Greetings to our Friends,

So I don’t normally get all political, and I never forward on chain letter shite and the like, especially as 3DC. You know the rule; “leave your politics at the door”, but even I have my limits.

The “right honorable” British politicians are attempting to enact legislation creating the term “Blended Malt Scotch Whisky”. Now, the dram they intent to use this term on is currently called a “Vatted Malt”. There is simply no reason to muddy the terminology by tossing “Blended” into something that is not actually a “Blend” under the current terminology. OK, so I’m not going to belabor this.

Long story short, John Glaser of Compass Box has asked us all to sign his petition requesting that they go stuff the new term someplace where the sun does not shine. John is a wise and great whiskey man who we, the founders of the 3DC, respect as a whiskey sage; so I am in turn asking the whiskey lovers I know to sign as well.

If you feel inclined to do so, here is the link to learn more: http://www.thescotchblog.com/2008/03/an-open-letter.html
(John’s original letter can be seen by clicking “Continue Reading” below…)
Yours in Scotch,
Raz

Hello friends,

Pardon the interruption, but I simply want to call your attention to an issue that is very important to our business and to the Scotch whisky industry, and is something you can help us with.

Please help us tell the Scotch Whisky Association (SWA) and the UK Government that we think their legislative proposal to force companies such as ours to label our malt whiskies “Blended Malt Scotch Whisky” (instead of simply “Malt Whisky” as we do now) is a bad idea for the industry. If this proposal becomes law, it would cause further confusion for consumers around the world regarding the labelling of Scotch whisky. It would make people think less of artisan-made malt whiskies, such as ours, because we would have to put “blended” on our labels, a term people (wrongly, but nonetheless) perceive to refer to inferior quality products.

It would also force us to redesign and reprint all our labels, and resubmit them to label authorities around the world. Which would be an expensive pain and a waste of time.

This proposal has been widely derided by people across the industry, including whiskymakers, marketers, retailers, distributors and writers, including the late Michael Jackson, all of whom have pointed out that the proposal will do exactly the opposite of what it is intended to do, which is reduce consumer confusion about Scotch whisky. But the SWA have buried their heads in the sand on this issue in order to push through other legislative issues they feel are more important!

I could go on. But instead I’ll point you to a petition on the web that takes less than a minute to sign and which will help us send a message to the SWA and the lawmakers that the “blended malt Scotch whisky” legislation is a bad idea. Just click the link:

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/no_to_blended_malt_Scotch_whisky/

Help us help the Scotch whisky industry!

Regards,
John Glaser
Compass Box Delicious Whisky Ltd