Scotland's Bruichladdich Distillery Set To Grow, Grow, Grow

The Bruichladdich distillery on Scotland’s Islay island has been undergoing a number of noteworthy items of late, including the pending retirement of long time master distiller Jim McEwan and the debut of its most recent super peaty Octomore Scotch. You can now add massive expansion plans into the mix, courtesy of six new maturation warehouses to be built nearby.

It was announced last week Bruichladdich, which is owned by Rémy Cointreau, would be vastly growing its output to 1,500,000 ola (original liters of alcohol), hence driving the need for half a dozen warehouses to be added into the fold on top of what it already owns. The distillery said this production increase could only have taken place

if additional Islay-based warehousing was made available as the company is committed to maturing all of its spirit for all of its life on the island.

It had petitioned to local officials and, despite objections from some who opposed it based on the planned size and other items, was unanimously approved very recently.  Other infrastructure will also be included in the project, and all of this comes on the heels of other work already done or in the works, including rebuilding the open-topped mash tun which dates back to 1881 and major refurbishment of the wash stills.

No immediate financial cost was mentioned by Bruichladdich, but it will likely be spread out over time as plans call for the warehouses to be developed over a number of years.

“1,500,000 litres ola is the volume of spirit that we could distill when working round the clock for five days a week,” said Bruichladdich spokesperson Carl Reavey in a statement. “We have always made no bones about the fact we are utterly committed to maturing all of our spirit for all of its life on the island. The company has always said that if we can’t mature our spirit here on Islay then we will stop distilling.”