Port of Leith Distillery – Ian Stirling | Edinburgh Business Stories Ep29

Ian Stirling, the Founder and Co-CEO of Muckle Brig Ltd, is featuring in this week’s episode of Edinburgh Business Stories alongside Alex and Alan.

Ian established Muckle Brig, a Scottish spirits and wine producer, in 2014. The company has three significant brands, namely The Leith Distillery, Lind & Lime Gin, and The Leith export company.

During the episode, Ian shares stories about how he came up with the idea for the company, the inspiration behind some of Muckle Brig’s brands, and the workings of the drinks industry.

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Ian thank you so much for joining us today my pleasure great to here so just tell us about your business what is it certainly so uh well I’m co-o of a company called Muckle brick um we are a spirits and wine uh producer distributor and I guess experience company uh to

Some extent um and the experien bit is is getting bigger and bigger um so we have uh three sort of key Brands um uh the port of leaf Distillery which is uh we believe the world’s tallest Distillery uh now located um in edinburgh’s historic distilling District

Of leth um right next to the Royal yot brania um so that’s a 40 m tall vert vertical uh single malt whiskey Distillery then we have Linden lime which is our gin um organic premium Scottish gin uh again made in leth at the Linden lime Distillery on Coburg

Street um and then we have the Le export company uh which began as our online shop and uh sort of distribution uh mechanism if you like but now has its own proprietary Brands as well and something that we’re seeking to grow in due course so that that’s the the Holy

Trinity of Muckle Brig um as it stands today yeah amazing and it’s been such a journey I know a little bit about it um but take us back to the beginning I’ve been on the tours so I know I know about some of it as well but take us back to

The beginning how did you end up in uh you know the chaos of of distilling yeah certainly yeah um it’s it’s it’s certainly been a very long road so um I I started the business with my my uh business partner and lifelong friend Patty Fletcher um we both went to school

Together in Edinburgh um I’ve known him since I was five um and after school we both ended up uh going different ways for University but ended up in uh in London together afterwards um and I’d had a short failed career in uh sort of Showbiz PR um which didn’t go very well

My great claim to fame is Christian Slater specifically asked never to work with me again which is great um can we ask why um no but reasons but I’m I’m I’m sure I’m sure he he he’s probably come around to it by now um and so after that I went in the

Drinks trade started on the shop floor at Majestic wine and then ended up working for a great um London Merchant called robers and wine where I was traveling the world visiting Winery selling wine to supermarkets in the UK and exporting it to Southeast Asia um and then Patty in the meantime he’d

Become a charted accountant and um you know after working in a few accountancy firms and a house builder then ended up in the sort of tech startup world so he worked for a taxi app and then an Events app and then he became head of Finance

For Europe at um wework um you know that little company just before everything went uh SK with um he he was working with them so so you know o over the years I’d learned how to sort of create Brands sell them a bit and I’d learned a

Lot about the the drinks industry Patty in the mean time had had learned a lot about startups about how to run companies about the finances of that Etc and all the while um you know in our early 20s sort of overworked and underpaid we were sharing a horrible

Little flat in voxhall and buying whatever we could that was on offer in saintsbury and buying a bottle of whiskey and sort of talking about it and then we started going to tastings there’s a wonderful shop in London called Milroy um and they would do these amazing tastings where you taste

Whiskies you could never normally afford and off that we began to get really into whiskey and then and then got a little bit carried away and um started to experiment with elements of whiskey production in our back Garden which is all I can say for legal reasons um and

And it was really through that that the seed of this business really really developed um when we were sort of having a go at Whiskey production we you know by this stage we’ve been to loads of distilleries we were really into whiskey and we found that actually the the

Hardest B bit of making the whiskey wasn’t in the distillation bit that was quite simple there’s very strict parameters of distillation because otherwise you’ll blind yourself um but actually the the really complicated bit was the Brewing bit because to make a whiskey you you sort of make a halfway

Beer and then you distill that into whiskey and it was in that sort of fermentation bit that there were all these difficult decisions you know what yeast do you use how long do you ferment for what temperature Etc and we realized you know all these distilleries we visited they don’t talk about this

Really they you know they talk about their casks their beautiful water trickling off the Glenn the they they’re shiny Stills but the fermentation bit we felt was being missed um and the more we dug into this with people who are in the industry and around the place the more

You realize there was an opportunity here um a lot of distilleries in Scotland were doing exactly the same thing for fermentation it was seen as a sort of alcohol creation piece and there was an opportunity for for new flavor production and new and interesting things so this is where you had the seed

Of a there’s something new and interesting that we can do with this product um and that’s what really set us off and the other bit being that we were from Edinburgh we very much wanted to go home to Edinburgh and we realized that there wasn’t at the time a single malt

Whiskey distillery in Scotland’s capital city um so it was those two things combined that that were were the seeds of of the the business that it became it’s interesting can because I I suppose you could look at and say how on Earth did you think that you could break into

The the established whiskey industry but as you say you look for the where there’s an opportunity yes well certainly you know already being in sales um you know you are always just focused on but what’s your USB what what what is going to be your your thing um

And and so we have that from a product perspective and something that genuinely excited us and interested us which was which is important you know for that drive but yeah whiskey is a horrendous business to try and break into really you can choose worse you know you need

