The Livery Vocational Training and Education team delivered a stellar day of insights to students of the Institute of Brewing and Distilling on Wednesday 11th Oct, using the 4th Floor venue at WSET in Bermondsey. The day’s module of “Business of Spirits” is just that – it brings alive the business aspects of the distilling business to those who only have a technical understanding of distilling.
After an introduction to the Livery by Master Chris Searle, Liverymen Martin Riley, Chris Pitcher, Steve Wilson, Richard Watling, Nick Carr, and Clive Bairsto – and featuring new speaker Abhishek Banik from the Copper River Distillery – were all on great form sharing their knowledge to give distilling students a wider perspective of the whole business. Topics covered included: a Global market overview and trends, Pricing and Finance , Consumer and Category Segmentation, Innovation, and a terrific personal story from Abhishek on his experiences of building a business and distillery from scratch with Bob Russell and his family and team at Copper Rivet in Chatham, Kent.
Comments from the students in the end-of-day evaluation were consistently 5 out of 5 gradings across the board with remarks such as: “..very knowledgeable and entertaining…”; “fantastic, highlighted how much I don’t know..!”; “..loved the practical advice/steps for real business application…” and “…absolutely brilliant; so worthwhile, and especially the networking opportunity” and “…I would love to attend more events like this…!”
Thanks go to our partners at WSET, Richard Harding and his team, for supporting us on the day with a very good venue – and to Bob Russell and Copper Rivet for kindly making Abhishek available to support us. The next delivery of this will be February 2024 at ICBD in Edinburgh.
