I started my first company in 1990 – a technology hardware business right at the start of the internet age. Since then, I’ve run, bought, sold, started, and invested in lots of businesses. As you might imagine, I’d enjoyed many a good dram of whisky over those years and had started building up my personal collection of rare bottles about 30 years ago.
Whisky galore
Whisky has always been a hobby – or, in my wife’s words, an obsession. From the first small dram with my father when I was 18, I’ve been utterly enamoured with how it’s made, where it’s stored, the people involved, the stories, and, of course, the taste. I never imagined when I bought my first bottle almost three decades ago that I would be able to transform my passion into a business and share my love for whisky with so many enthusiasts.
Identifying the opportunity
My journey into the cask trading market felt like a natural progression after years of collecting old and rare bottles. Over the years, I ended up with thousands of bottles in storage and hundreds at home. The turning point came on one of my many visits to Scotland, where someone suggested I buy a cask. My initial reaction was surprise; I didn’t know it was possible. Ten years ago, most people had no idea you could buy a cask. It was a closed market known only to those within the industry.
After starting to curate my cask portfolio, I ran into several obstacles. Many of the casks I had bought weren’t in my name, not stored in the right warehouse, and some didn’t even exist. I spent 12 months trying to sort out almost 50 casks.
Having personally fallen victim to a scam, I knew there must be many other whisky enthusiasts like me who wanted to collect casks but had no accessible way to do so. The desire to put this right inspired me to turn this hobby into my life’s focus – creating a transparent marketplace enabling anyone to enter with confidence.
Building the business
The business plan was simple: to do everything for new customers of casks that I wished had been done for me. We set up a registered company in the UK, obtained all necessary licenses, and applied the transferrable skills from my IT background to develop a computer system to catalogue, look after, and manage the casks properly. This was crucial for starting from a solid foundation.
I knew from the start that I didn’t want to be a broker because you don’t have full control that way. You have to own the stock to check it. In fact, the main cause of my previous issues was brokers selling someone else’s stock. My idea was different. For me, whisky is more than a commodity to be traded on a sales platform. I wanted to create a marketplace where this labour of love brings benefits to all in the ecosystem – the distillery, drinker, and independent bottler alike.
To achieve this, building a team of experts was essential. Having immersed myself in the industry, making connections came naturally, which made it easier to approach individuals in my network with deep industry knowledge and experience – people who ‘speak whisky’. For example, the expertise of Colin Hampden-White, a Keeper of the Quaich and frequent judge of the Whisky Awards, and Lee Tomlinson, a former manager at the iconic Milroy’s of Soho, with his own networks among independent bottlers and distilleries, was pivotal in Cask Trade’s early days.
Overcoming challenges
In fact, hiring talent of this calibre and track record was crucial in overcoming one of the initial challenges – gaining the trust of Scotch whisky distilleries. These distilleries were rightly sceptical of newcomers as the market was plagued by ‘here today, gone tomorrow’ scammers. From the beginning, I emphasised integrity and expertise. That became our purpose. We ensure all casks are held in HMRC-bonded warehouses, which are regularly visited and approved by our whisky masters.
For me, it was vital that this purpose carried through beyond the purchase, too, so we started offering clients health checks and tastings of their casks. This commitment to quality has allowed us to build strong relationships with clients and industry partners, not just in the UK but globally, with agents in Australia, Singapore, India, the US, and an office in Hong Kong. Trust and integrity continue to be a focus as we campaign to call out the scammers who risk the reputation of the industry we love.
Final thoughts
Reflecting on the journey we have been on over the last six years, my key takeaways are clear: passion, persistence, and a strong team are crucial. For aspiring entrepreneurs, turning your passions into businesses is possible with dedication and strategic planning. If you have a genuine love for something, pursue it relentlessly, and you may find yourself building a career around it, just as I did with whisky.
With an extensive background in technology, commercial property and agriculture, angel investor and serial entrepreneur Simon Aron is now the Founder and Managing Director of Cask Trade, one of the world’s largest cask whisky marketplaces.
