This Travelling Life: Ian McCulloch
The founder and managing director of Silent Pool Distillery shares his top tips for travel – including the value of a good electronic tablet
Ian McCulloch and James Shelbourne put their years of marketing and commercial experience together to found Silent Pool Distillers in 2015. Since then, they have been pushing hard to build the brand’s gobal footprint and its sustainability credentials.
What have been some of the most memorable and interesting countries and places that your work has taken you?
Japan was probably the most exotic. We have a great distributor there; they gave us an amazing tour including Kyoto, which we got to by Bullet Train. They also took us out for a classic Japanese dinner in the old quarter of Kyoto; departing the restaurant in a very gloomy street at midnight we passed two geisha on their way home. I’ve never seen anything so mesmerising. Shanghai and Hong Kong were incredible, so fast and the urban population are incredibly digital savvy. Everything can be ordered on the phone and can be with you within an hour, wherever you are in the city, and that includes gin. California has been a dream. We pitched to our distributor who couldn’t believe we have a 1,000-year-old Saxon church here in the Surrey Hills, a stone’s throw from the distillery. We installed one of our young distillers for a year in West Hollywood. Los Angeles has some epic bars, too.
What spirits other than gin do you like to buy in duty free when travelling overseas?
Normally rye whiskey and Bourbon, but most often competitors’ gins.
In normal times do you spend a lot of time on the road? If so, what travel tips do you want to pass on to our readers?
There’s no substitute for meeting face to face, at least initially, and also pounding the streets of the territory you are looking at. Watch how people behave around booze in all settings. Also get a decent case and try and avoid checking bags, always go for a window and get yourself an Uber account, especially in the US. I also invested in an iPad Pro with a large memory. I probably don’t use 15 per cent of what it can actually do, but for downloading hours of TV and films on flights and hotels listened to through good-quality headphones (especially on the flights) it’s unbeatable.
If your flight was delayed, who would you most like to share a G&T with while sat in an airport bar?
Alison, my better half.
If you had 24 hours to spare, what city in the world would you most like to explore? St Petersburg. It’s always seemed slightly off the beaten track. Whilst some cities are business cities with history tacked on, this feels like a history city with (for me at least) very little business tacked on. The Russians seem to have history on such an epic and sweeping scale and I’ve always felt I don’t know enough about it.
We have a long 12-hour flight ahead. What book would you recommend we read to while away the time?
Haven’t read a book for years. I’d download everything onto an iPad and do a decent stretch of binge series watching.
When we are back travelling again, what travel-retail exclusive versions of Silent Pool should we look out for?
We have a focus on gifting, so keep a lookout for some great glass and bottle value added packs in addition to our large two copa [glasses] and bottle gift packs, now in Silent Pool Rare Citrus gin. We also have an ultra-premium Silent Pool Gin variant in the pipeline.
Brand loyalty aside, what are some of your favourite gins and gin cocktails?
Aside from Silent Pool Gin I also love Silent
Pool Distillers Colorado High – it’s an ultradose CBD gin, great for long trips where you might need to zzzzzz for a bit. I’m a Negroni fan and that’s my reflex go-to cocktail, or obviously a Martini. I’m not good with sweet or fruity or gimmicky drinks.
Tell us about a funny, strange or unusual thing that happened to you on your travels. I once got the middle seat on an EasyJet flight to Ibiza. There was a really scruffy bloke by the window who looked like he’d had a colossal night the night before; I thought I recognised him but couldn’t place him. We said nothing to each other for the trip. On the bus to the terminal I realised it was Jason Donovan. That could have been a very interesting conversation…
Once international travel gets back to normal after this awful pandemic, what destination (international or national) will be top of your list to return to?
The USA and California in particular, where we have been growing at an incredible rate. It’s a key focus for us. Also Germany, where we are ramping up with a great distributor team on the ground.
California is such a rich and vibrant state. It embraces the new much more than the East Coast. Our current activity is around LA, San Diego, San Francisco and Sacramento – all great places to spend time.
Germany is such a diverse country on the scenery front, but the people’s outlook – especially where drink is concerned – is very similar to ours in Britain. They love quality and are prepared to pay for it and they enjoy consuming food and drink, much like the British.