Tag: whisky

Recovering from being snowbound

Big companies fail to deliver the goods. I deliver myself as I can’t let my customers down.

Well, what a muddle the transport system here has got into. Found most of our shipments to customers, apart from the one sent via a massive company, whose 20,000 employees or whatever they have, appeared unable to advise me that they had lost my consignment – and still have not found it nearly 2 weeks after a 1-day service was booked. Makes  me think of the maxim of not running away from problems and admitting mistakes. Funny that our biggest supplier is most guilty of both of these traits.

Last week was fraught indeed – I ended up driving stock down to one of my Licensees at a consumer show in the centre of Newcastle, as the Courier used couldn’t even make it to the warehouses. Given that I had more to lose than they, did, I managed not only to collect from two unreachable warehouses but travelled through Scotland to Newcastle, and then on to The Lake District for anther delivery. In commercial terms it might not really make sense, but I couldn’t let my customers down when I knew I could sort it out myself.

Pity my suppliers didn’t have the same view.

What would you have done? I’d like to know your opinion.

On the Internet front, all I have manged to do is get used to looking at Keyword Spy and Google Trends. It is amazing to have these tools available and mostly for free – these type of products are usually in two forms – a free standard one and a version with more features that you pay for. I use ‘Log Me In’ for remote PC access. I am actually using it now while writing this on a Netbook PC logged on to my home PC located in my office. The Log Me In program I use includes remote printing, which is what I want and pay for. The standard version doesn’t have this feature and is free. For me, the extra functionality is worth the cost of @ $40 per annum.

More fun and games next week – keep warm – all the best.

Roy Lewis

Trying something new – should be easy…..

Mistakes made in making a YouTube video.

This blog is the start of a slightly different tack from the recent ones. The past ones have been mostly about shows etc. This and a number of subsequent blogs will be about the new ideas I am having a go at and how I get on with it, what worked, what didn’t and how I get round the issues – which may be finger trouble on my part or just not reading the instructions properly, not that that has ever happened.

The reason for setting up all these forthcoming blogs is so that others who are attempting similar activities can see that it can be done, it is worth the effort and that they are not the only ones feeling a bit overwhelmed by some of the new skills that need to be learnt just to set up one new idea.The new idea I would like to cover in this blog is making a YouTube video of me explaining the background to one of my liqueurs, namely Hebridean Whisky Liqueur. I have thought about doing this for over a year, got the equipment needed but not started. Analysing this, I have come to the conclusion that it is the number of areas involved in actually getting a video on YouTube that has put me off even starting. This is ridiculous as I have explained the background to Hebridean Whisky Liqueur thousands of times at consumer shows over the years-I can do it without thinking. But what happened when the camera was on….

Well, to my amazement, I started to stumble over the words and forgot half of what I was planning to say, It was almost as if not having an audience to perform to, made it impossible to be natural.

So what now. I have two options – keep practicing or try making the video with an audience to explain it to.. My first attempts were so bad that I deleted them right away. By next week, I aim to be able to send you the details of the new YouTube video – has to be less than 1 minute or no-one looks at it apparently.

Have a nice weekend.

Roy Lewis

Busiest Internet shopping day-will it be 6th December 2010?

I’ve been thinking about the results of our customer survey and how I can tie in an special offer to coincide with the busiest Internet shopping day running up to Christmas. It’s an odd date for us because we can usually ship liqueurs almost right up to 3 days before Christmas. Customers often have an idea that they need to get their orders in really early to get what they want in time for Christmas. As I aim to send all our orders on a next day service, this is the reason I can keep up with demand at that time of year. Watch out for the offer on our e-newsletter. If you are not receiving the newsletter, you can register on our site. Here it is:

www.hebridean-liqueurs.co.uk

After the very positive and interesting feedback from our customer surveys at the BBC Good Food Show, I ma now including one with each mail order I send out – if you return the survey, then you get 10% off all your orders placed online between now and Christmas. The point of the survey is to help me identify how I can serve you, my customer, better with new products, new ideas and new services – the critical question is, ‘What could we do better?’ If you have ever watched any of Gordon Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmare series, you will recall that this is the question he is most interested in finding out customers views on, right at the start of a project to help turn a restaurant around. Usually the owners only want to hear praise and just ignore really helpful suggestions from their customers.

Very wet and horrible weather here in Argyll today-here’s to a better weekend.

Kind regards,

Roy Lewis

Whisky Galore: ‘lost’ stock rediscovered.

The Whisky Galore real storyfrom the 1940’s and what happened to the whisky rediscovered years later in 1990.

Whisky Galore – brilliant Ealing comedy of the 50’s on the S.S. Politician running aground on the Outer Hebrides with over 9,000 cases of Scotch whisky on board plus thousands of banknotes. By the time the weather had calmed down for the authorities to get there, there were  and little currency was left.

All goes quiet for many years, until a company is set up 20 years ago to excavate the S. S. Politician wreck for more whisky. Money was raised, divers employed, thousands of tons of sand and steel plates moved to discover…..24 bottles! The whisky was partly used to make a blend called Atlantic Gold. These were sold round the world at the time along with another brand, Calvey Mist, which replicated 1940’s whisky. Then the company went bust and the stock disappeared into a warehouse. Luckily, the warehouse owner pointed the goods out to me recently – I was intrigued with the story and as I travel to the Outer Hebrides each year, I was familiar with the story.

I have now purchased some of the stock – the Atlantic Gold has numbered bottles and presentation boxes. there are about 60-70 left out of @ 140 ever bottled. Both the Atlantic Gold and Calvey Mist are packaged in a nineties style card box, typical of the time. The whisky used too is the equivalent taste to the 1940’s to preserve authenticity all round.

Both brands are collector’s times – I am getting pictures of these taken and will post these to this blog and to our site in due course. Just shows that it is worthwhile to look into new ideas from time to time – I wonder what other gems lie forgotten? It’s a bit like finding a Masterpiece in the attic or coming across a valuable sculpture at a craft fair.

Roy Lewis

Selkirk Car Rally-Sunday 19 September 2010

Welcome to my first blog for Hebridean Liqueur Company.

I have just returend from Selkirk in the Scottish Borders where I took along our liqueurs to the Selkirk Car Rally. What a nice bunch of people the participants and standholders were. Belst seller was Lord Nelson’s Spiced Rum Liqueur and all the small liqueur cakes went too.

This weekend sees Paul and Sue Bowers, Show Distibutor, at the Alverstoke Michaelmas Fair – more Nelson will hopefully be bought here too. Look out for their stand – it’s the one packed with liqueurs.

Once I get into this blogging, I will send out a regular weekly blog, which will keep you up to date with all the Show Distributers shows and any promotional news.

All the best,

Roy Lewis