Dingle Distillery...

[JohnM]

A "Founding Fathers" scheme to raise funds.

http://www.dinglefoundingfathers.com/

[IrishWhiskeyChaser]

I wonder if the Cask prices includes Duty & Vat, bottle and labelling costs. If not they are very expensive. If it does include at the minimum Duty & Vat then fair enough.

[IrishWhiskeyChaser]

Been reading a bit of their prospectus and the costs do not include Duty & Vat.

Therefore costs after the 5 year term to include Duty, Vat & Bottling could cost anywhere between 11&12 grand so worth bearing in mind before you leap in.


I think if you bottle at cask strength you can expect to get around 280bottles from a 200L cask which seems good. And an estimate price of under €45 per bottles. If bottling at 40% at estimate of close to 400 bottles at a cost of just under €33 each.


Their first whiskey will be relased in 2015 hopefully all going well.

Dingle Whale tail 40% 3yo Single malt Irish Whiskey (100% bourbon Barrel) First release 2015

Dingle Green 40% 4yo Single malt Irish Whiskey First release 2016

Dingle Gold 40% 5yo Single malt Irish Whiskey First release 2017

Whether these stay at those age statements is unclear but it will take them a while to build up reserves to go with older whiskey so the ages may not be set in stone and may not even be on the bottle.

[Fionnán]

Are they exclusively doing single malt now or are they looking at SPS too? When i first started hearing about them they were saying they wanted to make traditional style irish pot still whiskey and i took that for SPS off the bat but maybe they've changed their minds or were just unaware of the ambiguity in that phrase

[TheWhiskeyBro]

What does John know

Perhaps he might answer some of peoples questions, but already sounds promising

http://www.johncmcdougall.com/forum/topic.html?id=106

[IrishWhiskeyChaser]

Latest from Dingle Distillery

[Fionnán]

brilliant! interesting still shape and glad to see so much progress coming out of dingle after the long pause

[DingleSpirit]

In regard to the cost of a cask of the Dingle Founding Fathers it should be pointed out that this is a strictly limited edition comprising the first 500 casks distilled. In other words, it starts off rare and will, in the nature of things, get rarer. Sure, there are cheaper casks out there and many of them contain very good stuff but they don't carry the bragging rights you get with one these 500. Incidentally, the stills are en route from Glasgow and will arrive in Dingle next Wednesday. There is much excitement!

[Fionnán]

glad to hear it! Are they all malt casks at this stage or are there any plans for an SPS run?

[IrishWhiskeyChaser]

In regard to the cost of a cask of the Dingle Founding Fathers it should be pointed out that this is a strictly limited edition comprising the first 500 casks distilled. In other words, it starts off rare and will, in the nature of things, get rarer. Sure, there are cheaper casks out there and many of them contain very good stuff but they don't carry the bragging rights you get with one these 500. Incidentally, the stills are en route from Glasgow and will arrive in Dingle next Wednesday. There is much excitement!

I'm not trying to be argumentative or negative as what Dingle is doing is great and we are all delighted.

Bragging rights may be one thing to have but and it's a big but ...

... these casks don't really offer any value at all as an investment which has been mentioned all over the prospectus as a selling point and as far as I can see they are pretty much premium RRP prices so there is no insentive for people to buy a cask as they could easily wait until it comes onto the market and just buy a bottle or 2. Further the price is for basically a fully matured 10yo single cask whiskey. Yet Dingle is asking people to take a punt on a unproven distillery and whiskey. I have no doubt that it will be the finest quality whiskey but I have no idea as to whether it will be to my liking especially what it is only going to be a 5yo and that could be a very costly mistake and is what everybody needs to think of. I think the prospectus it totally over playing the electability of Irish Whiskey and a bit disingenuous using Scotch Single Malt whisky as an example.

Further rarity does not necessarily equate to increased value. And a run of 500 casks is not exactly a very limited edition. That could equate to over 125000 bottles. A prime example of that was the Millennium Bushmills which at 25yo and released 12 years ago still does not command a decent premium. These were considered some wonderful whiskey yet because they are all privately owned they sell for well under what they would normally retail at.

I think maybe they should have offered the first 50 at the premium price and then the next 450 at half that which would still be a premium over the majority of what is or was available. As currently it will cost close to €12,000 to purchase one of these casks include duty and vat which is very high for a 5yo whiskey

[DavidH]

When the IWS participated in buying a cask it charged members €60 for each bottle. If there were a conservative 200 bottles in the cask that comes out at €12,000 for the cask. Your estimate, IWC, of €10,000 sounds like good value compared to this.

Another detail that Oliver Hughes told me at Whisky Live is that the distillery will buy the cask back from you at any time at the price you paid for it plus 4% per annum. (I hope I recall that percentage right; check with the distillery before making an investment.)

