Bells
Caol Ila is an exception though. Most distilleries are stubborn individuals. ‘If we seriously wanted to change Mortlach could we do it?’ she asks. ‘No, you’d get a corrupted spirit. We always have to keep within the parameters of what the distillery character is’.
It’s a polite way of responding to criticisms that the bigger the firm the more likely it is that all their whiskies will taste the same. Ask Turnbull the same question and he visibly twitches. ‘People think if you’re big you don’t care about quality and all the whisky is the same,’ he says. ‘In reality, our size has allowed us to do the opposite. We’re more aware than anybody that we need the character of the 27 distilleries to come through. The Walker, Bell’s or J&B character is paramount. We won’t kill the goose that laid the golden egg’.
But there’s no doubt that the in-depth research done by UDV into new make character, distillery character and wood ageing has made the bean counters in head office question the logic of one firm having 27 malt distilleries and two grain plants (and a 50...
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