At Falkirk Distillery, all good things come to those who wait ...

Ambitious and exciting plans to create a new lowland distillery took root more than 10 years ago when George Stewart, who has run businesses in Stirlingshire and West Lothian for five decades, embarked on a journey to build something special – something that would put Falkirk on the map and create a tourist attraction as well as an innovative family business.

Fast-forward to 2021 and the results have certainly been worth waiting for – an incredible building that certainly stands out from other distilleries.

While the distillery exists thanks to the founder’s steely determination and courage to take a road less travelled, it is his daughter, company director Fiona Stewart, who is now the driving force behind the business. As passionate about the distillery as her father, she is rightly proud of the end result.

“It’s quite an amazing back story,” she says. “We’ve literally been through blood, sweat and tears to get to this stage. 

“Planning issues and a pandemic aside, we’ve got there – not one brick has been laid that is not in some shape or form connected with the family. And we’ve successfully married tradition and history with modern techniques to create something very special and contemporary with a nod to the past.”

The distillery’s location near the Antonine Wall – built by the Romans around 142AD – is what caused planning issues. But George Stewart refused to give up his dream, often referring to his vision as “dream – or a dram – too many”. He laughs: “My wife said I was mad.”

As Fiona explains, the fact the family largely self-funded the project, apart from one small grant, makes it even more remarkable. 

“Rome was not built in a day,” she says, alluding to the issues in relation to the Antoine Wall. Planning permission was granted back in 2010 but the site’s proximity to a section of the wall led to lengthy delays.

“The wall now has World Heritage Site status but didn’t when we first applied for planning permission,” explains Fiona. “And when everything was finally on track for us to open, coronavirus came along.”

However, the family was able to raise a glass to success when the distillery finally became fully operational last year. 

The family-run Falkirk Distillery has been designed and built around an historic mash tun

Distilling started last September, although aficionados will have to be patient for a little longer and wait until October 2023 to taste the first liquid gold, as a spirit isn’t whisky until it has been distilled for at least three years.

The directors worked with advisers from across the industry, including Alan Rutherford OBE, a former production director with Diageo.

George explains: “My goal was to create a light lowland malt that will appeal to a wider audience of whisky drinkers. It won’t be a heavy, peaty single malt but a lighter dram.”
Unlike other new distillery ventures that have to turned to making gin while waiting for their whisky to mature, The Falkirk Distillery Company has decided not to go down that route. 

“Distilleries have been popping up everywhere but we’ve been determined to keep ours special and exclusive to whisky,” says Fiona. “We’re in such a great location – in the heartland of Scotland – and within easy distance of both Glasgow and Edinburgh, and other parts of the country, so it’s easy for people to visit us.”

Visitors will certainly be blown away by the impressive building with its imposing cathedral-style doors, hand-crafted copper pagodas, reconditioned stills from Caperdonich distillery at Rothes in Speyside and a copper mash tun. Indeed, the building was designed around the mash tun by an architect renowned for his historic environment work. It also has its own bonded warehouse.

“The stills and mash tun were brought down from Rothes with a police escort,” says Fiona.

“What we have is very much a marriage of the old and the new. While the stills and mash tun have a history behind them, the distillery doesn’t have that type of heritage but our location does, thanks to the Antonine Wall.”

The Falkirk Distillery also sources its “water of life” from an Artesian well that George Stewart discovered. He already had an interest in the extraction and bottling of natural spring water and it was really this, along with his love of Scotch whisky and the wider industry, that sowed the seeds for his own distillery.

With the assistance of a diviner, he found the perfect site at Grandsable Road, Polmont. 

“You could say it was divine intervention,” adds Alan Stewart, Fiona’s brother. “Every part of the Falkirk Distillery is about place, people, family and the future,” he continues.

“We’re a passionate family business and we’re looking forward to starting to sell spirit within the next few months. We will eventually be able to produce over a million litres a year.

“We are hugely proud of The Falkirk Distillery and we hope the local area can be proud of it too,” says Alan. 

