Brass Tacks With Schustack: Rebecca Jago of Last Drop Distillers
"It's about having a drink in the end, isn't it?"
As much as spirits makers and spirits aficionados will tell you that an age statement isn’t the most important indication of quality, it’s the releases of older liquid that still get the most attention. We live in an era where everything is more expensive—never mind 60 year-old scotch. There’s been some backlash in the drinks media about ultra rare, very old expressions of spirits, most of which are released in such miniscule quantities accompanied by impenetrable allocations for them that the only people who can get their hands on them, let alone afford them, are billionaire collectors.
Every once in a while, we spirits writers get to taste them, but then who would we really be writing these articles for? Are we just showing off that we got to sip something most people don’t have access to?
There are exceptions, especially in the business of independent bottling. For those unfamiliar, these are companies who select specific casks of spirits and sell them in their own packaging with their name and information about the liquid. For decades, it’s been a huge business in Scotland, and a way for consumers to enjoy grain and single malt scotch whiskies from some distilleries that either exclusively have their liquid in a blend otherwise (like in a Johnny Walker), or don’t have their own bottlings on shelves for other reasons—sometimes even because they stopped producing ages ago but the barrels are still in a warehouse. In recent years, the business has grown well beyond the scotch whisky industry.
Because most of these bottlings are from single barrels, that automatically makes them limited edition no matter how old the liquid (some quite old), but because they tend to not get as much fanfare as some of the distillery only releases in Met Gala level packaging, they aren’t as objectified by high stakes whisky dealers.
The Last Drop Distillers is a UK-based independent bottler that, by definition, only releases the last of something. Most of it is scotch, but there has been some exceptional cognac, bourbon, rum, Irish whiskey, and even Port. The brand was founded in 2008 by best friends who were spirits industry veterans, James Espey OBE and Tom Jago (best known for starting Baileys and Malibu), who wanted to bottle and present rare Scotch in a way that would inspire drinking and sharing it, not let it sit on some collector’s shelf or be used as commodity.
In 2016, the company was acquired by the Sazerac Company, and further expanded its spirits category portfolio. Jago’s daughter Rebecca joined the company in 2014, and now leads it following her father’s passing in 2017.
I’ve gotten to know her a bit over the years. She is the head of a company whose sole business is dealing with things that, let’s face it, most people still find to be rather posh. However, she very much embodies that social, relatable mentality the company was founded on. She’s dang fun to talk to and share a dram or so with, which I have now had the pleasure of doing on multiple occasions.
Last Drop recently released a new collection—a 40 Year Old Single Malt Scotch Whisky from the Auchentoshan distillery, a 22 Year Old Infinity Rum Blend, and a 55 Year Old Single Malt Scotch Whisky from the Tomintoul distillery, its 34th, 35th, and 36th releases respectively. I had the pleasure of zooming with her to discuss the history of the company and the business of making spirits meant for special moments in life.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Amanda Schuster: How did the Last Drop originate?
Rebecca Jago: It all came about when two old men who spent many decades in the drinks industry decided that it was time for themselves rather than the big companies they’d worked for. But I certainly think there was a bit of a theme running through my father’s whole career… these wonderful moments of serendipity.
He used to tell the story of how he went for an interview at a company to become their photographer, he had this whole portfolio under his arm, and he came out as a copywriter because he’d gone to the wrong interview. That single moment led to what he was doing the rest of his life from copywriting within an agency to account management… to becoming the Go And Have Some Good Ideas Man [a.k.a. brand marketing], which is how he spent the rest of his career.
That ability to embrace the twists and turns that life can take is what makes life so fascinating. And to have the ability at ages 82 and 65, which they were at the time, to decide to start a new business is inspirational, isn’t it? With goodwill, persistence, and enthusiasm, they managed to get this idea off the ground and into a bottle. James was able to go around the world telling the story of his and my dad’s careers, spouting all the stuff that marketing people talk about, having that last drop of something before there is no more.
When we chose our packaging, it was supposed to be something that “haloed the liquid”. We’re not in the business of sculptures and sealed crystal decanters. It’s about the bottle being shared.
AS: How did they go about acquiring their first casks?
