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Haig, December 1967
Kane McKenzie Haig founded a distillery in the early 1720s in the Kennetpans in Clackmannan, Clackmannanshire, which became Scotland’s largest distillery by 1733. It has been called the world’s first commercial distillery. John Haig & Co. was subsequently merged into the Distillers Company Limited (DCL) in 1877.
Wishing you a Happy Christmas from the Team at Whisky Intelligence
Who else is heading for a half century celebration in 2033? That’s the year The Scotch Malt Whisky Society turns 50 and we’re already getting organised. What about you?
If 2033 is going to be a landmark year for you as well – maybe with a big birthday, a wedding anniversary or a group or society celebration of your own – then you could mark the occasion with your very own personal bottling of a whisky from The Scotch Malt Whisky Society, by signing up to be part of our exclusive 50th Anniversary Cask Club programme.
The idea is simple – sign up now to share in the experience of selecting a cask of new-make spirit from one of two prestigious Scottish whisky distilleries. You can monitor the cask’s maturation over the next 10 years, and then in 2033, on the Society’s 50th anniversary, you’ll be able to bottle your own whisky with a specially customised label and share the delights of your 10-year-old dram.
The 50th Anniversary Cask Club experience starts from £4,000, depending on what cask type you choose. The up-front price covers the contents of the cask, as well as storage and insurance for the next 10 years. Additional costs such as the bottling fee, duty, and VAT will be payable at the time of bottling.
Don’t miss out – we have a limited number of casks available and they are being snapped up quickly. Grab your chance to own a part of The Scotch Malt Whisky Society’s story over the next 10 years, with a once-in-a-lifetime bottling to share as part of your celebrations in 2033!
Visit the website now to discover everything you need to know about the 50th Anniversary Cask Club.
NOTICE TO EU & INTERNATIONAL MEMBERS
Online ordering is only available for UK Members. If you would like a front row seat for our next decade and live outside UK, please visit the website via the link below to find out more. You can then contact our DRAM-cierge team if you have any questions or are ready to place an order.
Email DRAM-Cierge: dram-cierge@smws.com
The Scotch Malt Whisky Society, The Vaults, 87 Giles Street, Leith EH6 6BZ
Contact: sales@smws.com or call 0131 555 2929 (Mon-Fri 9am-4.45pm). Visit the Society at here for membership information
This is your chance to join and to take advantage of their great offers!
Spot the SMWS bottles in this amusing You Tube video
Whisky Auctioneer Live Auction
December 2023 Auction // 21.12.23 – 08.01.24
A warm welcome to our final auction of 2023, featuring over 9,500 rare whiskies and fine spirits. This month’s auction includes a vast number of exceptionally rare bottles, from early 1960s & 1970s Strathisla, to a selection of the iconic Highland Distillers ‘dumpy’ bottles, and of course a number of legendary Samaroli releases.
Falkirk Distillery Inaugural release: This month Whisky Auctioneer is delighted to partner with Falkirk Distillery to offer bottles 2-101 of their inaugural release at auction. Bid on the bottles here and read our interview with distillery founder, George Stewart.
🎄🎁 Whisky Auctioneer Festive Campaign: To celebrate the festive season and the 10th anniversary of Whisky Auctioneer, we are giving away five special bottles, inspired by five special people at Whisky Auctioneer. Keep an eye on our newsletters and social media over the next two weeks for further details.
Browse our live auction.
Official 60s, 70s, 80s Strathisla- Discover an exception collection of 130+ Strathisla
Glen Garioch Whisky- Rare Glen Garioch Highlights
Falkirk Distillery Inaugural release
Whisky Auctioneer is delighted this month to partner with Falkirk distillery to auction bottles 2-101 of their inaugural whisky release. Falkirk is a Lowland whisky distillery producing a classic Lowland style spirit using Scottish malted barley. Production began in 2020, with the inaugural release limited to just 640 bottles.
Highland Distillers 1970s Dumpies
Samaroli & Moon Import – Dreams
Whisky Auctioneer Festive Giveaway 🎁🎄
To celebrate the festive season and the 10th anniversary of Whisky Auctioneer, we are hosting a festive giveaway! Over the next two weeks we will be giving away five special bottles, inspired by five special people at Whisky Auctioneer. Please keep an eye on our upcoming newsletters and social media for further details.
Vintage Dewar’s White Label Scotch Whisky Advert
Dewar’s rose to prominence in the United States when Andrew Carnegie requested a small keg of Dewar’s Scotch whisky be sent to the White House for President James Garfield’s inauguration. Carnegie also sent the same gift to President Benjamin Harrison on his inauguration eight years later.
Mark’s Whisky Ramblings 512: Paul John Christmas Edition 2023
Mark Dermul, Belgian whiskyblogger, wishes you a Merry X-mas. Just like last year, he had the honor and pleasure of discussing this Christmas Edition of Paul John live on Instagram with none other than their Global Brand Ambassador. Nice, right? For this new – their sixth already and this time completely unpeated – Christmas Edition they have used two types of casks: Ex-Bourbon for maturation and then a Single Vintage Colheita Tawny Port cask for the finish. FYI: Colheita is a port wine made from single-vintage grapes aged in barrels for at least 7 years.
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 10th 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