Lots and lots of money to set up your your production facility and then you can’t sell anything for yours and yours so you need a fortune to to actually just produce your stuff until until you can sell it you know we are going to spend 22 million pound a year producing

Whiskey and we’re not going to release a single malt for at least 8 years so that’s 60 million pounds of cash flow you know you need you need to to to fund Your Whiskey production for you know and not for not forgetting the tens of million pound uh the millions of pounds

You need to to build a whiskey Distillery so our our solution for that you know is a startup that’s very hard and so you you either go let’s raise tens of millions of pounds or you go we need another Revenue uh stream so our answer to that was Edinburgh um so you

Know there had been a bit of thinking at the time there were new whiskey distilleries emerging and and a big inspiration for anyone in the whiskey industry in recent years would have been Brook lad who uh launched um the botanist gin and also uh revitalized Brady whiskey Distillery and um you know

There was this sort of system whereby well in the early years we can sell the gin and then we’ll get the whiskey going now an actual fact you know the Gin boom was going crazy when we were starting we’re going this the the world doesn’t need another gin we’re never going to

Get revenues from that we need something else but it was the fact that there wasn’t a whiskey Distillery in Edinburgh but there were 5 million visitors to Edinburgh every year and so we thought well if we can get the right location in Edinburgh then maybe we can get revenues

From tourism and that can be that extra income Revenue stream that pays for the whiskey production and furthermore from a sales perspective this is fantastic you know um potentially loads and loads of uh visitors that you can sell directly to um and and you got uh you

Know a Sal stream down the line and better yet um you’re selling directly to Consumers so you’re keeping all of the margin so so it was that that tourism piece so so the the answer for us had to be finding a location in in Edinburgh uh where we could build a whiskey

Distillery and make a strong case that we’d be be able to sort of reach visitors and get lots of visitors through the door to to to fund the whiskey production that that was the um the the Genesis of the plan ah so out of Interest what other what other sites had

You looked at before arriving on where Year yes well I mean therein lies a St tale of Woe and and sadness so um it was actually not long after we’d been mocking around in the garden um so I was selling a lot of wine at the time uh out

To Southeast Asia and my biggest client out there um in terms of uh sales revenue not his own physical size was um uh he was shipping container loads of wine um out there and then we were having lunch in in London one day and um

I said to him you know what I really want to do is build a whiskey distillery in Edinburgh and he went oo oh I’ll fund it I was like oh okay right um and so I found up panning went you know this whiskey thing I’ve got a guy he wants to

Invest he’s he’s 10 million we could do this and and so paty was actually just on his way on holiday but um spent his whole holiday writing a business plan um and putting together a massive Excel sheet for this thing and um from that because you know we had this big guy

Loads of money we very quickly found a site in Edinburgh um in Le um and um with that we appointed an architect and we designed a Distillery and actually the this this investor of ours he was also getting involved in renewable energy in Scotland and the Scottish government was getting excited about it

We ended up at a dinner at Edinburgh Castle with Alex salmon and the whole Scottish government was it was it was crazy it was it was going you know in a matter of six months suddenly it was all going to happen and it was very exciting

And then not long after that dinner that investor stopped answering emails and just sort of uh went off the radar and like oh okay but actually we thought it’s fine because of him we found a site we’ve created a business plan we’ve got a design we’ll find more investors we

You know we we’re well set up and we did uh again through my wine work we managed to find um a trio of of investors um again from Southeast Asia who who between them were going to put in10 million P into the company um but as

Soon as we’d sort of come to an agreement with them and we hadn’t signed an investment agreement we we we just kind of agreed the parameters that that’s a crazy story in itself um we then found out we’d lost the site that we designed the Distillery for um uh

We’d never really had it you know it was sort of on paper but basically a large house Builder came in and bought that site and and a big sve of land with it um so suddenly we lost that site the investors we just lined up went yeah

Okay bye um and we lost them and we were right back to square one and by this point so you know it’s 2013 we’re in the garden this is all happening across 20145 and by the end of 2015 all we have is a business plan and no money and no

Sight and nothing um and at that point it then became very difficult um and we found you know unless you’ve got lots of money behind you people who own land aren’t particularly interested in talking to you and even then it’s just very hard to find a site Edinburgh where

You can do a new build industrial facility um and we were we had probably about 12 months of just trying to find sites and just looking at places writing to anyone doing whatever we could and eventually um I had a meeting at edmer council with their sort of economic

Development team and they said um have you tried talking to Ocean terminal and I went well no because I don’t want to build a distillery in a shopping center go away um and I went back to London sort of quite grumpy and um but then I

Got a call from the own ocean terminal shopping center and he said you I’ve got this site you know just have a look at it I’ll send you a PDF and I remember I was in the park uh and my my daughter was just a you know Oney old at the time

And I and I had her pram and then I looked at my phone I looked at the site I just forgot where my daughter was for about 10 minutes because I was looking at the site going this is perfect um it was a very small site but it was right

On the the the corner of land sort of uh you know uh facing the sea um in leth and it was 20 M away from the Royal Opera and and I knew that you know as we set out to raise investment investors could look at pad and I and go I don’t know

About these idiots and whether or not they can make whiskey but that site with its location that will work from a tourism perspective um and and you had a willing uh sort of uh partner with the site and so that put us back in business but from that stage onwards we decided

