A few our our magical team.
Welcome to my annual Christmas ramblings for 2020.
Normally, contrary to belief, the Christmas letter comes fairly easily with a little light heartedness and a few pertinent stories from the year gone by; but this year is rather different isn’t it. Covid & Brexit – Brexit and Covid…..hard to make these subjects light hearted.
To be honest I should be consumed by both but both have gone on for so long – I find myself becoming immune to the daily updates by both our Government and the daily rags. More than a few of my friends get themselves very worked up on a regular basis about one or the other – or both, and like to apportion blame on our PM. I can’t quite bring myself to do this as I am not sure I could do any better and more importantly probably, I can’t think of anyone else who would do the job more to my liking.
The first useful part of my letter must concentrate on my staff at the distillery. Way back in March I took a very fast decision to shut the distillery bistro, this was a horrible decision to make having spent 3 years getting The Kitchen to a point where we had a wonderful team and were actually profitable, with hindsight it was a sensible call but we still miss those we had to let go. I did think the closure might see my waistline diminish but it seems my fridge at home provides adequate calories to ensure no such miracle has occurred.
As a result of the bistro closing, Lee moved the distillery reception and shop back to the old distillery building and I am delighted at how well it has worked. A doorbell to enter has ensured every visitor has their hands washed in high strength whisky and is donning a suitable mask. No one has moaned about this and it has made the distillery a very safe place to be.
Luckily for us we had commissioned a whole new website before 2020 Armageddon and as a result we were in a good place to move to online bookings for tours and the automating of engraved bottles etc. This has been a godsend – especially as you all have been very kind and have ordered plenty of engraved bottles – Thank you.
Quite amazingly, after 15 years of trying to export to China successfully, this is the year it happened – thank goodness. I am slightly concerned that exports generally have been better than expected, as it seems that me not turning up in a country has a positive effect… I have a feeling that when life returns to normal, my sales trips will be curtailed drastically so as not to ruin the good work of the team.
Production has continued as normal but with a new face on the distilling floor. Steve has retired, having worked for me for nearly twenty years and therefore it is a well-earned retirement – we wish him well. His replacement Chris has come from Greene King and has been thrown in at the deep end but seems to be coping just fine under the watchful eye of David.
The end of the year therefore sees us a leaner and hopefully fitter business with a great team all working their socks off to ensure our survival and for that I am grateful. I am also very grateful to you our customers as without you we simply would not exist. I want to wish each and every one of you a peaceful Christmas regardless of where you are and who you are with; if your loved ones can’t be with you – pick up the phone and call them preferably more than once.
Finally to finish on an exciting note. We have leased out The Kitchen building and the new operator has some wonderful plans, so we look forward to welcoming you back in 2021 for tours, whisky and lovely meals – all hopefully shared in the company of friends.
Merry Christmas
Andrew Nelsrop – MD.
We just wanted to send you a quick…
MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!
I could harp on about how tough a year it has been, etc, etc., but we all know that already.
What I would like to say is that we have missed seeing everyone this year, in person. And that we have been truly touched by your messages of support and your patience and understanding throughout.
Our hope is that we can get together once more, when vaccines, or herd immunity, or whatever allows, and that 2021 treats us all a lot better than the 2020 model.
So, in summary, please do take care of you and yours, and we hope you enjoy the festive season and hopefully a well-earned break!
Much love.
Eddie
Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 358: Ledaig 26 Year Old 1993 Casqueteers
Mark Dermul, Belgian whisky blogger, tries a peaty malt from Mull. Casqueteers is a brotherhood of whisky lovers that purchase a cask every now and then in which you can buy a part. They recently bottled a single cask Ledaig from 1993, giving it the wonderful age of 26 years. Cask #243 was laid down on 5th March 1993 and bottled on the 10th September 2010.
Springbank Society Newsletter
December 2020
It’s that time of year again where “All I want for Christmas is… Whisky”
Well we can all agree that 2020 has been one to remember. We would like to take this opportunity to thank all of our Society members for your continued support, even through a global pandemic. Hopefully 2021 will let us see some of you in person again.
