Wm. Grant & Sons to buy Tullamore Dew Brand.

[John]

Just saw the story that Grants (Scotch Whiskey producers) are planning a takeover of C&C Spirit and Liqueur business, inclunding the Tullamore Dew range. Seemingly they have big plans for the site and brand which they believe will be positioned as one of their core global brands.
J.

[JohnM]

This, hopefully, will be very good for Irish whiskey. I suppose they wouldn't be moving in on Irish whiskey if they didn't see growth. Might be good for all the distillers here....

[jcskinner]

I’m always worried when Irish whiskey brands end up in Scottish hands, due to historical precedent in that regard.
I hope Grant are to be trusted when they say that they intend to promote the brand globally.
Tullamore is already one of Ireland’s top whiskey brands, and the recent expansion of the range was very well received.
I hope Grant choose to build on recent successes.

[IainB]

If this happens, and I'd say it's a big if, the most interesting question is probably what type of whiskey they'll make - as we know most expressions of Tullamore Dew have a component of PPS - will they attempt to do this or will they go down the single malt route, a la the 10yo Malt Tullamore Dew. It would seem to me a Scottish distiller would have more experience in double distilled malt.

If that was the case at least we would probably be able to get a single malt from yet another Irish distillery.

If they want to recreate everything that goes into Tullamore dew they'd have to produce PPS, Malt and Grain. Now that would be interesting.

That said, I'll believe it when I see it.

[Whiskey Pilgrim]

Kaixo Chico´s,
The Irish Whiskey sector is the most dynamic sector of the Whisk(e)y Industry,and W Grants would be "Tontos" eejits in the venacular not to exploit and develop Tullamore an excellent Brand abroad.If they go ahead with a new distillery on the Aul Emerald Oil it can only be a good thing for Irish whiskey.They have been trying Fodo Fodo to get into the lucrative and Brand loyal Irish US market with "The Knot" to questionable success.

However my experience here in Spain is that when the likes of Pernoid Recard,Diageo or now Grants have an Irish Stallion in its stables they tend only to focus on the "Anglo-Celt" cultures of USA,Australia etc & the U.K. (apart from Jameson in France)and in traditional Scots markets like Spain etc continue to push their scots products.

Which is very frustrating for yours truly flogging his "spirit" to sell Irish...................

would´nt it be grand to see also a Redbrest Distillery or even a Greenspot ,,,giving these Classic´s a heritage of their own outside of Middleton.now all we need is for some astute global distributer to buy Cooleys and the Irish sector will be a force to be reconed with..

The Scots sector apart from recent "Pure" Malt Cardhu&Glenfiddich scandals has been further damaged by the Japonese winning the Single Malt awards and a Taiwan whiskey winning a highbrow Scots blind tasting sessiun...
so lads & lassie´s keep the faith,
Slainte !!

[DavidH]

Oh, The Knot! Well remembered.. I didn't put that and Willam Grant together. Why didn't they just open a Knot distillery here instead of buying another brand?

I never tried The Knot (never saw it in Ireland) but I do like the name and the marketing so I hope they make a whiskey out of it eventually.

[IrishWhiskeyChaser]

Tullamore Dew is a huge European brand especially in Germany so I would imagine they would concentrate on current markets as well as trying to exploit the markets that they are already in with other Grants lines.

I think this is great news and will add a new dynamic to the industry. In my opinion it is no different from Bushmills being owned by Diageo or IDL by Pernod. Imagine if Dingle gets off the ground and Tullamore reopend and with Kilbeggan running we'll have a grand total of 6 distilleries ... now we're talking

By the way the Knot was not a whiskey but a whiskey based shot drink marketed only in the US and sold at 40%

[JohnM]

Deal closed now and a new distillery not ruled out.

Irish Times Article

[TheWhiskeyBro]

News from a couple of weeks back... William Grant concentrate non-Scottish spirits brand marketing in Dublin.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/bre ... ing23.html

[TheWhiskeyBro]

Company on a mission, William Grants divest themselves of all C&C's old brands for €129m (Irish Mist,Carolans,Frangelico) except Tullamore Dew.