Okay let’s stop trying to get these big ticket crazy uh investors involved and inste instead we decided to sort of Build It Up incrementally so we said let’s raise a seed round of investment just a small amount of money and with that let’s design a building secure planning permission we’ll also get a

Small gin Distillery going and then we’ll have something to show and we can raise more investment and more investment and more investment and do it incrementally that way instead um and that’s how we did it so we we um we got to work with a PDF and a potential lease

On the site and Managed IT you know they always say you’re looking for the three FS at that stage friends family and fools and uh we didn’t get any friends or family involved but we found seven Visionary fools one one of which I believe you know um and uh and between

Them they gave us 400,000 um and we signed that first investment agreement in 2017 that triggered the lease on our site and and off we went um to to design we were in business so and and so through going back to obviously the first lunch that

You had that got the first investor in and and and then the next three yeah what was the emotional cycle like for you cuz that you must have been chuffed a bits and then yeah yeah it was pretty pretty much highs and lows and that thing of like continually refreshing

Your inbox to see if like the investors got back to you and stuff um and and yeah there were highs and lows and but I think no matter what we just this you know Patty and I over the years we we’d always wanted to start a business and

And we’d had a few sort of crazy ideas along the years and this one just stuck we just thought this is a good idea this can really work and so we were pretty determined with it um and so even when those investors walked away it you know

By by the very fact that it had almost happened it told us this can happen this could happen um so so we stuck with it and and you know it was exciting you know even the highs and the lows were exciting and and part of the journey and

It was fine you know we both had good jobs in the meantime anyway so um so why not keep plugging away at it so um yeah and if any of these guys kind of um got back to you and just said no never heard

Of any of them again no I think one of them owned well one of the trio who were going to invest later owned the entire waterwork system for Shanghai I mean they were crazy rich people um and I’d happened upon them through oh gosh yeah it was it

Was it was quite a crazy I mean one thing I I’ll say you know we we’ve been on a long road of raising investment and it it it is so much fun um we’re kind of at the end of that road now and who knows you know we’ll probably need to

Raise more investment in the future but it’ll be probably a bit easier and a little bit more corporate it ever has been when you’re scrabbling around just trying to find rich people who might give you money it’s it’s actually really good fun and you have some crazy

Experiences as a result so yeah even with the highs and the lows it’s it’s fun yeah yeah are there any kind of particular stories that you can tell us in that little space there yeah well um I I I guess so so you know talking about

That Trio who we got we got in uh the I I I I basically come across this this company that organized um uh sort of management courses for South Southeast Asian business people who wanted to learn you know development their their management techniques and they they would come to Cambridge and have courses

There and then every week go out and visit a town and and sort of spend a weekend in a different town as part of their RNR and I managed to get to know the people who are running this and say you know when you do Edinburgh I could

Be your tour guide and so I ended up uh going up to edur and showing these people around around Edinburgh and you know the whole time going yeah here’s the castle and we’re going to build a Distillery over there and you know and here’s the Royal oh yes our distiller is

Going to be right next to the Royal yacht brania here um so basically being a tour guide but pitching my business the whole time and um and the end of it at the end of that weekend we got an email from uh from the course convener

Saying oh three of these guys would like to talk to you about it can can you meet them at the the Hilton in London um uh next weekend um and actually what happened is we we couldn’t do the meeting at the hotel so instead um Patty

And I set up a presentation in my living room in camberwell and it was tiny little room and basically we got um we got the three these three like crazy Rich individuals on my sofa um and set up the Pres presentation on a TV and oh

There was something like um uh the China Britain Business Council or someone sent a representative as well to be present to help with this meeting and so so they turned up as well and they’re sitting in the living room my wife’s bringing in tea and biscuits and stuff um and and

We’re presenting to them all day and they’re questioning the plan Etc and then the next day we meet at the hotel and that’s where we we sort of hammer out this uh this sort of agreement on how an investment deal could look uh could look like and at the end of that

Day um I have a picture of actually we signed what what they love a memorandum of understanding and and we got a picture of it afterwards um and yeah that crazy sort of fortnite uh where suddenly we had 10 million pounds by the end and then three weeks later we lost

The site and we didn’t have it anymore well there we go that’s the that’s the fun in the games of it so it’s it’s it’s generally you know to begin with it was a FR strating exercise you know um I I certainly felt in Scotland it was it was a difficult place

To raise money I think that there was quite often a little bit of a who do you think you are you know attitude with with a thing like this um I I say that that that’s not fair because you did find little pockets of of energy and

Excitement you know and and where you found it it was incredibly um uh invigorating um one of my favorite things though was was actually getting out abroad to raise money I mean going to America was just amazing the the contrast in Attitude they were just yeah

Let’s do this high five um in a big way again yeah yeah yeah and they just love the ambition and and and and got behind it which which was and you know there’s so much money to raise out there as well so so so that was exciting um but yeah

All in all you know all those people um all those meetings kissing so many frogs you know and and the the the personalities that you’re having to you know encounter you know from terrifying VC funds um who who literally just talk with the most evil Vil voice you could

Possibly hear um right down to um you know someone who made a fortune run running casinos and slot machines and was terrifying in a different way um and you know all the all these people all these meetings it was it was incredibly good fun yeah yeah wow you you use the

Word fun a lot even before we kind of started filming just now and I can see on your website that fun kind of goes through the values as well can you just maybe tell us a bit more about that angle on things yeah I mean it’s it’s