“We’ve had great support locally and also from the whisky industry and we anticipate that eventually there will be more than 80,000 visitors coming here every year.”

Those visitors will be able to enjoy distillery tours, whisky tasting and dine in the restaurant when the visitor centre is ready to open. Tours of the distillery will then be available year-round.

Fiona also expects to require about 60 members of staff, although the distillery manager, Graham Brown, is already keeping the stills and mash tun running. 

Formerly of Distell and someone who knows the workings of a distillery like the back of his hand, having worked at both Deanston and Tobermory distillers, he is overseeing production – with the focus very much on quality of spirit.

www.falkirkdistillery.com

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Distillery embraces whisky’s brave new spirit with its lighter, lowland flavour

Falkirk Distillery is at the forefront of the drive to broaden whisky’s appeal beyond its traditional market

WHISKY is no longer an “old man’s drink”, says Fiona Stewart, director of Falkirk Distillery Company.

“The whisky industry has developed considerably in recent years and is no longer about an old man ruminating over a dram next to an open fire. 

“Instead, whisky is about a new demographic of younger drinkers and recent analysis indicates that more women than ever are enjoying whisky.”

The new Falkirk Distillery, which will be able to sell its single malt Scotch whisky towards the end of 2023 once it has matured for three years and one day, is already building and positioning the distillery on a global market. 

“The industry has changed in the 10-plus years since we started building the distillery,” Fiona continues. “Our marketing, creative activity and product strategy will reflect that.”

“The changing demographic means that there is a greater interest in whisky that isn’t heavy or peaty.

“It’s all about remembering and respecting the age old values of whisky and marrying those with the dynamic appetites and tastes of the present day.”

One of the most globally renowned spirits categories, Scotch brands have worked hard to throw off outdated perceptions of design, imagery, and how it should be drunk in order to appeal to new markets.

Competition from the gin and vodka markets has also led to whisky reinventing itself to appeal to younger drinkers and this is reflected in many ways, including on cocktail menus in bars and in packaging relaunches.

Fiona Stewart is very aware of shifting trends. Very much at the forefront of the business founded by her father George Stewart and driving future plans, she points to the fact that The Falkirk Distillery is a perfect marriage of old and new, a nod to the past will embracing the future yet focusing on “place, people, family and the future”.

The Falkirk Distillery will be looking to sell its single malt into both domestic and export markets.

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An opportunity to be part of whisky distilling history

WHISKY lovers who want to be part of The Falkirk Distillery from the start can now sign up to be a founding member and, for those who wish to invest further, there’s an option to own your own cask in a first-fill bourbon and sherry hogshead. 

Membership of the Founders Club costs £698 and offers whisky aficionados the chance to part of distilling history.

Members get access to produces that will not be released on general sale – and they can have their name carved into the stave wall in the distillery. 

Benefits of membership include a unique Founders Club 70cl bottle of spirit for five years plus a 10% discount on restricted sales of distillery merchandise. Members will also receive prior notice of limited-edition releases and purchase opportunities plus two free distillery tours a year for two people. 

In addition, members receive a welcome letter personally signed by a member of the Stewart family, a certificate, a 200ml bottle of Falkirk Distillery new spirit, and a pin. 
Membership of the Falkirk Distillery Founders Club is an inspired choice of gift for a whisky fan’s birthday and is a good option for Father’s Day in June.

But don’t rule it out as a gift for a woman as research shows that growing numbers of women are starting to drink whisky and the new Falkirk Distillery single malt will be a lighter lowland spirit – a deliberate move to appeal to a wider market and also a younger demographic as whisky shakes off its image as an “old man’s drink”. 

Meanwhile, a limited number of casks of new spirit, which will be Scotch whisky after a maturation period of three years and one day, are available under the names of The Falkirk Distiller and Cadger’s Whisky. These are being released by invitation only to private investors – those interested should fill out a form at www.falkirkdistillery.com