If my maths are correct, this means that acquiring Tullamore Dew and facilities in Clonmel and elsewhere cost €171m.

http://www.foodbev.com/news/campari-acq ... ant-brands

Not an unusual development in the spirits industry, however it shows the speed and sense of purpose that Grants are moving, again great news for TD as it shows that Grants are going to concentrate all their resources on this single brand.

Grants don't forget are no. 3 in production of spirits or whisky? after Diageo & Pernod.

[IainB]

What I didn't realise until yesterday was that Grant's have built a new super distillery like Diageo's Roseisle to make malt for their blends. I think it's called Aisla Bay or something like that.

Not relevant to Tullamore dew except that it shows they're not shy about building new distilleries when the percieve an opportunity. It would be very interesting to see what they might make in such a distillery - if they are to maintain TD's current taste profile they'd have to make PPS. This might be a more challanging prospect then we assume - after all their expertise is in Malt. I know the basics are the same but I'd imagine getting the whiskey right involves more that just adding some unmalted barley to the process. I wonder will they buy in expertise.

I've also heard it suggested that the talk of building a distillery may be a strategy to get the best deal from IDL in supplying PPS and Grain - something along the lines of "you know we can do it but we're happy to buy from you if the price is right".

[TheWhiskeyBro]

Interesting angle Iain, perhaps they will do their own malt and grain and get PPS from IDL purely for blending purposes...

Whatever happens it will be interesting to see what their approach will be, like any brand I imagine the core blend Tullamore Dew nas will form the bulk of their sales and they probably couldn't tinker with that too much. Similarly the existing range although newly established provides an excellent portfolio to build upon.
I imagine whatever change we see will be slow and part of long term strategy (as is the nature of the business)

Current Range

Tullamore Dew Irish Whiskey nas
Tullamore Dew Heritage Irish Whiskey
Tullamore Dew 10 YO Single Malt Irish Whiskey
Tullamore Dew 10 YO Reserve Irish Whiskey
Tullamore Dew Finest Old Irish Whiskey 12YO aka Tullamore Dew 12 YO Special Reserve Irish Whiskey
Tullamore Dew Black

[DavidH]

I checked my own crystal ball. I predict a reworking of the current TD lineup in the short term. It's a mess.

Long term, W Grant will make its own grain and malt whiskey and TD NAS will have no PPS content. I think this because

• even if they were to make their own PPS the taste would be different so there is no question of recreating the current TD.
• the current TD is hardly "authentic" and so doesn't need to be preserved (if W Grant is smart, they will put their distillery in Tullamore and reclaim authenticity).
• the TD market is not sensitive to taste and is probably mixing the stuff anyway so W Grant will stick to its knitting and make malt
• they can piggy back on the perceived status of "single malt" for premium Tullamore Dew bottlings.

[JohnM]

I wonder what the arrangement with IDL is. I think IDL blend the Tullamore Dew. Does Tullamore have their own stocks in IDL warehouses? If so,it could keep them going while they do their own thing. Or they could retreat into the malt and malt blends while Grant's make their own stuff. Or things could continue as they are until Grant's make their own stuff - that's making a big assumption that they are actually going to build a distillery.

[IainB]

I think it would be very smart to build a distillery in Tullamore. It's probably not going to happen though. What I've heard, but couldn't say from where, is that if there was a distillery it would probably be in cork.

[IainB]

By the way their newest distillery in Scotland is Ailsa Bay, not Aisla Bay and is on the same site as the Girvan grain distillery.

[JohnM]

It's another lowland distillery too. There's a few cropping up. Maybe it's their plan to focus some more on neglected whisky regions.

[TheWhiskeyBro]

Initial focus on brand consolidation and market expansion it seems, distillery plans on the long finger...

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/fin ... 74159.html

[JohnM]

That they've not ruled it out is a good sign, I think. Outside Clonmel is a lovely place for a distillery.

It would be probably very expensive, but a Dublin distillery would be great, since Dublin distilleries were viewed as the pinnacle of world whisk(e)y production at one stage.

[IainB]

Maybe they could put a distillery on a ship and sail back and forth - make Irish whiskey 2 days a week, and Scotch the other 5.