Something that we came to you know well I guess let’s start with the values to some extent because um uh you know I I’d I’d had a history of working for people in companies um who didn’t run their businesses very well um but fortunately I’ve always been quite good at thriving

In that in that scenario I’m I’m you know I’m a selfstarter and I don’t need too much attention Patty in the meantime worked for these startup companies who were really big into sort of good you know management strategies Etc and so I think it was a few years in he sat me

Down and said you know I think we need to define the values of our company I was like all right fine whatever and you know sort of humor paty now and again and and go through these let’s sets and values um but actually um probably you know today I’m I’m probably a bigger

Evangelist of this than he is even um and and I think it’s been absolutely uh core to to to our business and how we run it and and we we we try and make every you navigate our business entirely through it and and um navigate every decision we make through our through our

Values but when we were sort of piling those we really said what is it what we’re trying to do here um and you know we were doing this at a stage where we’ve been looking back a few years of what we’ve done and going you know what

The overriding thing when I look back at what we’ve done so far is it’s just been so much fun and I you know my wine job previously I’d been traveling the world to all the most beautiful it was it was it was you know you dream of a job of

The wine trade it was that job it was so beautiful I got to go to California Chile France Spain you name it all the and The Vineyards are always in the most beautiful place and and it was you know exciting creating brands on this I loved

It um but we Patty and I started this business because we thought it could be even more fun than that and it was right so in in creating those those values it was all about how do we keep this fun because we have to work all our lives um

We could do anything Patty was earning a lot more money at Wei work than he ever could in this business um so how do we make sure that this stays fun and and and keep that magic to to the business throughout so that’s yeah it is

Absolutely core to what we do and and why we do it yeah so you get your 400 Grand yeah you you you promised this gin Distillery yeah so what what next yeah yeah that was um that that was full hearty in a way I guess but um yeah that

The idea with the Gin so you know for the longest time we I mentioned before we weren’t going to go near Jin because you know there was a gin boom Going On It was there was a new brand launching every week and we thought the world really doesn’t need another gin but

Eventually we thought you know we’re going to have to do something because this whiskey thing is going to take ages and and we can’t just sit here twiddling our thumbs so we thought let’s get a Jin going and we you know we were super conservative with our aspirations for it

We thought at the very least it’ll we’ll learn a lot through doing it and we’ll begin to develop at least even a small distribution Network that can begin to be useful in the future for the whiskey um but the the other reason that we

Decided to do a Jin is we had again seen an opportunity literally because of the proliferation of jins you were seeing you know and and that the market was just going bananas you were seeing like a you know banana Gins or like uh or you know rhubarb or you name it every kind

Of gin Under the Sun and I began to think you know I think there’s a place for actually just cutting through the new noise and trying to create something that’s really classic and Benchmark because I want to know if you know if you come to me and say what gin should I

Try what what what should a gin taste like what’s that product you know and that’s the product that we should make something that that that is your quintessential Benchmark lond and dryin um and you know also through through sort of developing the whiskey Distillery I become incredibly immersed

In the in the history of leth you know where we were establishing our our business and there were lots of stories there that I was beginning to think could be intertwined into a brand as well um so it was off that that that that the seeds of uh Linden lime were

Were you know developed and we’d come across uh this guy uh James porus who who was already producing LEF um with his his gy brand called electric Spirit Co um and uh we met up with him got on really well and said you know what James you’re producing your gin in a broom

Coverboard um in in in leth um we’ve raised a bit of money so why don’t we take our money um and uh your skills and we’ll take a a small industrial unit together you can upscale your production you can help us set it up um and then

You can help us devise our gin and then we can we can coexist we can have like a a Distillery Cooperative if you like and get it going that way um and we did um and so we we took our little uh industrial state in Tower Street right

Next to the car pound and leaf if you ever had your car toad it was lovely romantic spot um place that Uber drivers like to go for rest and relaxation um and um it was uh and and and we got the the The Distillery set up there put in a

Little garden shed that became our office and um and basically I I underw went a sort of very long 18-month process of of creating lyen lime um essentially I’d always had this idea that um you know for my wine days that I wanted to if I made a Spirits brand I

Wanted to put it in a wine bottle um the idea being that I didn’t see anyone else doing that and I thought also it’ll be really easy and really cheap because they make millions of wine bottles so you know we won’t have to spend a fortune in glass it’ll be uh and and

Immediately you’ve got a distinctive silhouette on the Shelf um unfortunately when we really dug into it wine bottles are all produced in 75 CL format whereas Spirits bottles are all produced in 70 cl format um and we couldn’t find a wine bottle shape in 7cl um so we eventually

Came to the we’re going to have to make our own bottle and that was only possible because we found a manufacturer who said if you can commit to doing 20,000 units a year for the next three years we will spread the cost of the The Upfront sort of production costs over

Over those three years for you that’s viable 20,000 units a year if we’re not doing that we’re not really in business so okay let’s go for it um and so began this really long 18month process of creating the bottle um but fortunately we already had a very clear idea of what

It was we wanted to create we knew the shape of the bottle we knew we wanted to had these vertical ribs to add the this sort of refraction to the glass and and we also even Patty and I had always wanted to have a bottle that had this

