Casks of Distinction: Rare whisky for drinking, not investment
Whisky Business: CityAM’s monthly look at the world of whisky.
Established in 2017, Casks of Distinction was created by Diageo to offer something different for the world’s most devoted whisky collectors – 12 unique casks selected from the group’s vast whisky collection known as “The Twelve.“
The drinks giant owns around 30 distilleries across Scotland – 20 per cent of the country’s distilling capacity – as well as 20m casks ageing at various locations around the country.
Most of the capacity produced across the Diageo portfolio goes into its blended whiskies and a significant portion of the company’s distilleries don’t have their own single malts on the market.
“Whilst the widely known distilleries Talisker and Mortlach remain an important and central part of the cask list, there is growing interest from collectors for the lesser known distilleries that may add a distinctive edge to their collections,” says Tod Bradbury, Global Private Client Director, Diageo.
A great example is the Glenlossie distillery. Well-known for its light floral nature, which is complemented by a crisp grassy maltiness, over 90 per cent of Glenlossie’s output goes into blends. This year, Glenlossie 1994 Cask No. 110 is one of the 12 casks alongside the star of the show, a cask of Mortlach 1984.
Cask No. 110 is a Glenlossie Speyside single malt, first-fill American oak sherry cask, estimated yield 151 bottles. “Every now and then we get a singularity like this… who can dig into something that is so far off the beaten path, that it has the extra layer of speciality to it for a collector,” says Rajan Virdee, Private Client Manager, Justerini & Brooks.
With so many casks in storage across Scotland, it takes time for the team at Diageo to identify those 12 that are worth featuring every year.
The team estimates that approximately 4,200 hours are spent each year by Diageo’s Master Blender, Dr Craig Wilson, on selecting the 12 casks.
The team looks for “singularities, these moments in time”, ensuring that “each whisky is presented at its absolute peak, honouring both the legacy of the distillery and the rarity of the remaining stock,” says Tod.
“We carefully balance iconic distilleries with more esoteric offerings… there is growing interest from collectors for the lesser known distilleries that may add a distinctive edge to their collections.”
Casks of Distinction: Selected to be drunk
One thing the Casks of Discintion scheme is not is a cask investment scheme.
When a client purchases one of the carefully selected casks, they can, if they so choose, leave the cask at Royal Lochnagar distillery in Royal Deeside for another five years, but that’s the limit.
The programme has been designed from the ground up to focus on the quality of the liquid, its age, rarity, and the experience of owning, visiting and personally bottling the cask.
Most clients are “emotionally attached” to their casks, says Raj and only one or two have ever wanted to sell. “I don’t know of anyone who’s had a hard-nosed commercial attitude to it, like, I want to buy it, bottle it and dunk it on the auction market,” he adds.
In reality, most clients bottle the casks before the five-year deadline. In one example, last year, Casks of Distinction featured a 1975 Talisker.
Purchased at 49 years old, the buyer wanted to bottle the cask when the whisky reached its 50th birthday. When bottled, it will be the only 50-year-old Talisker ever created. “But it’s a private collector, so you can’t have it,” notes Raj.
Curating the product
Clients can control everything apart from the yield. The overall number of bottles that are produced depends on multiple factors. “There are so many variables that go in to determining the yields,” says Raj.
Yield depends heavily on the cask type and the “angel’s share” (evaporation). A large Sherry butt might yield 450 bottles, whereas a rare, older hogshead might yield as few as 117 or 133 bottles.
Interestingly, low yields are not always seen as a negative; for collectors, “the limited yield (e.g., 133 bottles of Mortlach) becomes part of the cask’s story, adding to its exclusivity and long-term value rather than detracting from it,” says Tod Bradbury.
Conversely, Raj notes that some clients avoid large casks, asking, “What am I going to do with 450 bottles? “ He adds, “Whereas a smaller hogshead from a slightly lesser known distillery can be quite a nice entry point for someone.”
The bottling process is included in the purchase price of the cask and is designed to give the whisky the quality it deserves. If the client does not have a specific date in mind, the whisky team provides expert guidance on the “optimal moment” to bottle, ensuring the liquid is captured at its peak. For some clients, it’s the bottling that really matters.
“We’ve had some of our clients where, two casks in a row, they’ve wanted, instead of going to visit the casks, they’ve wanted to attend the bottling,” says Raj.
”So we flew them over, got them all through the health and safety and they watched the cask being bottled,” he adds. “And we arranged for them to handwrite the first 12 labels themselves.”
For Diageo, bottling a small run of 133 bottles can only ever be a one-of-a-kind experience, which is what the team is trying to achieve.
As well as being present for the bottling and writing the labels, clients can choose colours, art and add the signature of Dr Craig Wilson. But the important thing is the ability to choose the age and use the distillery’s name, picking up a cask from a “fully ghosted” distillery such as Pittyvaich (shuttered in 1993 and later bulldozed to become a car park), or hidden gem, such as the 1984 Mortlach was selected specifically because it was aged in refill American oak a departure from the distillery’s typical Sherry-forward character.
Other casks included in the Casks of Distinction program have included a 1979 Port Ellen, one of the last remaining casks from the legendary Islay distillery’s original stock.
There’s also been the 1977 Brora (Cask No. 2845), a 47-year-old cask that was the centrepiece of “The Twelve” 2024 collection, one of a limited number remaining from before the distillery’s original closure and a Glenury Royal: A 1968 vintage matured for over half a century, yielding only 192 bottles.