Aberdeenshire auction firm Whisky Hammer has achieved a UK-first as it targets more sales from people in Asia.
Founded by brothers in 2015, Whisky Hammer has become a global destination for buyers and sellers of rare and collectable whiskies.
Since then the business, based in Udny, near Ellon, has achieved more than £60 million in whisky sales.
Now co-owners Daniel and Craig Milne hope a new service will make buying “as seamless as possible” for its global base.
Whisky Hammer is launching a bonded warehouse service – a first for a UK auction house – in Singapore.
It is hoped this will make it easier for Asian buyers to take part in monthly auctions while helping UK sellers achieve better prices as they tap into the continent’s growing interest in whisky collection.
Asia showing ‘growing demand’
Asia Pacific continues to be the world’s most valuable export region for whisky, with exports totalling more than £1.7 billion ($2.2bn) in 2023.
Daniel, managing director of the company, said: “Our customer base in Asia continues to grow, and they are demanding more value-added services from us to complement our auctions.
“We want to make our services as seamless as possible for our global customer base.
“Singapore and the Asian region in general is an area where we continue to see growing demand for our whisky and services.
“Singapore being the hub makes the most sense for us to set up this service. What we are opening up is all centred round convenience for buyers.
“Shipping and logistics from the UK can be off-putting so what we are trying to do here is make it seamless.”
Customers first make their purchase from Whisky Hammer and ship their bottles from Scotland to Singapore.
Upon arrival in Singapore, the goods are safely delivered to the Singapore Bonded Warehouse.
A small entry fee covers all additional costs associated with transit “under bond”, and customers can then pay for their bottles to be stored and insured at the warehouse.
Further locations in future
Daniel revealed it took about a year to get all the necessary paperwork and licences completed for the incorporation of the business.
He said: “It’s great to finally be open and ready.
“Our ambition continues and it remains on our radar to make it as seamless as possible for our global customer base.
“At the minute we’ve got our premises in the UK and we ship globally.
“Singapore warehouse is step one in a multi-step process which we are hoping to continue to work on and open up in more locations.”
Changes in progress
The Milne brothers, born in Macduff, opened their Still Spirit premises in Udny – a whisky shop, e-commerce site and dram bar offering more than 100 rare whiskies – in 2020.
Daniel said: “Business is going well. We are continuing to see nice old and rare whiskies coming to auction on a monthly basis and across our group our retail arms continues to grow.
“Still Spirit for us is all about the ecommerce growth and how we can achieve that.
“We are working really hard behind the scenes on a whole new digital experience online that we’ll be launching soon via Still Spirit.
“It’s a very competitive landscape so we are doing our bit behind the scenes to see how we differentiate ourselves.”
Whisky Hammer success
In 2022 the firm notched up a world record when a rare cask of Macallan single malt fetched £915,500 at one of its auctions.
Other high-profile bottles sold by Whisky Hammer include a 55-year-old Yamazaki, which went for £380,000.
To date, the auction site has sold a total of 155,000 lots in its auctions. Bids have come in from 88 countries.
Its milestone 100th auction went live in March and is due to end this Sunday.