A day in the life of the managing director of Isle of Barra Distillers
Michael Morrison, the managing director of Isle of Barra Distillers, describes his day making gin on the island.
5am
Every morning starts the same. It's not the alarm that goes off, but the kids that wake us up, as both Micheal, three, and Ada, one, get up most mornings around this time.
It's downstairs we go, and straight into the morning bottle – milk for them, of course. After a little time to wake up while watching either Spiderman or Masha and the Bear, there’s a quick wrestle on the rug with Micheal and a cuddle from Ada.
6am
Work begins, starting with the emails, to catch up from what was missed during the night and get back to what I meant to reply to from the previous evening. This is followed by the first cappuccino of the day and certainly not the last.
9am
Our gin, also called Ada, is fired up and our distillery comes alive. Now another coffee!
10am
The shop opens and it’s time to get the previous day's mail orders ready for the daily post collection at midday. It's all hands on deck for this as we like to make sure that our shipments leave only a small carbon footprint when taking the extensive journey from us to the customer. We do this by utilising existing public transport links to send our gin to the mainland and beyond. So it is vital we make sure we get our orders out every day and on time.
3pm
Winter season means that our island shop closes early.
At the same time, Ada, our gin still, is coming to the end of her distillation run for the day. It’s time to grab another coffee before our daily visit from the kids, which happens after Micheal finishes up from his day at nursery.
We have a quick chat about whatever puddles he was jumping in and do a few high fives, then it’s a quick tidy-up before I head upstairs to start the round of daily Zoom meetings.
This is the only time I can do this as our shop is open from 10am to 3pm. It’s almost time for another coffee.
6.30pm
Depending on how busy my day is, I can head home about now. Fingers crossed I make it home for bathtime with the kids, as it’s the only part of the day when I can switch off from work. The only thing I need to think about now is how much fun we can have. I usually throw some cold water over Micheal before he quickly fires some back. Then it’s time to get dressed, downstairs for a wee snack and to watch some Igglepiggle from In The Night Garden, and before you know it it's time for their bed.
8pm
The kids are down and it's our dinner time. By now, I’d probably eat anything and everything before it's back onto those emails for an hour or so. I catch up on some social media, the emails are checked and, with a bit of luck, I grab an hour of Netflix before it’s bedtime and the whole day starts again. I wouldn’t change it for the world.