Good Evening!

Let me first deal with the Elephant in the room… I know I'm two weeks late and for that, I can only apologise. In my head, you have obviously been climbing the walls waiting for this latest blog post.

Moving on swiftly; after the roaring success of our first two batches of which we sold out of both, we are now well into our third batch with another due to be distilled in a week. The past 4 weeks have been an overwhelming mix of bottle making, rinsing, filling, corking, labelling, and packing, Oh the boxes… Cardboard is definitely in season in our lives. We have both barely stopped to take a breath. Not to mention, the kids returning to and starting school for the first time, three birthdays, and family gatherings.

We were over the moon to finally take delivery of the remaining quantity of our stoppers, which has now meant all bets are off and we can push forward with distributing to stockists all around the country. We have been selective on who we stock our gin with, as we both agree they have to understand the care, love, and attention that has gone into Igneous up to this point and will continue to be the core of our business moving forward. Obviously, to many businesses money talks volumes and comes as a priority, but we also want people to want to stock us for one single reason; they love the product and they believe in what we are doing. We have had a few wobbles over our premium price bracket, but sadly if they can't see the value in what we are doing as a brand and the work that goes into Igneous Gin then they may not be the right stockists for us. You win some and you lose some.

It's been incredibly exciting to get to know new people and businesses all over the country and also have people far and wide from across the world asking if we can sell to them. I would have to say, sitting here on this dark autumnal evening with the fire crackling, cup of tea in hand, the proudest moments of the past month have been reading the reviews and comments of the public and experts who have purchased a bottle. I keep having to have a word with myself and remind myself that people are actually loving our gin! In the words of Mr Clarkson… WE DID A THING!

When we got a review about a week after we launched from Andrew Gordon at The Gin Den describing our West Highland Dry Gin and story in detail, stating it was in his top three new releases for 2023, I almost combusted with joy and it gave me the much-needed drive to pick up the pace after the tiring journey to launch. It has been worth it…

Now with Christmas around the corner, it's heads down to get the stock levels up. We have some Christmas events planned as well as a potential little limited edition treat for our Christmas shoppers.

With eyes to 2024, we are planning to go large and get to as many gin fairs, festivals, and shows as we can and hopefully do it in style. Anyone who knows me personally, knows that I don't like to do things by half, and I'm desperate to create a show stand that will support our brand, story, and the unique nature of the Never Ever Ordinary.

I will try and get another blog done at the end of the month to make up for my poor performance over the past couple of weeks. For now, I hope you all have a restful weekend full of fun and most importantly Gin!

Miles and Katie x