Established in the UK, The Last Drop Distillers was born from the pursuit of a long held dream of spirit connoisseurs Tom Jago and James Espey OBE. Formerly holding successful careers in the spirits industry, Jago and Espey were inspired to find some of the world’s most exquisite liquors. Infused with a passion for spirits and a thirst for adventure the duo scoured the globe to unearth rare and vintage releases that quickly became some of the most rarefied and highly coveted spirits in the world.
Today, their daughters Rebecca Jago and Beanie Geraedts-Espey have upheld their vision and taken the helm as managing directors of The Last Drop Distillers. Rebecca Jago sat down with Neue Luxury during her recent trip to Australia to celebrate The Last Drop’s much anticipated new releases. In an intimate conversation we discussed Rebecca’s relentless commitment to uphold her father’s legacy.
Joshua Elias: When your father and James Espey first began hunting these rarities, did they envisage The Last Drop as the business it is today?
Rebecca Jago: The idea was ‘let’s find some amazing old whisky, let’s put it in bottles, let’s call it the Last Drop and then we’ll sell it’. It was only really when they sold out of the first release and someone asked them the question ‘what’s next?’ that the germ of the idea of an actual business started to ferment.
JE: Was there a ‘Eureka!’ moment in the early days?
RJ: Before they found the 1960 [Blended Scotch Whisky] there were some doubts about whether they were going to find that eureka liquid … My father said, to the day he died that the 1960, our first release, was the best whisky he ever tasted. They (Jago and Espey) tasted several hundred whiskies before they chose that as their first release. They were touring all the facilities and distilleries in Scotland and when they came upon the 1960, there was enough for 1,347 bottles. They knew they’d found their holy grail.
JE: In some ways, the purpose of extracting the spirit from the cask and bottling it, is liberating the spirit and being able to share it?
RJ: Absolutely, it is. It is saying, ‘we found something, it is amazing, enjoy it’. We don’t talk about investment. In fact, we would quite actively counter that by saying that spirits, all of them, were never ever designed to be kept in crystal decanters behind a locked door. Whisky, cognac, rum, etc. they are all designed to be shared.
JE: In terms of the physical process of visiting the distillery, are the spirits usually stored in a cask or do you source bottled spirits as well?
RJ: We would never buy anything that is in glass already. Spirits don’t age once they are put into glass. So a 12-year-old from 1936 will always be a 12-year-old, it is not going to age any further. Especially in the Scotch industry every cask has a history. H.M.R.C (Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs) know exactly where it is from the point of filling until the point of bottling. Therefore, you have provenance and you have history when buying a cask.
JE: When you decide on a Last Drop Distillers release, is it a case of something you absolutely know at first instance or is it a case of tasting over and over again before making a decision?
RJ: It is both. In Cognac I’ve had exactly both of those experiences. When I was quite new to the business my father and I went to Cognac. We’d been told about a man and his family that had a lot of very old cognac and he was interested in selling some of it. It was a beautiful day and we drove down this wonderful countryside. We went into the bar and it was full of aged cognacs in demijohns going back to 1906. When we tasted them there, they tasted amazing but when we took them back to the UK and tasted them with the whole team, we decided that they were not a quality we would buy.
[On the other hand] I was in Cognac a year ago and we were offered a cask from around 1925 and I tasted it with Clive Carpenter who has worked in Cognac all his life. The guy who was selling it was seriously confident that he had something good because he presented it alongside with Hennessey Paradis and Remy Martin Louis XIII. He was sort of waiting for us to just say ‘ok!’. It was mind bogglingly good and when I brought it back to the office, everyone felt the same without any doubt. Those are the eureka moments we are looking for.
JE: What is your favourite spirit from those that are currently available?
RJ: For me, I’d say it is the 1971 [Blended Scotch Whisky]. Every time I taste it I’m blown away by how good it tastes. Everything that it has been through, you can taste it. It is like you are tasting this extraordinary journey where you have 12 years in bourbon (cask), 9 years in sherry (cask) and then another 24 years in bourbon (cask). Even in a tiny taste, you get every layer. Like a very old married couple—they’ve been through the courtship and they have been together in the childbearing years and now they are retired—it is real storytelling at its best and I love it.
JE: Old spirits can be quite delicate. Do you have any advice as to glassware and service temperature?
RJ: In an ideal world, the best glasses are grappa glasses because they have a bulb to open up the spirit and they have a narrow funnel which really really enhances all our spirits. In the absence of a grappa glass, I’d say a copita is infinitely preferable … certainly not a tumbler. Other than that, a white wine glass is preferable. Room temperature is best and certainly not chilled. We would never put ice in our spirits. Maybe a drop of water but every one of our spirits tastes superb without any water added.
Since its inception, The Last Drop have launched a total of thirteen rare and highly coveted releases. The Last Drop’s tenth, eleventh and twelfth releases are now available in Australia at Dan Murphy’s.
For more visit www.lastdropdistillers.com
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