Recycled glass look that that slightly sort of off-white look and when we spoke to the manufacturer they went oh yeah that’s off white glass that’s what we do in between doing white glass and Green Glass it’s kind of almost a waste product to some extent and it’s got a

Very high recycle content it was about 75% recycled and we’re like perfect we’ll take that um and uh and and you know we come across the story of James Lind um who who was this doctor from edmur who identified that citrus fruit prevents scurvy and is almost most

Famous for for conducting one of the world’s first clinical trials um uh on board his ship HMS Salsbury that that happened in 1747 and you know I’d grown up in Ed I never heard about this guy and I thought that was an incredible story to tell with a brand so we so we

Did that we also discovered that Ros is LAM cordial had been originally produced in leth um for sea farers to get their their vitamin C um sort of shop while they they’re at Sea thought lime again and this lime with uh the Citrus with uh with James Lynn so those are two inter

Stories again um and it just all gradually came together um but it was it was a very lonely and nerve-wracking um sort of Journey that one I mean Patty was still very much working in London we work was going bananas he and I were catching up with calls all the time um I

Was satting the shed just you know I remember Oliver Stone said that making a trying to get a movie made in Hollywood is like trying to cook a steak by leaving it in a room and waiting for people to walk by and breathe on it and

It felt felt bit like the same with um with trying to get lyen Li made it was just every step was so slow um and and the thing about creating these things is you only know like you know you’re designing the bottle you’re designing the labels you’re you’re kind of working

On the Gin but it’s it was literally only a week before we launched that you finally had the bottles from the factory in Italy you finally had the labels from the printer you finally had the stopper from the stopper manufacturer and the Gin in there and it was only then that

You could see it all come together and see it worked like you know you were you were looking at computer uh you know images on computers but you couldn’t really know until until you put it together and I remember uh you you know bottling uh the the first batch um and

First of all going God it’s really hard to get these label straight but uh and and event and then just going oh my God this this looks so good and I just couldn’t stop staring at it for like you know a month um and be watching TV with

My wife and I’d just be staring at at the bottle and she be like are you okay Yan and I go sorry what um and I was just I was just so mesmerized by it um and that’s that was the first moment I thought you know what I think we might

Have actually created something pretty good here um and then we launched um uh we just Monday is our fifth anniversary so we launched 27th of I think it’s 27th of November um 2018 and uh our feet didn’t touch the ground after that it just it just went crazy so it was it was

It was amazing so yeah so go talk through kind of what that looked like then in terms of the yeah so I guess we did uh so so for the launch party the launch party was so much fun uh we we we did a party in our industrial estate um

And we’d already launched this Sherry that was actually the first product we ever launched which is you know uh which was a consciously crazy thing to do because no one in the world makes money selling Sherry um so we we had that and then uh uh through that we’ve gotten to

Know a few retailers um and principally rawal whiskies um and uh there was um Jamie from from Oran whiskey who’s now at Cork and Cask he helped us put together a guest list for the party and in fact we engaged a PR Company as well and so we got a a good

Old party together and a few sort of interested investors and stuff and then did this launch party with with proper bar people in in in our industrial estate um and yeah it was just an electric night um and social media wise went totally bananas of people sharing

Pictures of the bottle and and stuff like that and the 5,000 B the next thing you know the 5,000 bottles we put together just went immediately and we’re like oh my God we need to make a lot more of this a lot faster which was very

Difficult to do because uh we we had a small I mean we we just from that day for the next three years we never kept up with demand we just couldn’t um and so we we were bottling it as hard as we could but um but but couldn’t quite

Manage and um yeah I I remember one one journalist said we we uh for for that night alone we broke the internet with Linden L because the the reaction was was so good um which which was which was super exciting and and um and you know

We we didn’t have to actively sell it in any way because people were sharing it so much people were talking about it so much it was all incoming sales you know I wish I could say I was an incredible salesperson but it was just incoming inquiries um which was which was like

Magnificent but just on that you’ve got obviously got a knack for kind of almost you’ve created something in itself which is a thing of beauty then you’ve got the launch party but you must have had a good Network you’ve nurtured to then you know if you if you’re selling 5,000

Bottles in a night you must have brought the right people into the room it was uh yeah I think I think there were just um it just took it was still a very small Network I had by that stage I really did I mean you know the network I

Developed at robber and wine was a very different one um uh and it wasn’t one that was going to work for for Lindon you know for a small scale Gin Gin producer so it really sort of the network really just grew out of that night it genuinely did like because

We’ve been so under the radar until then as well I think um so and I think there were just a bunch of retailers who discovered us very quickly and you know were placing orders and orders and orders and orders um and so yeah and

That was the idea of Linden Li it was to create that Network and it did it very quickly um so and it wasn’t long before we got our first export order to I think Italy we did first uh and then Germany and and we had a real focus on trying to

Build those up as quickly as possible um and and pick up new markets and we weren’t being systematic about it you know that in this day and age we’re now a lot more careful about the the importance that we work with but at the

Time we were like you want it take it um you know uh uh can you breathe yes okay um and and so we we we we were getting out to as many places as possible Germany suddenly just went bananas for us it became our biggest Market by by

Some distance um and uh yeah it was lynon lime was was the seed that grew the network there was no network before that um it’s what it’s for so yeah I I I hadn’t worked the the spirits world and the wine world are different they are remarkably different um in terms of the