There is also genuine rarity value here. Where else can you get your own cask of Irish whiskey, to be filled this year?

I always make a general point regarding whiskey prices that there is no moral obligation to sell whiskey at an "affordable" price. It's a luxury item. If you charge €1,000 a bottle and sell them all then you charged the right price. If the casks sell at the price they are offered, it's the right price. If €5,000 was small change to me, I'd buy one

[DingleSpirit]

Good points, DavidH. And of course the first 500 casks will be the first 500 casks. Not the same as the second or third 500 casks and so forth. The rarity is therefore guaranteed. It's not for everyone, of course. And that, in a sense, is the whole point....

[John]

Hi DingleSpirit,
I must have missed your introduction? Do you have a connection to the distillery, in fairness you seem to have the inside track!
Cheers,
John.

[JohnM]

I'd like to buy a cask. Are they selling fast? I just have to raise a few bob first.

Is it possible to buy shares in the distillery?

[DingleSpirit]

Apologies, John! We should have introduced ourselves. DingleSpirit is the username of the Dingle Whiskey Distillery so we do... er... have a bit of inside knowledge alright! Many thanks for the expression of interest, JohnM. The casks are certainly selling well. At present it's not possible to buy shares in the distillery.

[IrishWhiskeyChaser]

Firstly I don't want to get into a knocking match on Dingle Distillery as I think it is wonderful to see and I am delighted by the news that it is going ahead and a wonderful thing for the Irish Whiskey sector. And if they sell all these it will be great for the company but in comparison to any other project they are frightfully expensive, which is disappointing and I honestly don't think they are a great investment. So I thought it was my duty to let people know it is not a guaranteed gilt edged investment. Certainly a great buy if your a whiskey enthusiast of which I would happily go along with but not an investment.

When the IWS participated in buying a cask it charged members €60 for each bottle. If there were a conservative 200 bottles in the cask that comes out at €12,000 for the cask. Your estimate, IWC, of €10,000 sounds like good value compared to this.

It actually will be closer to €12,000-13,000.

The casks we got for IWS were around the ten grand mark too (all in) and we did not get any deal as we pretty much paid a current retail price on the age of the whiskey. So I was trying to make the point they were selling theirs for more money but for a whiskey half the age. Further the 5 year mark (4-6year even) for whiskey is a funny time and can be quite unhinged/unbalanced so it is another risk element.

Another detail that Oliver Hughes told me at Whisky Live is that the distillery will buy the cask back from you at any time at the price you paid for it plus 4% per annum. (I hope I recall that percentage right; check with the distillery before making an investment.)

That is correct, I think the buy back scheme is probably the best option of making any money on these. But I'm not 100% sure on the figures and how they work. It says a total of 21.7% gross after 5 years which equates to your 4% odd. Does Gross mean you have to pay other charges/taxes on that to get a net profit, It is not clear? Further I hate seeing quotes like "The Scheme therefore offers investors a virtually risk free return of 4% p.a. That to me means there is some risk. There are plenty of banks offering similar returns on similar money so is it worth talking a RISK for the same money. So there is no real logical enticement to invest. People just need to know exactly what they are getting into.

There is also genuine rarity value here. Where else can you get your own cask of Irish whiskey, to be filled this year?

As I said rarity and increasing value do not go hand in hand and also remember there will possibly be 2 more boutique distilleries on the go within 12-24months too (Belfast and Derry). So we could have a multitude of "RARE" whiskey sloshing around the place which nobody wants to buy. So how much rare Irish whiskey are we going to have on a very small Irish Whiskey collectors Market will determine the value and not because someone says it's rare. Please see my reference to the rare and sublime Bushmills 25yo Millennium casks. I don't know of any other Bushmills 25yo out there which makes it very rare but it still does not sell for a decent premium on the collectors market and consistently sells for less that the Bushmills 21yo which is a travesty but solely down to being too much of it out there in private hands. So you could have your whiskey after 5years and still be sitting on it after 10 further years wondering what to do with it if you don't have a predetermined route to sell it. Which by the way technically & legally you can't do privately for a profit. So your AER of 4% could suddenly be down to well under 1%. People really need to understand the market and what they are getting into.

I always make a general point regarding whiskey prices that there is no moral obligation to sell whiskey at an "affordable" price. It's a luxury item. If you charge €1,000 a bottle and sell them all then you charged the right price. If the casks sell at the price they are offered, it's the right price. If €5,000 was small change to me, I'd buy one

I would definitely buy one too if I had the money and might still even do a share in one but my gripe is that this is being sold as an invest-able and to me it is not and I would only be buying it as a wonderful opportunity to buy a new whiskey. I'm trying to highlight to the normal Joe soap not to be woo'ed by the wonderful but misleading examples in the prospectus of Black Bowmore's, 1919 Springbanks and old Macallans being sold at auction as examples of investment potential of whisky. The Irish Whiskey Market is far behind the Scotch Single Malt market in terms of collectable and investment potential. And remember there are 500 "RARE" casks ... so a lot of whiskey ... no matter how rare the opportunity is. And I think that is the nub of this ... it's the opportunity that is rare and not the whiskey.

