Newly released bourbon, honey-spiced rum and our much-loved honey gin receive official seal of approval from judges at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition.

We are thrilled to announce that Keepr’s Smoked Honey Bourbon was presented with a gold medal at this prestigious spirits’ competition, now in its 20th year. Our Classic London Dry Gin with British Honey was also on the roll call of honours taking home a silver award, while our Honey Spiced Rum received a bronze.

Keepr’s Classic London Dry Gin with British Honey is a premium British gin infused with British honey from our own apiaries. It already has numerous awards under its belt, winning bronze at the International Wine and Spirits Competition and the London Spirits Competition, both in 2018; gold at the China Wine and Spirits Awards in 2019 and highly commended in the Great British Food Awards, also last year.

Our pure honey can also be found in the rum and bourbon, with the base spirit supplied by our partners, List Distillery in Florida. List triple distill the rum in the US while the infusion of honey, spices and pure Cotswold water is added at our distillery in Buckinghamshire. Similarly, List’s Master Distiller Edie Zurita distills and ages the bourbon in Florida before it reaches the UK to be further aged at our distillery for three months and then finished with an infusion of Cotswold water and honey from our hives, which is smoked at Upton Smokery just outside Burford in Oxfordshire for added flavour.

Speaking about the awards, CEO Michael Williams, said: “We are delighted with these results. It is further recognition of the exceptional quality and craftsmanship of our Keepr’s spirits and those supplied to us by our partners at List Distillery in Florida.

“We are particularly delighted to have received honours for our rum and bourbon spirits which we have been working hard to the perfect the taste of.”

This is the second year Keepr’s spirits have won at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition. In 2019, our New Make Single Malt Whiskey won silver and our Lemon & Pepper London Dry Gin took home bronze.

The San Francisco World Spirits Competition convenes once a year where more than 40 judges decide the fate of around 3,000 entries across the world in a stringent and experienced blind tasting process. This year’s competition took place between March 13-15.

More international recognition

To add to our success in San Francisco, we also received a silver award for our British Sloe & Honey Gin in the liqueurs category at the 2020 International Spirits Challenge, currently in its 25th year.