“You could say pat on the back for Tullamore, or shame on Diageo for not focusing on Bushmills,” he says. It had leapfrogged Bushmills, which Diageo bought in 2005, presumably to take on Jameson, and was now in second place. Despite the distraction and C&C’s failure to give Quinn his longed-for distillery, Tullamore had grown to 600,000 cases by 2010.
When Allied Domecq was sold in 2005, Tullamore Dew continued with C&C International, which was enjoying success with its Magners cider brand. “And in the early 2000s we began investing in broadcast and outdoor media in countries like Bulgaria, Slovakia and the Czech Republic.” John Quinn, Tullamore Dew global brand ambassador
“In the late 1990s we started to plant seeds in Central and Eastern Europe,” he says. He explains how Tullamore Dew was always considered an export brand that established a good base in Germany and Scandinavia. Quinn insists consumers were not bothered that Tullamore lacked its own distillery, but admits not having a home to show distributors and sales teams was “really disappointing – as part of Allied we were aware that they had lovely distilleries in Scotland”.
#WHISKY TULLAMORE FREE#
IDL was bought by Pernod Ricard in 1988, and the monopoly continued until Tullamore Dew broke free to join C&C, which was part-owned by Allied Domecq, in 1994. Within a decade, the company produced every drop of Irish whiskey from its new Midleton distillery in Cork, apart from what it distilled at Bushmills. The category had been struggling since Irish independence in 1922, and it was O’Reilly who persuaded the industry that survival meant combining to form Irish Distillers (IDL) in 1966. It was not unusual for it to be ‘stretched’ with a little cheap spirit by the time it reached the public, a practice that finally persuaded brands such as Jameson to start bottling in the 1960s.īy then, Williams’ granddaughter, Teresa, had married Frank O’Reilly, head of Powers whiskey, who transferred Tullamore’s production to Dublin and closed the original distillery in 1954. In its home market, Irish whiskey was mostly bottled by bonders and publicans who received labels from the distilleries. The blend included grain whiskey that Tullamore began producing six years earlier. All Quinn can say for sure is that “the Tullamore Dew we know today as Ireland’s first blended whiskey really happened in 1954 when the first shipment was made to the USA”. He died in 1921, meaning his family came to own the distillery, though quite when they launched the brand is unclear. He also imported tea, ran a chain of 26 general stores and, most importantly gave his initials to Tullamore D.E.W., as it’s written on the label. The credit lay with Williams, who brought electricity, the telephone and the first motorised vehicle to Tullamore in the form of his delivery truck. It was sold “all over Ireland, but principally in Dublin”, he wrote, “whilst a large quantity goes to Liverpool, London and Australia”. The whisky produced was pot still Irish and known as Daly’s whisky, according to Alfred Barnard, who visited in the 1880s while compiling his Whisky Distilleries of the United Kingdom. Ownership passed to their nephew, Captain Bernard Daly and his family, but the running of the distillery was left to the general manager, Daniel E Williams, who had joined aged 14 in 1862. “The Irish were never predisposed to pay taxes to an organisation based across the water who had come without invitation.” Tullamore was doubtless producing all manner of illicit hooch before the Molloy brothers took out a licence in 1829. While famed for its big urban distilleries, “Ireland had a rich history of rural distilling, mostly illegal”, says Quinn. The canal brought in empty casks and coal for the stills and took away the whiskey to Dublin in one direction and Shannon in the other. The original distillery in the centre of Tullamore was the most landlocked in Ireland, but it was well connected, thanks to the country’s Grand Canal, which flows through the town. “We’re right in the heart of Ireland, geographically and emotionally – as I say in my more poetic moments,” says Tullamore Dew’s global brand ambassador, John Quinn. * This feature was originally published in the May 2020 issue of The Spirits Business magazine.
Tullamore Dew is owned by William Grant & Sons Irish whiskey brand Tullamore Dew has a long history and thanks to shrewd marketing, it has become hugely successful on home turf and outside of Ireland.
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