I have been talking to you for some time about our plans for the next live broadcast. Well I am extremely excited to announce that we have finally confirmed everything and this year’s broadcast will be live from the Maker’s Mark distillery in Kentucky, USA.

For those of you who know a lot about Laphroaig you will know that we mature our whisky in Maker’s Mark barrels so it is a fitting collaboration I think – plus it’s a bit sunnier there than here on Islay so it should be a lovely setting!

We will be holding the event on Friday 25th September 2009 at 20:00 (EST – Kentucky time!).  For anyone in Europe this will actually be on Saturday 26th September due to the time difference. For those of you who want to work out the time in their country then you can use this site: http://www.timeanddate.com/. As the broadcast is from the US the timing of the broadcast isn’t ideal for our European FOLs but we have made the broadcast on a Friday so hopefully those of you who don’t have work on Saturday will still be able to log into watch the show.

The broadcast will last around 40 minutes and will include a live question and answer session where you will be invited to put your questions to the panel. This will include Kevin Smith- master blender for Maker’s Mark, John Hansell – author of the famous Malt Advocate and of course myself. We will also have Simon Brooking, our US Ambassador on hand to answer any questions.

Those of you who have watched our last two broadcasts will know that we very much concentrated on tasting our range. This year as we are the guests of Maker’s Mark we wanted to do something a little different. We will of course be discussing what makes the Maker’s barrels so special for us at Laphroaig (and of course tasting some of the fine spirit) but we will also be trying a few food dishes that go well with Laphroaig and Maker’s Mark and also trying our hand at some cocktails! If any of you have any suggestions on dishes or cocktails please email them into me at info@laphroaig.com with the subject line: Distillery Live Recipes and any that we decide to make will win a special prize.

Pass this email onto your friends
As you know we always ask our ‘friends’ to help us spread the word about Laphroaig. This live tasting would be the perfect way to introduce all your friends to our unique single malt so please pass it on – unlike normal whisky tastings the web can accommodate everyone!

I’ll be writing to you again in the next couple of weeks with all the confirmed details including the website address but I just wanted to get the date and time firmly in your diaries.

I look forward to ‘seeing’ you on 25th…or the 26th for some of you!

Slàinte,

John Campbell
Distillery Manager

P.S For anyone who hasn’t noticed I am now on Twitter. I’ll be updating my Twitter page with details of the event as well as the FOL page. http://www.twitter.com/laphroaigwhisky