The distribution um piece so yeah um so that’s how it banned out but the brand is a work of art thank you is I just I think that when you every every experience I’ve ever come across in in terms of the whiskey in the Gin like everything is just Excellence like it

Just is like I just think what you’ve done incredible I I think the Gin is just the bottle is insane like I really think it’s like but it it just puts such an emphasis on the brand right it’s like you say like the network wasn’t huge it

Wasn’t like yeah you know 400 Grand in the scheme of things is not much money to raise like what has grown this is just the fact that you created something with such a story with such a brand and it’s just led to to the absolute you

Know explosive rate of it and it’s yeah and it’s funny to think that um so you know we were never going to make a Jin but there’s no way I’d be talking to you now if we hadn’t done lyen lime because Linden lime more than than the

Sales and the network it actually is the reason we managed to raise the investment to build the whiskey distill because that’s what gave confidence to investors to go okay these guys seem to know what they’re talking about um so it was yeah it was existential and we

Almost didn’t do it so very lucky and and to to kind of where is the brand now in terms of you know for five years on what are the that you could share or yeah an idea well we’ll do we’ll do just shive 100,000 bottles so we we we

Actually this year you know tell you honestly slightly Fallen uh from last year sales and uh that’s basically because lyen lime has had to exist purely organically like we’ve had no money to throw at it in any way shape or form every penny that we’ve raised has

Had to go into the bottomless black pit of building a very expensive whiskey Distillery um and and en you know we even have a very small sales team attached to it and you know there’s well now there’s five people for for the longest time there’s been three people

You know for for a lot of it it was just me um so you know compared to any gy brand in the world it’s it’s no money and no people um it’s just had to to to exist um we are now fortunately at a stage where that that’s changing um uh

We you know no more construction bills no more budget increases and we now have a uh a far more sort of systemat strategic approach to how to grow the brand um but yeah just you know organically importers finding us Etc it got up to 100,000 bottles which was what

We’ve needed it to do in the last kind of uh five years and now it’s a different stage for it yeah where uh where we U I mean you know if you want to do anything in America in terms of a brand you need to invest time and money

To to make it grow etc etc so yeah that’s that’s just where we are with it now so and in terms of distribution points then so you’ve in the in the 5 years since launch you’ve been in uh exporters and in the drinks trade in

Bars yes yeah so so the the the strategy was always that you know we uh we have no money um so uh we if there’s an Orthodoxy in the in the spirits world you know if you’re a big company it’s that you you tackle the the on trade the the bars and restaurants

Head on and that’s your shop window and that’s the tail that Wags the dog of retail so you know uh you you make sure you get it in you know whatever groups get it get get it seen get that visibility and it drives retail we

Didn’t have that budget to do that so we knew we had to create a product that was going to fly off shop shelves without you know it had to it had to do the work itself um and so we only ever focused at retail you know with a little bit of

Bars on the side obviously particularly in Edinburgh but uh largely speaking we’ve not been able to to to chase that market it will come one day but but um for now we we we just haven’t had the money money and energy to do it so

Distribution wise in the UK it was um it was very much about um building as wide a network as we possibly could um but focusing on on the premium uh as much as possible and so you you only really find lindine at this stage um in uh sort of

Independent shops you know your farm Shops and and people like that um the topend ones um you know raw M whisky obviously drink Monger in Edinburgh people like that John Lewis um became our bigger biggest retail in the UK um it became a lot bigger than we thought

It was going to be um and for a while we were their biggest selling alcohol uh item particularly during covid when you know online orders went went went went so became so big um uh but it going into next year we we’re finally looking to make the move into into sort of grocery

Into multiple retail as well um and then globally um as I say it’s 25 markets at the moment the the biggest export Market is Germany um and Germany’s uh just a wonderful market for most brands because it is a lot more fragmented than than for example the UK where 90% of alcohol

Sultry supermarkets in in in um in Germany you have a far more sort of a fragmented Market where it’s easier for a small brand to sort of get a a bigger slice of the pie um uh China’s been an unexpected success for us we have we have a a wonderful distributor there um

We’re now one of the top four premium G in China and CH you know Jin’s still a very small thing in China but but um we SE we’ve gotten in early uh with a great distributor there um and then uh you know other markets Europe uh USA and

Then uh a first for this year and it actually just launched last week I think is Global Travel retail so you’ll Now find this in Edinburgh airport Glasgow abine uh and uh about 12 other airports worldwide JFK LAX um bunch of German airports as well um and that that’s had

A really good start actually which is which is exciting to see so yeah it’s definitely definitely a new phase for l l and kind of fun actually to finally be able to sell it properly and and and and uh yeah um super do do what it deserves

Yeah yeah so the Jin was always the the going to be the the Catalyst to enable you to do but really the whole thing was about the whiskey so tell us about The Distillery you started building what happened yeah so um well yeah I mean it took long blooming time to get building

Um so uh you know in 2017 as I said we signed that investor agreement we had a lease on the site at the time and we we got the Gin going and um we sort of designed the building got an outline budget and I think at the time we were looking at

Maybe 8 million or something like that um some something along those lines um but and we started to you know set out and raise investment um uh for that next chunk uh and as we got out there we just discovered that most investors were not