This month we have an update on upcoming releases, information on the greatly anticipated next society bottling and a round-up of distillery news, letting you know what has been happening in Campbeltown over the last few months.
Distillery News
In early September we finished with the last filling at Springbank and, after a couple of weeks of preparation, moved up to Glengyle and began producing Kilkerran in its various guises. The move up to Glengyle always signals the end of summer and the start of autumn for us, and we have been fortunate that the processes and procedures we have put in place to keep our staff safe from the spread of COVID have worked well and all our operations have proceeded as normally as can be expected in the current environment. We will continue to produce up at Glengyle until the 18th of December, which marks the final day of the working year before our Christmas holiday.
One of the biggest developments in the last 3 months has been the commissioning of our new warehouse, as after receiving clearance from the local council and approval from HMRC we were able to get the first quarter of the new warehouse racked and the first casks stowed – hooray! This new warehouse will be called ‘Warehouse 8’ as it sits between Warehouses 7, 9 and what was warehouse 10 (now dispatch) – very creative, eh? With a capacity of near 7,000 casks, it will help us to continue with our increased production output, as well as bringing more casks on site for Cadenhead’s.
Our maltings have continued to run constantly since we returned, helping to supply malt for Glengyle as well as giving us a head start at Springbank when we return in January. The bottling operations have been incredibly busy since we returned, with products being bottled and shipped to try to ‘catch up’ with the 4 months of lockdown we missed and to get new products out to our customers around the world.
Sales Team Events
Due to the ongoing Covid-19 outbreak, all sales team events have been suspended. We will follow government guidelines and hope to be back on the road visiting as many of you as possible soon. In the meantime we are planning an exciting online Society tasting event which will be held in early 2021. Look out for details being announced in January.
Please remember, the Events Section of the Springbank Website is updated whenever we have new information to share with you all.
Springbank Website – Events Page
Although the sales team have been grounded in Campbeltown we hope that you enjoyed our trip to the online world with our virtual malts festival, we know we did. Our sales team continues to look for when they can do the next tasting (I think they are missing being out on the road) so keep your eyes peeled for any upcoming events.
If there is anything you would like to see from us in the meantime please get in touch.
Springbank sales team coming to your screens soon…that might be more of a Christmas nightmare than a miracle.
New Distillery Releases
We made the most of our last few months of the year and released some cracking whiskies, the Springbank 17yo Madeira and the first ever Kilkerran 16yo being two of our highlights.
You will be pleased to hear we have some more exciting releases lined up for 2021.
February/ March 2021
Springbank 10yo Local Barley
Later than the regular Local Barley release date, our next edition has been bottled and will be dispatched across the world in the New Year.
Springbank 25yo
The casks for our next Springbank 25yo release have been selected and will be bottled in early 2021.
Longrow Red 10yo Refill Malbec
Our next expression of Longrow Red is also due to be released in early 2021. It has spent its final three years in refill Malbec barriques from the De Toren Private Cellar in Stellenbosch, South Africa.
Kilkerran 8yo Cask Strength
We are sure our Kilkerran fans will be excited to know that the next Kilkerran 8yo has been fully matured in Oloroso casks. Some of you may have had the chance to try it during our Kilkerran online tasting. This will also be available in early 2021.
Next Society Bottling
Yes, the next greatly anticipated society bottling has been chosen, vatted and scheduled for bottling. We can reveal that it is a Springbank 8yo fully matured in fresh oloroso hogsheads, bottled at cask strength.
We plan to release it on the Society Portal in early 2021. We will send an email closer to the time with details of this and our planned online tasting. Please ensure that you can log in to your account prior to the release date: https://experience.springbank.scot/.
Christmas Closure
The distilleries and our office will be closed from Friday 18th December until Monday 4th January. We look forward to catching up with you all in 2021.
Slàinte Mhath!
The Springbank Team
TO JOIN THE SOCIETY CONTACT THEM AT society@springbank.scot