So to sum up this is probably a good investment if you are in the trade and have an outlet to sell it on. Further if you are a whiskey enthusiast and want a cask of whiskey yes it is an okay buy say over buying 280bottles(cask stength) or 400 bottles @ 40% at retail but not really an investment. However if you are a regular Joe Soap I don't think it is an Investment of any merit as your choices to sell on are very limited and what are you going to do with 280 odd bottles of RARE whiskey. As once the hype of the initial releases come out the market will fall flat and I'd put my cask of Dingle Whiskey on that

And that is my whole point these are being sold as investments and I don't think they are. There are my arguements against and people can take from them what they like with an open mind.

However I do wish to stress that I am not trying to be negative against the project and wish the Dingle Distillery the very best in their endeavours and every success and hopefully I will have a small part in it.

So all I'm saying is Caveat Emptor

And a big Welcome to DingleSpirit it is great to have you on board to give your side and we do appreciate it.

[DavidH]

Apologies, John! We should have introduced ourselves. DingleSpirit is the username of the Dingle Whiskey Distillery so we do... er... have a bit of inside knowledge alright! Many thanks for the expression of interest, JohnM. The casks are certainly selling well. At present it's not possible to buy shares in the distillery.

Welcome to the forum, DingleSpirit! There is no greater concentration of Irish whiskey enthusiasts anywhere else on the internet (or offline, since we meet every month too) so do stick around and join in the conversation.

[JohnM]

The reason I'd buy is because I'd like, in some way, to be part of something special like this. I just have to go about raising some money!

[DingleSpirit]

Thank you all for those kind words! And there's no harm in a caveat emptor in that there's nothing certain in life beyond death and taxes. We would hope that the vast majority of Dingle Founding Fathers will invest for reasons other than mere financial gain. This is, essentially, a very personal thing and a way of sharing in the birth of what we hope will be a truly exciting addition to the wonderful world of Irish whiskey.

[DingleSpirit]

A quick update: our stills have arrived from Forysth's in Scotland this afternoon. Much excitement! Follow us on Twitter for regular updates (and a pic of the stills, encased in a great deal of bubble-wrap, on the back of the truck!) This is the start of something small (i.e. an artisan distillery) and quite big (a new independent Irish-owned producer). Whoopee! Twitter: @DingleSpirit

[Pudge72]

A quick update: our stills have arrived from Forysth's in Scotland this afternoon. Much excitement! Follow us on Twitter for regular updates (and a pic of the stills, encased in a great deal of bubble-wrap, on the back of the truck!) This is the start of something small (i.e. an artisan distillery) and quite big (a new independent Irish-owned producer). Whoopee! Twitter: @DingleSpirit

Congratulations on the new addition, and best of luck!

[Raven]

Has stilling actually commenced in Dingle yet ??? I thought September was the start date and
had been looking out for a press/TV item but perhaps I missed out.

Best of luck to the new venture and that it produces a quality Whiskey !!
I agree on earlier comments about the prospectus ---- too much about future Auction values
and comparisons being drawn with well established top marques and this before any product
is made !! A bit like watching a foal being born and expecting prices for a 'Camelot' thoroughbred
straight away !!!

[DavidH]

Has stilling actually commenced in Dingle yet ???

Here's a photo of the whiskey stills today:
http://twitter.com/DingleSpirit/status/ ... to/1/large

Still some plumbing to be done there, obviously. Distilling is pushed back to December.

Gin distillation, on the other hand, should start this weekend.

[IrishWhiskeyChaser]

Was in the distillery at the weekend. Located in what used to be a saw mill up to 10 years ago. It is a fairly inconspicuous industrial looking shed except the sight of the 19th century mill wheel on the back side. It is actually situated in a very scenic site on the bank of the river on the way out of dingle towards Milltown (Ballyferriter etc). The stills are in place and the stainless steel wash backs are also there and looks close to being ready to rock and roll. Estimates are for mid November first useable runs.

They also have a small pot still for pot still gin and possibly vodka. They hope to have the Gin on sale pre Christmas. And if anybody has been to that part of Kerry in the summer will know of the fushia hedge rows and the fuchsia flower is one of the botanicals they will be using in the gin. Got to sample a drop and must say I enjoyed it. Not as dry as other this I've tasted and a sweetness that was unusual but pleasing.

Will post up a few pics in the distillery sub forum when I get a chance.

[IrishWhiskeyChaser]

Not sure if anybody is interested but Dingle are due to distil on Thursday.

If anybody is in the vicinity I'm sure ye could pop in.

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