RJ: They came out of nowhere but not out of nowhere. They were 40 years in the drinks industry. The advantage they had, especially James who knew everybody… from what was then parts of Diageo and then Chivas Brothers, and my dad had also spent some time working for Moët Hennessy, he knew a lot of people. There was a lot of good will in those connections, a desire to help out a couple of guys with a nice idea.
AS: You have a background in linguistics and design. What lured you into the business? Did it just sound like more fun?
RJ: My dad used to say that if you can’t have fun in the drinks industry, you can’t have fun anywhere, and I do think that’s true. It’s a wonderful, convivial place. Generally, it’s about the enhancement of happiness. I mean, it’s not like cleaning fluids, is it?
I came on board because initially with my design background, I used to help them with the packaging. Along the way I got interested in the marketing.
Back to the idea of twists and turns, if you have an idea that you should do something, then you should maybe have a go. And maybe ask for help when you don’t know what you’re doing.
AS: Words to live by. So to you, what kind of spirits tick the boxes to be considered for Last Drop? Do you already have specific distilleries in mind, or does something just present itself?
RJ: If there is an overarching set of criteria for potential releases it would be age (but that’s not the end all be all), rarity, and above all, deliciousness. Which is obviously very subjective.
They started with scotch and the second release was cognac, then they evolved to whiskey being not just Scotch. Partnering with Sazerac in 2016 opened up the doors to certain warehouses to wonderful American releases.
People now know a little bit about us, and occasionally we are approached. The Japanese releases we’ve done—someone knew what we were doing and came to us with these opportunities.
You set out your platform and say, “This is what we believe in”. And it’s still true. You adapt that without compromising the value.
There are certain distilleries we wouldn’t bottle, these large distilleries [that are already in high demand]. Why would we? They know how to do it. They know how to do it really well. Our “shape” is that it’s about the liquid.
If we taste a rather old whiskey from a rather young distillery, that can be rather lovely. It would be a good liquid to showcase, as unexpected as it may be. As with the recent release of the Tomintoul. It’s a 55 year old whisky, but the distillery was only 4 years old when it was made. That’s a rather lovely juxtaposition.
AS: The company recently celebrated its 15th anniversary. What changes have you noticed in the landscape since it started?
RJ: I was in Taiwan quite recently. The proliferation of independent bottler brands on the shelves—I’ve never seen anything like it! There were hundreds there. It was wonderful to see, and fascinating. So since 2008, the number of bottlers has multiplied many times. The demand for Scotch whisky has just escalated, and the price of the barrels is now extraordinarily higher. I suppose at some stage we’ll see a correction to that.
Equally, in the states, the demand for bourbon seems to be absolutely insatiable. No matter how much more volume is planned for, you can’t keep up! As the American whiskey companies become more global, it’s going to continue to be a hugely in demand product.
A trend I’d like to see: that more people will start to drink “well”, more discerning of what they drink, how they drink it, and enjoy these things for what they are rather than chasing after labels.
AS: China is going through major economic changes right now. You’re spending some time in China this month. What’s happening in the spirits market there right now?
RJ: We were first contacted by a man in 2011 who had come across one of our early bottles and loved the idea, and James in his Keeper of the Quaich regalia and the story of my dad and Baileys. He said, “I’d like to represent your brand in China.” We didn’t have any other ideas. He did really well for a small business. He would take the brand story to private customers and it worked in certain markets.
AS: So this kind of business is about meetings rather than traditional marketing?
RJ: We’ll have a series of private dinners with customers ranging from 10 people to 30 people where we will sit, taste, talk—we’ll mostly be translated. But a lot gets said without words. There may be the odd bottle at a bar in Shanghai, for example, but it’s almost all sold through private networks. That’s a very Chinese way of working. It’s been incredibly successful for us. It’s like a ripple effect. Each group that discovers us and shares it with another network…
AS: Do you bring Phoebe [a high concept mechanical single pour dispenser Last Drop brings to tastings]?
RJ: There’s a Phoebe that lives in China.
(Phoebe at a Last Drop tasting at Overstory in 2022.)
AS: WOW! OK, so tell us about Phoebe. How did she come into play?
