Scotland
Land Of Whisky
December 2000 - 7’30”
ENGLISH SPEECH: 1 MINUTE 46 SECONDS
0.02 Here in the green rolling hills of the Scottish lowlands, they’ve been producing Glenkinchie malt whisky for over 160 years.
Scotland’s cold, wet climate suits the growing of barley. And they say the local water is vital to the taste of the finished product.
0.18 Inside these vats the fermentation is taking place which will eventually produce the star product - the single malt – so-called because it’s from a single distillation process. The rest is sold for the mass market blended whiskies.
0.34 But it’s the malt – aged in wooden barrels – that demands the high prices and is the connoisseur’s ultimate prize.
0.42 CHARLIE SMITH, DISTILLERY MANAGER:
"As the last 25 years have gone past, disposable income has risen across the world really and there’s been a move away from blended whiskies to more expensive blended whiskies, the better quality ones. And then a move again from that to single malt whiskies which has been good news for us obviously as an industry."
1.03 The casks will sit for ten years until the flavour is mature. Even with modern technology you can’t hurry a malt.
1.17 The spirit is distilled in traditional copper stills. In the old days, the distillery would have employed specialised stillmen and mashmen.
Glenkinchie is now owned by the drinks giant United Distillers and Vintners.
And with the world-wide trend to cut staff numbers, Glenkinchie employs just eight general operators who do everything. Some of Scotland’s more than 100 distilleries are even single-man operations.
1.43 At the distillery’s shop a bottle of 10-year-old single malt Glenkinchie sells for around 40 US dollars. Despite the high price there’s been tremendous growth in the last five years.
And whisky marketers are adding new ranges and limited editions to their malts.
Single malt’s on something of a roll at the moment. Sales are increasing at 20 per cent each year and world-wide sales last year were more than 200 million dollars.
2.15 NATSOT horns
2.17 But in New York City the single malt popularity has rolled over into a phenomenon.
2.21 Kilts in Manhattan are as rare as a hot, dry day in Scotland. But in fact Scottish malts have taken a curious route to midtown New York, where Japanese bar owner Hivaiwa Koichi (Hee-VYE-wah KOH-ee-chee) has assembled an extensive collection.
In his discrete, second floor bar called the Hole in One, drinkers can throw back a single shot of malt whisky for 980 US dollars.
2.30 Koichi shares his passion for Scotch whisky with his customers – mainly Japanese businessmen travelling through or working in New York. He serves the Scotch in a traditionally Japanese environment.
2.49 But the prices – ranging from 14 to nearly one-thousand dollars – are distinctly modern.
Koichi’s love of Scotch is shared by millions around the world. Distillers sell in excess of 3 billion US dollars worth of whisky each year.
3.08 He boasts his well-stocked bar is recognised as one of the best collections of fine single malts in the world.
3.20 HIVAIWA KOICHI, BAR OWNER:
"In my bar, Scotch whiskies, about 280 bottles."
3.27 The star is the rare Bowmore 40. But not everyone is willing to pay nearly a thousand dollars for a mouthful.
3.35 CUSTOMER:
"I can pay 100 to 200 I think but 1,000 is too expensive for me."
3.43 The bar does a steady business but the outrageously expensive malts only come out on special occasions.
3.51 As profits march remorselessly on, distillers invest in more automation. Ironically, there are fewer jobs for Scottish people.
Glenmorangie is the most popular single malt in Scotland and the number three in the world.
Here, just outside Edinburgh they bottle their own single malts and pack up blended whisky for the big supermarkets.
It’s a state-of-the-art three million dollar bottling plant, employing 200 people.
But the trend towards automation takes its toll on jobs – and there’s a constant push from the big customers to keep costs down.
4.28 COLIN CLELLAND, GLENMORANGIE ENGINEER:
"Increasingly there are mergers between supermarkets and these big players and they’re able to put a fair bit of pressure on us to reduce costs and have more say in how we do business."
4.40 The vast majority of whiskies sold are the blended brands that everyone recognises. Single malts are only 5 per cent of total whisky sales.
The producers are falling over themselves to capture this niche market.
4.54 MICHAEL JARVIS, GLENMORANGIE MARKETING MANAGER:
"I think that people generally are moving to buying premium items of whatever they’re buying and particularly so in drink. If they drink lager they’re drinking premium lager. People tend to drink less but drink better. They’re more concerned about their health. They’re more concerned about their waistlines. So, therefore, rather than having several cheaper drinks they will have one or two but really spoil themselves and buy something which has more complexity about it, a bit more richness in the flavour."
5.24 In an Edinburgh garage – amidst the bicycles and grimy bric-a-brac – Phillip Hills is making whisky. He’s single-handedly making a single malt but it can’t be sold. It can’t even be sampled.
The writer has the only private licence to distil in Scotland. But the still is purely for show and explaining the various chemical processes at work in making whisky.
Hills takes much of the credit for widening access to single malts. His book, "Appreciating Whisky", is considered a bible for whisky buffs.
5.58 PHILLIP HILLS, AUTHOR OF APPRECIATING WHISKY:
"Whisky became really popular outside Scotland in the later 19th Century and it became popular mainly among the English middle classes who by and large didn’t know good drink from bad. So the distillers were, like the gin producers were, able to sell them rubbish provided it had sufficient social status then they would drink it."
6.19 Hills doesn’t mind that drinkers in New York have more money than sense when it comes to rare single malts. He’s not surprised that they’re willing to pay through the nose.
6.27 PHILLIP HILLS, AUTHOR OF APPRECIATING WHISKY, PART OVERLAID:
"There are lots of people who really don’t care what they pay because they are so rich and they’ve got the idea that the more expensive a malt it is the better it is. That is not necessarily the case. They are quite often mistaken in this."
6.42 Tourists from Finland visiting the Glenkinchie distillery. Increasingly, drinkers from around the world are using the labels on their bottles as a road map to find where their favourite malt is made.
6.54 NATSOT Piper
6.59 But is it the rich Scottish heritage or the Scotch that lures the tourist? Statistics show that whisky alone accounts for more than a million visitors a year to Scotland.
It’s the most international of national drinks. The French drink more whisky than cognac and whisky sales in Greece outstrip Ouzo.
Whisky-making is admired and imitated throughout the world, but now the single malt is making its name as a money-spinner – as well as the preferred ‘tipple’ of those in the know.
7.30 ENDS