When someone reminds me each year that we only have minutes to go until Christmas – I am a bit like a deer in headlights – a little startled! But I’m mostly dumbfounded that another year has rolled by in the blink of an eye. So many questions emerge… have we achieved what we wanted to this year? What else could we have done? Who do I owe a drink to for all the work and seemingly unrecognised support they have given us this year?

2023 at the distillery has been a fun year. The team are all fantastic and cheerful. They get on and are good at their jobs, making it a lovely place to arrive each day. The distillers have had one of the busiest years ever, with our largest output ever achieved in a year and a growing contract storage business for other companies’ casks – they have not had much spare time on their hands. We have said goodbye to Stuart, who has decided to try a career in farming, and we wish him well. To try and speed some jobs up, we have invested in a very hi-tech new labelling machine, which should result in straighter labels and more bottles filled per day, which in turn should free up a  bit of time for the most important task of looking after the maturing whisky casks.

I am delighted to see 2023 exports continue to thrive, especially in Belgium, the Czech Republic and Singapore, which have shown significant growth this year. My usual reminder to you all reading – if you have a favourite booze shop or restaurant/hotel that doesn’t stock our whisky, let me know, and we will do our best to get it into stock – no matter where you live. Many thanks to all our distributors, wholesalers, exporters and the teams that work for them for continuing to look after us so well; it is noticed and appreciated.

The distillery has taken on the wonderful Becky to fill our event spaces. These have been a bit of an unintentional secret for many years as we simply didn’t have anyone to shout about them. Becky has arrived all guns blazing and has already shown what is possible – so if you need somewhere for a meeting, conference, event, etc, we are now ready for you.

The events are made even better by the re-opening of the distillery restaurant. The building has been taken on by Lucy and Grant, who formerly ran the Kings Arms at Haugley, a very smart and wonderful award-winning pub in Suffolk. They are a very welcome addition to the distillery site and one you should find time to come and sample – the food is amazing.

We also have a new website, and a reinvigorated distillery shop, which I am told makes online shopping easier. The website, newsletters and all things online have hugely improved this year, and I hope you are now getting lots of newsletters that are more interesting and useful to you than before and a few more discount codes (this makes me scowl, but apparently it makes you all happy, so will continue whilst my scowl becomes even more locked in place)

I think 2024 may be a difficult time for all businesses, and indeed, in the distilling world, the belief is it may be a tricky year, with reports in from fellow distillers of reductions in distilling and cutbacks in staffing – it feels as though the industry is hunkering down for a bit. I am refusing to moan, though, as I am reminded how lovely our life is compared to the poor souls in Ukraine, Israel, Gaza & Yemen and lots of other places not as wonderfully secure as our green and lovely island.

My political bit for the year – the chancellor needs to leave alcohol duty alone! Did you know that today, on a bottle of our Original single malt, which retails at £47.50, the chancellor takes £17.44 in tax? I think that’s quite enough…

On a personal note, thank you to my lovely wife Katy for being there, working twice as hard as I did, and then coming home to work another few hours looking after our two children. The kids have entertained us all year and seem to love school, but back to my initial point, it is Sofie’s 10^th Birthday next week. How is that another year gone rushing by?

Merry Christmas to you all, and thank you for continuing to support us. If you can, make time to come and try out the Grain Kitchen in 2024.

Yours Sincerely,

Andrew Nelstrop

Chairman