We recently got this press release about an exciting new competition at Bushmills!
MASTER DISTILLER SET TO TAKE DISTILLERY ON TOUR…
Colum Egan, Master Distiller at the Old Bushmills Distillery is set to launch a global competition – ‘Make it 2 Bushmills’ – that will, for the first time, see him take the world-famous distillery on tour.
Colum is offering two friends the chance to work alongside him for two weeks, to learn the skills of whiskey-making that have been alive and well in the Bushmills area for over 400 years, before he packs up the best bits of the Old Bushmills Distillery to go on tour. Destination? The winners’ home country.
Speaking ahead of the launch of Make it 2 Bushmills on St Patrick’s Day, Colum said: “More than 100,000 people visit our distillery every year but there are millions of BUSHMILLS™ fans the world over – so we thought it was about time that we visited them.
“We’re going to bring two friends here, give them behind-the-scenes access to the distillery, £5,000 spending money, luxury penthouse accommodation and the chance to together make their own unique blend of BUSHMILLS Irish Whiskey. Then we’re going to take the distillery on tour, when we pack up some of the equipment, people and whiskey that make our distillery the home of the world’s Best Irish Whiskey¹, and bring them to the winners’ home country for the ultimate BUSHMILLS party, where the winners and their friends will be the guests of honour.
“We’ll have live music from some of Ireland’s best up and coming musicians, we’ll unveil our winners’ unique blend and we’ll even toast the occasion with a few bottles of our special Distillery Reserve – a whiskey you can normally only get at the distillery itself.
“Make it 2 Bushmills is a great opportunity for friends from around the world to come here, to the heart of distillery and then take the distillery home”.
Make it 2 Bushmills will culminate in a global final – Bushcamp – a three day event taking place on Ireland’s spectacular north coast this August. Two friends from each country² will be voted by the public to go forward to Bushcamp, where they will experience what life at the Old Bushmills Distillery has to offer.
Colum said: “At Bushcamp we’ll be looking for our winners – the two friends who best represent the BUSHMILLS spirit of friendship, so we’ll be challenging our finalists to together try some of the things the team here love to do. I love my golf, so we might be asking our finalists to together take on my trickiest Par-3 on one of the world’s biggest bunkers, or, as I like to call it, the beach! We take our whiskey ‘mixing’ very seriously, so it could be fun to see how our friends get on when it comes to DJing, and we’ve got some keen cyclists here, so we may even organise a tandem race round the distillery!
“We’ll not be forgetting the whiskey of course – we’re also going to test the palettes of our finalists with a series of whiskey challenges.”
Make it 2 Bushmills will be judged by a panel of famous BUSHMILLS fans, chaired by Colum himself. The full panel will be announced in the run up to Bushcamp.
“We’re looking for real friends, with a genuine love for life and wicked sense of humour”, said Colum, “and do you know what? I’m sure we’ll find them.”
To enter or find out more, visit facebook.com/bushmills1608. Entry closes at 11.59pm GMT on Sunday 17th April 2011. Terms and conditions apply.
Share Bushmills Responsibly
The contest is open to residents of
• Belgium
• Bulgaria
• Czech Republic
• Germany
• Great Britain
• Netherlands
• Northern Ireland
• Republic of Ireland
• Russia
• South Africa
• United States