Happy with the idea that we had a uh a lease on the site and they wanted us to own the site because you even though it was a 60 lease I’m like guys well we’ll all be dead it’ll be someone else’s problem um but they wanted us to own it

So we it took us two years to to get through the process of um securing uh buying the site mainly because we even though the site had been offered us to us by ocean terminal we just discovered a small chunk of it was actually owned by forth ports and took a while to

Convince forth ports that they actually own this little bit of land um and then and then just just you know the the the the slow glacial process of of getting a land deal over the line um but over those two years we were going through the detailed design of the building we

We got we swam through planning permission we didn’t get a single uh objection which was amazing for for the for the type of building we built um and um it was finally in 2019 um at the very end of 2019 um the the land purchase completed uh 5 million pounds roughly

Speaking I think of investment that we we we’d managed to secure then triggered and came in um and we were able to get site um and uh we you know the first bit was the um was the substructure and actually you know people often ask me what’s been the most

Stressful bit of this business um uh since you’ve run it it wasn’t actually getting to sight it was almost a year and a half after that so you know when we taken in that seed money we designed the building and uh we were I think we were quite close to sort of submitting

INF planning application and then for Port sent us a drawing so we’re we’re we’re we’re our distiller is built next to a a seaw wall and what I’ve learned never ever build anything next to a seaw wall it’s really bad idea so um you know seaw wall is really thick concrete wall

And it’s holding back you know this massive force of water and it’s supported by all these metal rods that go in from the wall underneath the ground and sort of the ground is anchoring the seaw wall you know with the weight of the the ground and um so

We’re at a corner of the seaw wall which means you’ve got rods coming in from one side and rods coming in from Another Side so underneath our site is a crisscross pattern of metal beams essentially supporting this wall and when we got that we we really thought my God we’ve

Designed a building on a site that’s completely unbuildable um because there’s just no way you could build on top of this crisscross pattern of of metal rods um and I didn’t sleep for two months uh really I was so stressed I couldn’t stop thinking about it I you

Know I’d wake up at midnight and that was it I couldn’t get back to sleep it was it was awful because the the responsibility of having take taken people’s money and and missed this you know that that you know uh that that we’ve done this um anyway you know long

Story short turns out if you throw enough money at anything you can solve it um and so you know we we we had to get a consultant to sort of do an inspection on the Harbor wall agree that was a very good condition and then essentially our structural engineer had

To design a substructure that we had to excavate the site very carefully map out exactly where all these metal rods were and then we had a a detailed plan of of of that design and then our structural engineer could design the substructure not putting piles where he wanted to but

Where he could and then from that design a super structure that sort of caner levered over these piles in in in a way that would work um because the building itself had to be incredibly strong when you’re building a vertical Distillery so our building is 40 m tall um the bottom

Half is all production the top half is all visitor facility um but in the building itself you’ve got these tanks you know you got seven fermentation tanks each of them 10,000 lers and so one day you’re fitting one of those on one side of the building the next day

You’re fitting another on the other side so you got massive weight fluctuations happening in this building in a tall building that you would just never get anywhere else you know quite apart from hundreds of people moving through it and uh gale force winds trying to blow it

Down so um it you know even without the challenge of the substructure it was going to be a uh uh u a structural engineering uh challenge um so so that made things very difficult um anyway you know again lots of Steel lots of money

We got past it um and so we we went into the design uh in into construction at the end of 2019 and everyone you know I’ve never built anything I haven’t even built but no I built a gun shed because that was our office um but but that’s it

Um and everyone had warned us oh you know it’s it’s the substructure it’s the groundworks that’s where they’ll get you that’s where you’ll find you know the trouble and and and your budget will go crazy um it’s the only bit of the entire construction process that went ahead of

Budget ahead of schedule and under budget um it it it all went wrong after the substr but the substructure went well so we got that done and about 3 weeks later Co shs up down and and off we go um so yeah so that that obviously in March 2020 and and uh everything

Became very strange for for a long time as all we know um you know and we went into uh at the Gin Distillery we went into um uh you know hand sanitizer we were making the world’s most beautiful hand sanitizer for some time because we could only fill it into our gin bottles

So um um so doing that for a while and then and then you know the online sales started to go crazy with with with Co so that that that that was uh that was a welcome rest bite and finally we got back to Construction in August of that

Year but from then on it was just so painfully slow because there were material shortages there were all sorts of challenges and then we had a a very key challenge uh challenge with the building um so you know when you design a building you get your planning

Permission and then you go into the detailed design and and with every bit you’re sort of submitting this to the council for for building warrants you know to get approval on the detail design and basically when they saw our building they almost quite literally threw a book at us because you know

You’ve got uh a fairly explosive production process on the ground floor with visor you know visor facilities above and like oh my God you know no one in the world has built a building like this before no one’s di there is another vertical distillery in in Sweden but

That’s just a production facility you know it no one’s done it where you have you know then shop tasting floor bars Etc on the floors above and so we really had to have the most stringent um you know fire stopping regulations possible um now with with the strength of the

Building required um the initial design had something like 2 and a half million pounds worth of Steel in it um you know was incredibly strong and we were going at that stage we’re going guys you we we we we really need to try and shave some

Money out of this budget you know where we can and so our sh engineer said well I can actually shave some of the the weight of the steel because we have the same structure but I’ll just make the all a bit thinner and we’re like that’s

