, yeah.
I needed that. Lucky, lucky with with the
portfolio and with the the diversity of liquids across the
range like favorite, least favorite or you know, G's
favorite. It really like it's it that
comes down to personal style of what whiskey you like, but I
think. Hopefully everyone can agree
that each each drama is is thought out and and of of a high
quality. It's it's but the across the
board, we've got a little bit of everything.
Absolutely. Well, look, let's show an.
Appreciation for time for coming along.
Absolutely. Thank you very much.
Let's hear of our diggers leaf as well.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much.
You lesson in the whiskey stories.
Blame my border disteller. Morrison Distillers, Thank