Once in a while very old business models can still work.

by Tom Mason

The water of Maclellans Brook is already the purest, cleanest water in Cape Breton when it tumbles out of the Mabou Highlands on its way to the Northumberland Strait. But as it runs through the Glenora Distillery grounds, a small portion takes on an extra sweetness. There, it is collected and run through an age-old process that turns water into Uisge Beatha, the water of life. Pure, single malt whisky.

Glenora Distillery is unique in North America – the only single malt whisky manufacturer on the continent. Since 1992, the small operation has been quietly filling 1,500 oak barrels with fine single malt every year. When they bottled and sold the first batch of eight-year-old whisky last year, Scotch lovers around the world suddenly began to pay attention.

“We can’t call it Scotch,” says Glenora vice president Bob Scott, with a hint of protest in his voice. “True Scotch has to come from Scotland. We just call it single malt whisky.”

For Scott, the point where the waters of Maclellans Brook and the Scottish culture of Inverness County intersect is a “mystical” spot on the map – a word he uses frequently to describe Glenora and its flagship product, Glen Breton Rare. “It’s all in the mystical way the whisky ages here in Cape Breton,” he muses. “That’s why we’ve got such an incredible product here. That’s why the experts are telling us that our eight-year-old single malt is as good as any 12- to 15-year-old Scotch on the market.”

He may be on to something. No product takes on the personality of its surroundings like single malt whisky. The unique combination of water, the local vegetation, fluctuations in temperature and the flavor of the barley all combine to create the subtle taste variations of each brand. That’s why nothing on Earth can compare to Glen Breton Rare, says Glenora’s master distiller Daniel MacLean. “The spruces, ferns and maples that grow in this area are nothing like the plants you would find anywhere in Scotland. Our weather is different here too. It gives our product a flavor all its own.”

Unique flavor is something this part of Nova Scotia understands all too well. Inverness County got less than its share of the province’s natural and financial resources but it did get one thing in overgenerous portions – culture. The Scottish immigrants who settled here in the 1820s imprinted a proud heritage on the surrounding landscape. Gaelic is still spoken in remote parts of the county, and musicians from Scotland frequently make the pilgrimage here to learn their own traditional music from the masters who have kept it alive. This is a place where the names of stars like Natalie MacMaster and Jimmy Rankin are dropped casually into conversations about old high school friends; where a Saturday dance at the Inverness Fire Hall might include an impromptu performance by Ashley MacIssac or fiddling legend Buddy MacMaster.

Glenora Distillery is a final piece of that cultural puzzle – the Highland flavor of Cape Breton preserved in bottles of golden liquor. At the same time, Glenora is packaging Highland hospitality for the thousands of tourists who pass through every year. Along with the distillery itself, the complex offers a nine-room luxury inn, six chalets overlooking the Glenville Valley, gourmet dining and a lounge. In the evening, guests can sip on Glen Breton Rare a few meters from the building where it is made, while enjoying the live fiddle music of John MacDougall, 76-years-old and well known to the musical community here. Enticed out of retirement by Bob Scott, MacDougall travels down the mountain from his home in Kenlock every night to play the haunting reels of the old country on a fiddle worn white from years of constant playing.

Most visitors take the tour while they’re here – a step by step jaunt through the Scotch-making process. From a bridge over Maclellans Brook, the tour winds through the distillery, illustrating a complex process that mixes barley, yeast and water to produce a distilled alcoholic liquid that in eight, 10, 12 or more years will become fine single malt whisky.

The barley comes from Scotland where it has already been cooked over the peat fires that give the product its “whisper of peat” flavor. The yeast is imported from South Africa. The oak barrels are once-used bourbon barrels from the Jack Daniels distillery in Tennessee, still permeated with the bourbon that adds its flavor and color to the final mix.

Because of the fumes and the potential fire hazard, Glenora’s warehouses aren’t part of the official tour. That’s a shame, because the warehouse is the true heart of the operation. It’s Glenora’s Fort Knox – years of investment stacked in neat rows of barrels. Here even the most ardent teetotaler would find some level of appreciation for single malt. The strong smell is as pleasant as the finest perfume – not a heady, alcohol smell but the thick sweet scent of fruit and syrup. The sides of many barrels are stained a deep amber where the contents oozed out through small leaks until the liquid congealed and plugged the hole. It’s dusty, dark and dank, and a truly delightful place to be.

Like a spendthrift protecting a precious bank account, the barrels are tapped sparingly. Only two to three hundred of each year’s stock of 1,500 barrels are bottled in any one year, insuring that Glenora maintains a good stock of 12, 17 and 30-year-old whisky. Each barrel is marked with a year and the ones ready for bottling are tested and rated with a number from one to six, with six signifying the highest quality. As each year’s stock is opened and bottled, an experienced tester blends the grades of barrels together to create Glen Breton Rare’s distinctive single malt taste.

“Sometimes whisky can de-age,” says MacLean. “It can be ready at 10 years, not ready at 12 and then be ready again at 17. It’s the taster’s job to decide when it’s right to bottle it.”

Just 35 years old, MacLean has held the position of distillery manager for less than a year, since the retirement of Glenora’s original master distiller Ken Roberts. He’s worked at the distillery since 1994 but he admits he hasn’t developed the sensitive pallet of a single malt taster himself. “We brought in Jim Murray, a professional taster from England for our first bottling last year,” he says.

Sitting on a product for eight years before seeing any cash flow would challenge the financial resources of any business. Add to that the fact that Glenora had no idea what the quality of the final product would be and you have the kind of uncertainty that keeps creditors awake at night. Like the great Scottish distilleries that struggled to make a go of it in the nineteenth century, Glenora has seen its share of financial difficulties, to be sure. But it has been smooth sailing since the new owners took over in 1994, and since the first bottling in 2000, the product has been a raving success. The first shipment to Ontario and Quebec sold out in days. Reviews in magazines like The Robb Report have lauded the subtle flavors of Glen Breton Rare. And markets in Europe and Japan are starting to take notice. It’s all a huge confidence builder, according to Scott.

“It was a little luck and a little good planning on our part,” Scott says. “We’re just blessed here at Glenora – not only with the Scottish culture but with the right conditions to make a world class single malt whisky.”

This story was originally published in the Fall 2001 issue of Nova Scotia Open to the World magazine. Since then Glenora has survived challenges to its brand change by the Scotch Whisky Association and has released a number of new variations on its product line. It’s still delicious.