Great and he saved us like a million pounds in steel and we’re like fantastic um but then after this going through the ringer of uh you know fire stopping and fire regulations um we found out we were going to have to put unprecedented levels of uh fireproof paint on the

Steel because it was thinner that melt in a fire it would potentially melt faster and therefore we had to put like something like 8 mm uh of of incent paint on each steel beam which in itself added about 1.5 million to the budget um because it wasn’t just the cost of this

Paint it was the application of it which was incredibly complicated and painstaking and so slow and getting a system that oh gosh if I never hear the words interesant paint again in my life I would die happy man um so first time I’ve ever heard that word yeah it’s it’s

Awful um so so yeah that that became an enormous challenge of the build enormous it’s really hard to overstate how difficult that was um and and one of the reasons that you know it took us from 2019 to October 23 to to complete it so yeah a longer build and and through this

Ian excuse me could you you know winding back the time to when you guys were both in your jobs but you had this kind of interest you know could did you see this you know could you you people talk about having a vision and this is exactly how I wanted

To build it or or has some of it surprised you um I think I mean there hasn’t been much room for surprises because it’s happened so blooming slowly you know um so you know you quite often show people people the building they come around the corner go

Whoa wow look at that and they go oh you must be amazed looking this and go well it’s it’s like it’s been glacial I mean there has been the odd moment you go ooh that’s nice you know when they put a sign up or I actually what was nice is

We had to build the steel structure up first and as we were building up the steel structure we had to put the big bits of Kit into it because we wouldn’t get them in afterwards so it was great fun seeing the fermentation Vats go in

And the m go in and you know that was like three years ago ago now so moments like that um but largely speaking it’s been it’s been pretty a pretty slow process I’d say the most um gratifying moment really has been in the you know I

I I’m lucky that I’ve been able to enjoy the ride I really have like uh you know all along it I found bits that are exciting and and you know one of the most exciting bits in this business was when we took our first investment and I bought myself a laptop that was

Incredibly exciting um so so I enjoy every minute you know for what it is um but certainly having the building built and seeing it full of people and coming to live is that’s such a buzz that’s incredibly cool and like being being in the bar and uh you know and the bar is

Almost incidental to to to to the whole thing because um you know we set out to build a whiskey Distillery but now it’s ended up with this incredible double height bar at the top of it where we’ve got an amazing chef amazing head of hospitality incredible bar people and

It’s just such a cool space and that’s that’s like you know that is where you feel like you own the sweetie shop now and and you get to play with it so that’s really really good fun yeah what advice would you give to someone who has

A crazy idea um and they’re 10 million quid away from seeing it or or even more you know you I know that obvious is just go for it but practically for you what what does that look like if you were to say to someone who’s at the beginning of this journey even if

You go back to the beginning of you what what what would that message be I I think I think um yeah I get asked this a lot so I I I’ve now distilled it into sort of three key things I think that have been vital vital for for for me

Number one my business partner I I couldn’t have done this without him he sure as hell couldn’t have done it without me um and he’s so humble no like we you just doing this alone I just can’t imagine of ever being able to do that where we’re very lucky you know we we

Complement each other’s skills very well um it’s so much fun doing it with Patty cuz we’re all old friends and saves a lot of time because you know we can be very rude to each other cut through the nonsense and then you know we we have we

Have blazing RS and then you know we hug and we’re good friends again and and and it’s it’s not only made it a lot more fun but it’s also you know there are those times when you’re beaten down but the other ones got the energy and vice

Versa um so that that’s been that’s been absolutely key um take take every single meeting you possibly can um you know in terms of 10 raising 10 million uh pounds you take every single op even the whiff of an opportunity and I’m only now just getting off this sort of psychotic um

Thing I have of going into a room and just trying to identify anyone who might be able to invest in a whiskey Distillery I I’m I still catch myself doing it um little bit bit I go no I don’t need to do that anymore but um you become so

Shameless but you have you know it’s funny raising money just quickly on that raising money is a bit like finding a seam of gold so you find one investor and what you’ll find is they’ll often introduce you to other people who will invest because once they’ve invested

They want to bring their friends in and they want to so it’s it’s it is often finding finding those little seams of gold and and it’s really worked out that way actually probably most of our money has been through finding about five people who’ve led us to all the other

People um so so yeah you got to kiss a lot of frogs take every single meeting you got to show up you got to show up um MH and then the last thing I’d say looking back is that you do actually ultimately I just I I’m very grateful

For the times when I trusted my instincts and I wish I had on more occasion you know as you go down the the road you you get prayed upon by a lot of people who who who sort of you know their job is to kind of prey on your

Insecurities and go oh you don’t know what you’re doing you need me um and there’s been many occasions I this doesn’t quite smell right it doesn’t quite feel right and and looking back uh I shouldn’t have I I I should have trusted my instincts so I think quite

Often you know when you’re in the thick of it when you’re immersed in it when you’re hearing all the different opinions and you’re at the center of all that that creates that Alchemy whereby your gut actually begins to be quite clever and and know the right way

Forward and and you should trust it so um yeah I think those those three things probably you know yeah are the key elements if you’re starting out yeah yeah yeah yeah wow it’s just an incredible we really appreciate you coming on and sharing a little bit of

Your story and uh we wish you all the best in the future I love an audience it’s been a pleasure you’ve been great thanks cheers no Worries