RJ: Phoebe came about because of our 10th anniversary [2018] when we did a popup in Piccadilly Arcade for a month. The people who designed this [small] space were working with a design team in Brighton who already had this concept of an intuitive pouring device that they would take to festivals so people could pour themselves a glass of water. They adapted that down to this two-and-a-half foot wide device that would sense a glass and pour a perfect pour.
The original version was this huge glass decanter, which meant it held about 6 bottles of whisky. We found it to be rather unwieldy. My father was still alive at the time and he joked that after 60-something years of marriage, my mother had never poured him a glass of whisky. So he’d had to invent a machine to do it for him. The original version of this device was called Penelope, which is my mum’s name.
When we requested a more scaled down version—a cage with a cylinder to hold the whisky—my daughter Phoebe said, “We’re going to call this Rebecca since it’s the daughter of Penelope.” I thought that it would be really embarrassing to say, “I’m going to go introduce you to my doppelganger, which is a decanter…”
AS: Hey, sounds good to me…
RJ: Well, I felt more comfortable naming it after my daughter, who otherwise has absolutely nothing to do with the company. She’s perfectly happy to have this funny thing going round the world in her name.
AS: By definition your brand is that it’s the Last Drop of something. Has there been a spirit that’s been an especially tough goodbye?
RJ: One that has been quite emotional for me was a cognac that was released in 2008. A good friend took me to a tasting he’d organized with some very old barrels, and at something like 8 o’clock in the morning there’s 40 glasses lined up, and we’re tasting our way through them.
There was one glass we both kept going back to, and we were so drawn in by this liquid. The guy who was running the tasting had this sort of knowing smile on his face the whole time. ‘’What IS this? What IS this?” we kept asking.
It turned out this cognac was a single barrel of cognac that his great grandfather distilled in 1925. When the Germans were approaching Southwest France in the Second World War [in 1940], he had hidden it away in one of those great big Tournel wooden vats along with a barrel of something else. It had got left there, and only discovered by the chap we were with when he was doing a renovation [on the building where it had been left].
It had been untouched. No one had messed with it… it just sat in silence. It was utterly delicious. I felt very honored to be part of the tasting and decision making of bottling it.
From a very personal point of view, we discovered it in 2017. So my father did get to taste it.
It was distilled in the year he was born, and it turned out to have been bottled in the year he died. In July of 2025, we will toast him with it, on what would have been his 100th birthday.
AS: I’m so glad I asked that question! Anything else you would like readers to know about Last Drop or what’s ahead?
RJ: I think the most exciting thing of the last couple of years is the foundation of The Assembly. Colin Scott, who was the Master Blender of Chivas Brothers retired in 2020, and because he knew James and my dad, he agreed to join as our Master Blender and quality consultant on Scotch. And because we don’t want to make it a thing that we’re just a Scotch whisky company, we thought it would be a nice idea if we could bring in other people in spirits categories to join us [as volunteers] on something we call The Assembly.
It’s a combination of Sazerac and non-Sazerac team members, so we now have Colin, Drew [Mayville, Master Blender and Director of Quality at Buffalo Trace], Louise McGuane of JJ Corry in Ireland, Denis Lahouratate who is the Cellar Master of Domaine de Sazerac, Michael d’Souza from Paul John in India, Richard Seale from Foursquare Rum. Then earlier this year Helen Mulholland, who used to be the Master Blender for Bushmills and is now the Master Blender of Lough Gill.
So we have two women who happen to represent Irish whiskey. But the whole point of Last Drop is not that it’s about equal representation, it’s about having this amazing group of people who can sit and talk in a way that just makes your eyes go out in stalks. And it’s wonderful to listen to them listen to each other as well. I think because with great knowledge comes great inquisitiveness.
May last year we had our first in-person gathering [it had all been on Zoom during lockdown]. So the big goal this year is to try and get them all together again as a celebratory forum. And in the past year Colin, Drew, and Louise all created signature bottlings for the Last Drop. And in the coming years we hope that everyone else in that group will do the same. We hope [moving forward] to have a signature creation collection for one part of the year and a curated collection for the other part.
It’s about having a drink in the end, isn’t it?