As we’re fast approaching the end of the year, we would like to take this opportunity to reassure our EU members about their Society membership.
There will be no change to the way you order from us, whether it is whisky, our Single Cask Spirits or any of our other products, these will all still be available to you and it is very much business as usual. In terms of delivery, we expect some small changes to be put in place alongside new regulations coming into force on Friday 1, January 2021 once the UK leaves the European Union but this will not impact your Society orders being delivered from Edinburgh to your door with tracking visibility.
We will continue to share a dram with you at local tastings and festival events and you will still have full access online to our Unfiltered magazine and wider whisky community.
We’ve been working hard behind the scenes to ensure there is minimal disruption and change and we feel we are in a great position for a seamless transition. With this in mind, we’d like to highlight a few changes and developments.
DELIVERY TIMES
To ensure that all EU members still have full access to all the whisky on offer, post Brexit, we need to ship consolidated orders weekly to duty warehouses in six countries. From here we will redistribute with local couriers like DHL to members’ houses, this means that delivery times will be around 2-3 weeks on average. We will always endeavour to minimise this and look to prioritise the EU shipments on certain occasions. We felt that the alternative of warehousing smaller, limited pockets of stock in the local hubs to reduce delivery times does not give the best member experience.
In the next few months, as the EU and UK commence trading in a new way, there may be additional delays, as we start a completely new border and logistics process as a UK supplier to EU countries. There may also be additional delays due to a reduced capacity in transport provisions. However, we have been planning for over 12 months and believe our processes for delivery are solid and secure.
LOCAL WEBSITES
For the initial Brexit move, in phase 1, all members will continue to use www.smws.com as a single English language website, since we have already made significant developments and modifications to successfully fulfill EU orders. In this phase we mainly focus on the legal compliance of VAT and Duty calculations for local markets. Members will see very little change. However, with a further phase 2 development we look to offer local language websites for Germany, France and possibly Sweden.
PRICING
Whilst we transition, this first phase will see us hold the same pricing as the current site in British Pounds. Further development will see local pricing and currency being introduced depending on local VAT and duty rates.
CHRISTMAS ORDERS
Orders for deliveries in time for Christmas in the EU will need to be with us before 12 noon (UK time) on 17th December.
We will look to honour any last orders made on our current website, please make sure to do this before 12 noon (UK time) on 21st December, with deliveries being made before 31st December.
Sorry, any orders placed after this date will need to be refunded as we cannot legally accept orders for shipment to non-UK countries to arrive post Brexit date of 31st December, until our new EU site is live. We anticipate this to be Tuesday, 8th January 2021. We will aim not to release any new bottlings in UK or EU until the EU site is live, but if we do, we will ensure we save stock for the EU members. At this stage we anticipate the January Outturn to go on sale on Friday, 15th January 2021.
The Scotch Malt Whisky Society, The Vaults, 87 Giles Street, Leith EH6 6BZ
Contact: sales@smws.com or call 0131 555 2929 (Mon-Fri 9am-4.45pm). Visit the Society at here for membership information
This is your chance to join and to take advantage of their great offers!
Spot the SMWS bottles in this amusing You Tube video
