Kingsbarns whisky distillery

Perhaps the least likely distillery to exist Kingsbarns was the brain child of Douglas Clement, a former pro golf caddy with no background in the industry. Happily he had sufficient connection to wealthy investors and a little luck. Clement notes that he was "fed up sending my golfing clients out of Fife to visit a distillery and I thought, surely there’s an opportunity to create a distillery close to the golf courses?”/q>. With a £1.6 million target, despite securing £100,000 funding and a government grant of £670,000 it looked unlikely that Clement’s dream of a Kingsbarns distillery would go ahead.

Happily the attempt attracted the attention of the Wemyss family (owners of Wemyss Malts) who co-incidentally had owned part of the Cambo Estate between 1759 and 1783. In January 2013, in a buyout that saw Clement remaining as a director the the business was sold to the Wemyss family. Work began on Kingsbarns distillery within six months and the distillery was up and running within 18 months.

Kingsbarns factsheet