Compass Box is a producer, bottler and marketer of a range of blended Scotch whiskies. The company is headquartered in Richmond. Compass Box Whisky was founded in 2000 by American entrepreneur John Glaser, a former marketing director at Johnnie Walker.[1][2] The current blending team at Compass Box is headed up by James Saxon as whiskymaking director[3]
The company's whiskymakers select distillates from a number of existing Scotch whisky distilleries, with the selected whiskies then being blended together and the resulting blend matured further.
Products
Compass Box's main product line, called the Signature Range, consists of the following:
Blended Malts:
Orchard House
Peat Monster
The Spaniard
Spice Tree
Blended Scotch:
Artist Blend
Glasgow Blend
Blended Grain:
Hedonism
Compass Box has sold Limited Edition whiskies such as 'Art & Decadence', 'Optimism', 'The General', 'The Lost Blend', 'Morpheus', the 'Canto Cask' series and the three-bottle 'Myths and Legends'. Compass Box has worked with restaurants, bars, and bartenders to produce the range. 'Juveniles' was blended with restaurateur Tim Johnston to favour the tastes of the classic French cuisine of Parisian bistro Juveniles Bistrot à Vins. 'Delilah's' was created in partnership with Chicago punk bar owner Mike Miller. London bartender Rosey Mitchell created 'The Circle' with Compass Box whisky makers. To celebrate the 20th anniversary, Compass Box has released a limited cask strength variant of the Compass Box Peat Monster in April 2023.[4]
The Extinct Blends Quartet
The Extinct Blends Quartet was created to pay homage to some of the blending team's favorite blends that have continued to hold historic importance and inspire fans to the heights of blended Scotch whisky. Fashions change, and formulae follow suit. Blended whiskies of the 1970s, '80s and '90s are very different to today's versions, even when the brand name remains the same. The Extinct Blends Quartet, as it unfolds, reimagines four blended Scotches from yesteryear, using some of the company's rarest and most idiosyncratic stocks of whisky.
The first three expressions of the series (Ultramarine,[5] Delos[6] and Metropolis[7]) were released between 2022 and 2023.The fourth and final bottle, Celestial, in 2024.[8]
Other Products
Apart from whiskies, Compass Box also produced 'Orangerie', made from whisky infused with orange zest and spices.
Contravention of Scotch Whisky Association regulations
In 2005 Compass Box released a Blended Malt Scotch Whisky called The Spice Tree in which the blend of single malt distillates had undergone a secondary partial maturation stage in casks containing additional, flat French oak inserts (also known as ‘inner staves’). The Scotch Whisky Association, a trade organisation that represents the Scotch whisky industry, felt that the use of such inner staves in the whisky maturation process was in contravention of the Scotch Whisky Regulations prevailing at the time and threatened legal action against Compass Box if they did not halt production.[9] In response, Compass Box altered the production process for subsequent releases, by having the secondary maturation stage take place in casks containing toasted French oak heads instead of the flat oak inner staves.[9]
More recently, in 2015 Compass Box again disagreed with the Scotch Whisky Association when attempting to release complete information about every component whisky used in its blends, a step which the Scotch Whisky Association claimed was prohibited by both EU and UK laws. In response, Compass Box launched a 'Scotch Whisky Transparency' campaign to encourage greater transparency within the world of Scotch with other Scotch whisky producers – notably Bruichladdich – subsequently joined them in sharing full age component information about one or more of their blends.[citation needed]
Selected awards
2023: Compass Box Scotch Whiskymaker: The world’s Fifth Most Admired Whisky, Drinks International [10][11][12]
2023: Glasgow Blend: Gold, World Whiskies Awards
2023: The Spice Tree: Silver, World Whiskies Awards
2023: Hedonism: Silver, World Whiskies Awards
2022: Orchard House: Gold, world Whiskies Awards
2021: Hedonism: Gold, World Whiskies Awards
2021: Rogues' Banquet: Category Winner, World Whiskies Awards
2021: The Peat Monster: Bronze, World Whiskies Awards
2021: The Spice Tree: Silver, World Whiskies Awards
2020: The Spice Tree, Gold Winner, Blended Malt, World Whiskies Awards
2020: The Peat Monster, Category Winner, No Age Statement, World Whiskies Awards
2020: The Spice Tree, No Age Statement, Gold Winner, World Whiskies Awards
2019: Great King Street, Gold, Blended Malt - Super Premium, The Scotch Whisky Masters
2018: Glasgow Blend, Gold, Blended: Premium, International Sprits Challenge
2016: Flaming Heart. Scotch Vatted Malt of the Year, Jim Murray's Whisky Bible
2015: The Spice Tree, Best Blended Malt Scotch Whisky, San Francisco World Spirits Championship
2014: Delilah's, Most Innovative New Whisky of 2014, The Drammie Awards
2014: The Peat Monster, Scotch Blended Malt of the Year, World Whiskies Awards
2011: The Spice Tree, Winner of 'Best Scotch New Brand', Jim Murray's Whisky Bible 2011[13]
2011: Flaming Heart, Winner of 'Scotch Whisky Blend of the Year', Malt Advocate Whisky Awards[14]
2011: Flaming Heart (10th Anniversary bottling), Selected in Malt Advocate Whisky Awards 'Top Ten New Whiskies'[15]
2010: Gregg Glass, Shortlisted for 'Young Whisky Ambassador of the Year Icon', Whisky Magazine's Icons of Whisky Awards[16]
2010: The Peat Monster, Winner of 'Scotch Whisky Blend of the Year', Malt Advocate Whisky Awards[17]
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