IVOR Lewis, the man who
controlled a third of Scotland's whisky output, is quitting after his failure to gain a more senior post in the drinks giant Diageo.
As UK operations director of United Distillers and Vintners (UDV), the spirits arm of Diageo, Lewis controlled 27 of Scotland's 85 working malt whisky
distilleries.
From his headquarters in
Edinburgh, he also supervised the group's whisky bottling plants in Scotland and its Gordon's gin and and Smirnoff vodka production South of the Border.
UDV announced yesterday that Lewis was handing over his responsibilities immediately to David Hardie, 53, Diageo's managing director for global operations. But a spokesman said he would continue working with the company until the autumn to come to ensure a smooth
transition.
A new global management structure is being created within Diageo and Lewis will not be directly replaced. This inevitably raises fears that management control of Diageo's whisky production and marketing activities is slipping further away from Scotland.
There will no longer be one individual based in Edinburgh with overall responsibility for
Diageo's whisky production and packaging activities in Scotland.
Instead, responsibility for the different aspects of spirits production in the UK will be split between six directors with global responsibilities, three of them based in Edinburgh and three in London.
Hardie, who is presently based in London, will spend some time working out of a new office in Edinburgh, but much of his time will be spent travelling to visit Diageo's various spirits manufacturing operations around the world.
UDV insiders said Lewis, 52, quit his #180,000-a-year post out of disappointment that he was not promoted after Diageo was created by the merger of Guinness and GrandMet in December. He particularly coveted Hardie's job as Diageo's head of world-wide
spirits production.
The sources said Lewis wished to remain in Scotland if possible, but he was looking for a new business challenge to crown his career and this could take him further afield.
He joined United Distillers, the spirits arm of Guinness, in 1991, and became managing director for UK operations based in
Edinburgh a year later.
Using skills acquired as a manager in the engineering industry with JCB and Rover, Lewis set to work streamlining the whisky production chain to cut costs and improve efficiency. He closed three bottling plants and mothballed four distilleries in moves that led to 700 job losses. But for the last two years he has had little to do apart from keeping the company's slimmed down operations ticking over.
''He wants a fresh challenge, something of significance,'' one close colleague said of Lewis's decision. Earlier this year Diageo announced the closure of its UK spirits marketing operation in Perth.
Hardie, who supervises everything from tequila production in Mexico to rum making in
Australia will be at best an irregular visitor to Scotland.
A native of Alloa, he created and led GrandMet's brewing division in the 1970's. Following the group's acquisition of the US food producer Pillsbury in 1989, he moved to the US to direct
GrandMet's food production operations in North America.
Hardie moved back to the UK in 1994 and became managing director of GrandMet's global spirits operations last year, a few months before the merger with Guinness.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article