A great conversation with Peter Bowyer, partner and co-owner of Fort Glen in Duns, Scotland. My first engagement for The Still Life Stories was with Peter and his son, Matt. Their approach to maturing rare whiskies is unique and complex and produces wonderful results.
1. Before you owned a whisky company, what did you imagine owning one would be like? How wrong were you?
Before I owned a whisky maturation warehouse (no distillery of course) did it turn out as I had imagined? Pretty much so yes, although everything seems to happen more slowly than one might imagine, but being slow and careful is the name of this game! I don’t think that I was wrong about any preconceptions, and it was certainly the right thing to do.
2. Was there one moment when you realized, “Holy shit, I actually own a whisky company”?
I still pinch myself when I walk into the warehouse, see all of the barrels sitting there on the racking, dozing quietly and preparing themselves for greatness… Yes, it’s a great feeling!
3. What has been the hardest part of this business that nobody warned you about?
The hardest part is the sheer determination required to overcome everything thrown our way. We have so many rules and regulations (and regulators – most of whom seem to want to catch you out) that you can feel a bit oppressed at times. Being mostly Scotch whisky producers, we also have the added issue of the Scotch Whisky Regulations, which some might think are there for the benefit of the consumer, but the exact opposite is the case… They are there to benefit the multi-billion dollar producers by stifling any innovation – which is why we do both Scotch and non-Scotch whiskies so that we can innovate and do things differently.
4. Was there ever a day when you seriously considered walking away? What kept you here?
I have always loved a challenge! I used to race motorbikes and cars and always loved the most difficult tracks, and bringing a whisky brand into a world populated by the multinationals is certainly a challenge. I have yet to have a day when I could think that walking away might be a possibility – that’s probably mostly down to stubbornness and stupidity though!
5. What’s one decision you made that everyone questioned at the time—but you’d make again tomorrow?
I’m not sure that I have an answer to this one. Buying various different casks of whisky from all over the place gives us a large range of flavours and ages and gives us a wide range to chose from. I think they are all good and are being improved by what we are doing. Obviously the warehouse was a major purchase, and that wasn’t that long ago, so it hasn’t paid for itself yet, but it will. You have to take risks in life, but you try to minimize the potential for things to go wrong. If you never take a risk, you probably won’t achieve much…
6. Who inside this distillery deserves more credit than they get?
The warehouse is only Matt most of the time and me some of the time – as I live over 300 miles away! Matt and I agree the production plans and he puts them into practice. He has great ideas about the whisky but also about how we do everything that we do, which is rarely the same as what most other warehouses will be doing. He has all of the qualities necessary to take this on his own shoulders eventually – after I have sailed off into the sunset somewhere!
7. What part of this place are you most protective of—the thing you would never change just to sell more bottles?
We have the capacity here to produce enough bottles to make a decent living; the processes that we do, the amount of work that we put into each cask of whisky is not something that can be hurried or duplicated easily. We can expand production within what we have, and that would mean taking on a couple of additional staff, but the quality of what we do will never be compromised in order to push things through a little more quickly. Everything takes time, and that time cannot be hurried. That said we are always looking at ways to streamline processes, but will never compromise on the actually process itself.
8. If I sat at this bar with your employees after you’d gone home, what would they tell me about you?
Probably that I get distracted by small, relatively unimportant things – although I would counter this by saying that having a bit of OCD helps to make the product as best as it can possibly be…
I also try to be as fair as possible to anyone who works for me; I’ve been employing people for 40 years and the staff turnover has always been very low. That possibly means that I am doing something reasonably well.
9. Someday this distillery will belong to somebody else. What do you hope they never change?
The ethos – make the best possible product that you can, and never compromise on quality. It is the one thing that keeps us on our toes and constantly striving to be the best that it’s possible to be.
10. Last call. You’re not the owner anymore. You’re just another person sitting at the bar. What are you drinking?
Ha! I like to drink all sorts of different things; yesterday evening we went for a quick walk, not intending to stop for a drink, but passed a pub and thought “why not…?”
It was crowded, great atmosphere and got chatting to a chap we didn’t know, but had a very interesting conversation about all sorts.
I ordered a high-strength IPA from an award-winning local brewery – it was as good as I thought it would be.
Then we went home and fancied some cheese so I opened a very nice bottle of Pomerol – La Chenade.
I suppose this reflects my philosophy about lots of things – never compromise on quality, whether it is food, drink, travel, music etc. Life is too short to put up with mediocre…
See the amazing whiskies Fort Glen produces at www.fortglenwhisky.com
