Benriach

In the heart of the Speyside, between the village of Rothes and the town of Elgin, we find the BenRiach (Gaelic for “speckled mountain”) distillery in the Spey Valley. Founded in 1898 by John Duff (who also owned the nearby Longmorn distillery), and part of the Grant family, it was built in the midst of the whisky boom of the late nineteenth century.

The distillery was finished a few months prior to the famous Pattison Brothers bankruptcy scandal which crippled the whisky industry and led to the closure of a great amount of distilleries, some of which had barely just started themselves. Due to the crisis, Duff came into financial trouble, and was forced to sell the distillery shortly after it was completed. It was then bought by Longmorn Distillery Co Ltd, who chose to close BenRiach in 1900; the distillery having been operational for just over 2 years.