A conversation with Lancaster Spirits Company. The English whisky distillery scaling with digital transparency

In the historic city of Lancaster, a bold new chapter for English whisky is being written. Lancaster Spirits Company, born from the success of an award-winning brewery, began whisky production in July 2024 and with over 200 casks already laid down, they’re proving that scale doesn’t have to come at the expense of craft and tradition.

Combining brewing heritage, on-site sustainability, and a commitment to authenticity, 

 is building a legacy that’s distinctly English, and distinctly their own. From using live brewer’s yeast and their own well water to powering operations with solar energy, they’re merging traditional practices with smart innovation to move the industry forward.

Crucially, they understood from day one that precision matters. That’s why they implemented the Proof 8 platform to run their operation smarter using real-time dashboards, automated duty reporting and tamper-proof Digital Deeds for secure cask ownership and traceability.

With master whisky blender Max McFarlane at their side, Lancaster Spirits Company is laying down more than whisky. They’re laying down a legacy.

We caught up with their team to find out more.

Q. What is Lancaster Spirits Company all about?

Lancaster Spirits Company is a small-batch, single malt whisky distillery driven by quality. Everything we do is rooted in craft but with a progressive mindset. English whisky is innovative, flexible and exciting, and we’ve brought that into every part of our business.

We do things the way they might have been done in the 19th century. We use live brewer’s yeast, mill our own malt, and ferment for up to 168 hours. All our waste is repurposed locally. Because our brewery is on-site, the wash is exceptional, and that translates into better spirit.

This is what makes us quite different from most of our competitors.

Q. What’s driving excitement around English whisky?

It’s a young and dynamic category. English whisky has really just started out in the last few years. We take inspiration from Scotch, but because we’re smaller and owner-managed, we can diversify and innovate in ways Scotland might find harder. What we’re doing now in England is going to be incredible in a few years.

There’s no point in being traditional if you’re inefficient. We’re competing with some of the biggest distilleries in the world. They have economies of scale we don’t. So, we have to be efficient. We embedded Proof 8 into the business from the start for that reason. It gives us full visibility of all our production and maturation operations. That kind of transparency has become an essential part of how we operate and grow.

Customers today want to clearly see proof of provenance, they want visibility. They want to know where their cask is and how it’s doing. We sell private casks to people all over the world, and they need to be able to have information about what’s happening with their cask at any time. Proof 8 allows us to offer this with their unique 

Digital Deeds assigned to every one of our casks

. They show not only who owns a cask, but what’s in it and its location in our warehouse. Customers today want to clearly see proof of provenance, they want visibility. They want to know where their cask is and how it’s doing. We sell private casks to people all over the world, and they need to be able to have information about what’s happening with their cask at any time. Proof 8 allows us to offer this with their unique Digital Deeds assigned to every one of our casks. They bring peace of mind to people who otherwise just have a paper certificate to prove ownership which doesn’t stand up to much scrutiny today. They show not only who owns a cask, but what’s in it and its location in our warehouse. This has the potential to be crucial for us in the future as the English Whisky category moves towards Geographical Indication (GI) status and there’s even greater need for a system that validates provenance.

Q. How does Proof 8 support your day-to-day?

. From production tracking to tasting notes and cask maturation insights, it’s all logged and tracked. The platform also integrates with HMRC, which saves us a fortune on accounting costs as our team doesn’t have to spend hours preparing duty reports. The platform speeds everything up and helps us run efficiently.

The more efficient we are in the back office, the more we can experiment and invest in the quality of our spirits.

Q. How important is transparency to your approach?

Transparency is absolutely vital here for us. We need to know exactly what we’ve made, where it is, and how it’s developing. And our customers deserve that same clarity.

Proof 8 lets us follow the full journey of our spirit from the ingredients that go into it, the barley, yeast and water, through brewing, distilling, and into the cask itself. All of this is recorded on the platform, and on each individual cask with a Digital Deed assigned via a QR code.

Digital Deeds were a big part of why we chose Proof 8. They offer transparency of ownership that’s hugely important.

Q. What does Proof 8 unlock for the future?

It allows us to scale confidently. As a small producer, that’s critical. Everything is accessible from any device, which makes active cask management incredibly easy. That level of control and clarity is helping us grow.

Q. What’s next for Lancaster Spirits Company?

We’re gearing up for our first launch in two years. Max McFarlane, who’s a world-renowned whisky expert, is already working with us, sampling our casks and shaping our early releases. Some of the one-year-old spirit is already exceptional.

We’re also investing in a new warehouse that will quadruple our current storage and Proof 8 will grow with us as we scale. It’s not about growing production, but about growing quality, developing our spirit and the customer experience and we need accurate, real-time data to do that confidently.

To find out more about how Lancaster Spirits Company uses our platform, get in touch for a demo. To see more of our system at work in distilleries, take a look at 

"There’s no point in being traditional if you’re inefficient. We’re competing with some of the biggest distilleries in the world. They have economies of scale we don’t. So, we have to be efficient. We embedded Proof 8 into the business from the start for that reason."

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Putting transparency at the heart of English Whisky

Putting transparency at the heart of English Whisky

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Platform

Marketplace

Connected Products Coming soon

About

Team

Careers

Putting transparency at the heart of English Whisky

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