Dufftown Spey Cascade

Dufftown is one of the lesser-known Speysiders, despite being one of the larger distilleries in Diageo’s portfolio. Dufftown was for many years part of the Bell’s whisky company, which also owned the Blair Athol, Inchgower, Pittyvaich and Bladnoch distilleries when it was acquired by Guinness in 1985. This hostile takeover brought all of those distilleries into the United Distillers fold and later into Diageo. 

Dufftown’s malt was bottled officially at least as early as the 1950s and an official 40-year-old appeared in the 1970s. A 15-year-old Flora & Fauna bottling appeared in 1988, followed by a Rare Malts Edition and an underrated sherried Centenary Bottling in the 1990s. Dufftown became the European face of The Singleton whisky range in 2007, and Singleton of Dufftown featured in Diageo’s Special Releases in 2013 and 2020. Independent bottlings of Dufftown whisky are easy to find.

Distillery bottlings are, as the name suggests, bottled by or for the distillery from which the whisky has originated and are thus often referred to as Official Bottlings or OBs. Distillery bottlings are generally more desirable for collectors and usually fetch higher prices at auction than independent bottlings. They are officially-endorsed versions of the whisky from a particular distillery and are therefore considered the truest expression of the distillery’s character.

This ideal of the distillery character is regarded so seriously by the distilleries and brand owners that casks of whisky that are considered to vary too far from the archetype are frequently sold on to whisky brokers and independent bottlers. When this happens, it is often with the proviso that the distillery’s name is not allowed to be used when the cask is bottled for fear of diminishing or damaging the distillery’s character and status.