Whisky Riot Looming

Hobart, Tasmania – May 8, 2014 –  “Kyle Witek is our new hero,” grins Hobart’s Greg Ramsay, co-owner and CEO of the New Zealand Whisky Collection, which is enduring legal threats in a real David vs. Goliath legal stoush.

One of the world’s distilling giants, William Grant & Sons is continuing to threaten the Oamaru-based company about the Dunedin DoubleWood breaching trademarks of their Balvenie DoubleWood. 

“My lawyers and I see absolutely no risk at all for confusion,” Greg explains, businessman best known for developing Barnbougle Dunes Golf Links. “Our bottle has a map of New Zealand on it, prominently says ‘New Zealand Whisky Collection’ and has a black box. It could not possibly be confused with Balvenie which has a white box, white label, and to my knowledge doesn’t refer to New Zealand at all.”

Based in Illinois, and an ardent admirer of William Grant’s brands such as Glenfiddich, Kyle Witek has emailed the whisky behemoth directly, threatening to boycott their products until they withdraw their legal action.  

“When Kyle’s email came through, it aroused some enthusiasm among our staff and supporters to go global with a social media campaign by email, Facebook and twitter as Kyle has done; but I have a great affection for WilliamGrant & Sons, so hope they come to their senses on this. We really don’t want to see an online campaign against William Grants as the whisky industry globally revolves around a lot of their brands.”  

“Anyone and everyone I’ve talked to about their legal threat thinks it’s laughable and legally weak, but sadly we have to take it very seriously and I am still hoping we can resolve this amicably, because they’re a great company and Balvenie DoubleWood is actually a rather nice dram, and they’re the kind of company that might want to invest in New Zealand whisky one day.”

American KYLE WITEK’s email to William Grant & Sons:

“As a purveyor of many of your brands, including Glenfiddich, Balvenie and Milagro, I must express my disappointment upon learning of your recent threat of legal action against New Zealand Whisky Company regarding their Dunedin Doublewood. As a scotch enthusiast I can assure you that I am not confused in the slightest by the New Zealand label and I find your decision to pursue this matter most unbecoming and entirely inappropriate. I shall curtail any further purchases of your products and hope that you quickly come to your senses over this frivolous behavior.”

Greg Ramsay met with several William Grant & Son’s representatives in the UK last year. “We’ve not heard anything on this for months, and thought that the issue had gone away,” Greg said. “But we received another legal threat last month, which I’ll now have to respond too; meaning money is spent on lawyers rather than our fantastic loyal supporters. But what I find particularly galling, is that DoubleWood whisky has been coming out of Oamaru for nearly 10 years, and they only registered their trademark very recently; very soon after our Dunedin DoubleWood won a Silver Medal at the San Francisco Spirits Awards.

Background:

The New Zealand Whisky Company is a success story that signals a revival of the whisky industry in New Zealand. The whisky was once distilled by Seagram’s in Dunedin before the distillery was sold to Fosters in 1997 as part of a global rationalisation.

Fosters mothballed the distillery and inexplicably closed it. But fortunately, more than 400 barrels of this whisky remained, and were bought by the New Zealand Whisky Company, set aside to mature and sweeten. Since then, the company has worked hard to revive the century-old industry and the whisky has been met with wide acclaim.

In London last year, the New Zealand Whisky Collection’s DoubleWood won the category for Best Australasian Blend, while the South Island Single Malt was voted the best aged Single Malt from Down Under.

The Company has also just been awarded ‘liquid gold status’ by the man believed to have visited more distilleries than anyone on earth. Jim Murray has recently released his 2014 Whisky Bible, placing the South Island Single Malt 21 y.o. in the top percentile of some 4,500 whiskies worldwide, the first time a NZ whisky has reached such status.

As well as regaining the foothold once held across New Zealand by Wilsons, the whisky is now exported from Oamaru and available across Canada, the UK, Australia and Europe