On Wednesday, GlenWyvis Distillery celebrated the next milestone of its highly successful crowdfunding campaign on Crowdfunder UK.The distillery took the funding portal last month to secure £1.5M as it prepared to build the very first community-owned craft whiskey distillery in Scotland. After raising the initial goal, the company decided to extend the initiative another two weeks. The campaign has captured £2.25 million and became the Biggest Community Share in the UK.
The campaign’s launch was organized in conjunction with Community Shares Scotland (CSS) and offers investment opportunities for as little as £250 to locals living in all IV postcode areas. This will ensure a high level of local ownership of the distillery, but the Share Offer is also open to whiskey lovers worldwide with investment opportunities rising in tranches* to a maximum investment of £100,000.
Construction of the distillery is due to commence in this month with the first run of whiskey planned for Burns Night next year. The distillery will produce Scottish craft whiskey, and there are plans for an associated Visitor Centre in the town to be added as part of a wider plan to recreate Dingwall as the Craft Distillery Town of Scotland and as a quality tourism destination on the North Coast 500 route.
John F. McKenzie, founder fo GlenWyvis, stated:
“We hoped for £1.5 million, we were delighted when we hit £2 million and we are ecstatic reaching £2.25 million so quickly and really does underpin our ambition to make whisky history in Dingwall.We have a huge following locally and this has been borne out in pledges from over 50% of local investors and over £1.3 million coming from the local IV area – making it a community-owned distillery without a doubt. The distillery will bring employment, added tourism focus on the North Coast 500 and put Dingwall on the World Whisky map. Team GlenWyvis has worked hard to raise awareness across Scotland, UK and beyond and this has paid off. It really is history in the making and we are delighted to be able to say we will be reintroducing craft whisky distilling back to the Dingwall area after a gap of 90 years. We opted to extend our target date to meet demand and we would like to thank all of our investors as well as our GlenWyvis and Community Shares Scotland teams who put in a huge effort to make this happen.”
Community Shares Scotland, Programme Manager, Kelly McIntyre added:
“This has been an amazing project right from the start with interest from individuals globally, business, media and international organisations and really goes to show that community enterprise is hugely popular both in Scotland and around the world. The GlenWyvis community share offer is a bright shining light showing just what can be achieved in such a short period of time. Undoubtedly there is an appetite for community ownership in Scotland and another terrific example alongside our Portpatrick Harbour community share offer success last year. This should give community projects the impetus to take the next step and make their plans a reality.”
The campaign will remain open until noon on July 8th.
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