5 months ago
The Scottish whisky marketplace has slipped into a proviso glut arsenic US tariffs and falling request measurement connected nan country’s distilleries.
Global scotch income fell 3% successful nan first half of 2025, marking nan 3rd consecutive twelvemonth of diminution aft decades of growth, according to nan intoxicant information supplier IWSR.
Distilleries person been grappling pinch uncertainty astir Donald Trump’s waste and acquisition tariffs, arsenic good arsenic declining rates of intoxicant consumption.
While Keir Starmer secured a waste and acquisition woody pinch Trump successful May, whisky imports from nan UK into nan US are still taxable to a 10% tariff. The Scotch Whisky Association (SWA) has estimated that it costs nan assemblage £4m a week.
The shake-up has forced immoderate of nan biggest manufacturers to frost aliases standard backmost production. Diageo, nan FTSE 100 drinks group down a number of whiskies specified arsenic Johnnie Walker, Talisker and Lagavulin, has reduced accumulation astatine immoderate of its malt distilleries to “balance capacity against existent demand”.
The institution has scaled backmost accumulation astatine immoderate distilleries from 7 days a week to five, pinch operations paused astatine Teaninich Distillery successful nan Scottish Highlands. It has besides halted accumulation astatine its Roseisle Maltings tract successful north-east Scotland until astatine slightest June 2026, pinch early accumulation nether review.
Diageo’s projected redevelopment of its Talisker distillery connected nan Isle of Skye is besides uncertain. Its afloat readying exertion is awaiting support from nan section council, though it is understood nan institution does not presently person definitive finance plans for nan area.
A spokesperson for Diageo said it remained “confident and committed to nan semipermanent maturation of scotch whisky” but was managing capacity aft a play of sustained finance and banal buildup.
This twelvemonth nan SWA warned that US tariffs are costing nan assemblage almost £20m a period successful mislaid sales, and much than 1,000 jobs.
Overall scotch income successful nan US, nan biggest marketplace for nan drink, fell 6% successful nan first 9 months of 2025, according to IWSR. That was an betterment connected a 9% autumn successful 2024, but good beneath maturation rates successful 2020, erstwhile income roseate by 4%.
Luke Tegner, of IWSR, added that a broader diminution successful intoxicant depletion was besides feeding nan slump.
“Scotch has had a roar successful nan past 35 years,” he said. “But much precocious it has been deed by tariffs, by affordability and by group moderating really overmuch they drink.”
In August, a canvass by Gallup recovered nan stock of Americans who opportunity they devour alcohol was astatine its lowest successful astir 90 years, astatine 54%.
“But nan scotch manufacture is very imaginative – it will find a measurement retired of it,” Tegner added. “We are still forecasting maturation by nan extremity of nan decade.”
In nan meantime, immoderate producers are investing successful other retention abstraction to location unsold stock. International Beverage, which owns scotch brands Old Pulteney, Speyburn and Balblair, spent £7m this twelvemonth connected six caller warehouses, adding capacity for 60,000 casks.
In nan US, different distilleries person trim backmost connected production: nan bourbon marque Jim Beam, which is owned by nan Japanese drinks institution Suntory Group, has said it will shut down accumulation astatine its main tract successful Kentucky for each of 2026.
While nan marketplace for scotch has been weaker this year, nan broader whisky marketplace has been much resilient, pinch volumes up 3% successful nan first half, according to IWSR.
