Whisky is by its very nature a forward-looking industry. Spirit distilled today will slumber for years into the future before seeing the light of day. In the meantime, distilleries and their parent companies need to crystal ball a host of variables in an attempt to judge the shape and size of the market in the future. What will the whisky drinker of 10 or even 20 years look like? How much stock needs to be laid down in order to meet current demands, whilst also ensuring a sustainable future? Far from easy questions to answer. This year’s London Whisky show, the 10th such exhibition, attempted to shed some light on not only what the mainstream industry might look like, but also where some leftfield innovations might take us.
Small Swedish independent bottler Svensk Whiskeyförmedling is located in Örebro about 200 miles west of Stockholm. Founded around 2012 by a group of whisky enthusiasts, the company provides brokerage services, whisky tasting events, and a growing range of special releases of Scotch whisky produced under several different house brands. Their Chairman’s Private Reserve line originated in 2013 with a bottling of 1985 27 year old Longmorn for their friends and family, but, fast-forward to 2017 and there’s been 18 further releases covering a wide and interesting range of distilleries.
Door number 4 of the 2018 Boutique-y Advent Calendar delivers the first of several sojourns into grain whisky - Invergordon 25 year old Batch 9. An older batch, and seemingly sold out (so some of you might have an 18 year old blended whisky in your calendar as a replacement) – but, grain fans should fear not - since 2012 Boutique-y have bottled up 12 batches (varying in age from 10 all the way up to 44 years of age) from this distillery – I’m certain another one won’t be far away.
Day 8, and a quarter of the way through the highly enjoyable Boutique-y Whisky Company Advent calendar. When you get up to your fifteen batch of a single malt whisky you should probably rest easy that what you’re producing is ticking a few boxes for at least a few people. It’s therefore no surprise to see another Boutique-y Invergordon within the 2017 advent calendar. In fact, thinking back, this label is possibly one of the very first that I can remember seeing back in 2012. 15 iterations later…