Who We Are

The world's oldest licensed whiskey distillery. Born 1608.

In a world obsessed with followers, we prefer to Follow No One.

The best things in life are found far from the well-trodden path… by those who have a healthy disregard for the status quo and seek a superior alternative.

It’s why we’ve been making Ireland’s best whiskey with a steadfast commitment to our own way for over 400 years. In a world obsessed with followers, we prefer to FOLLOW NO ONE.

In a world obsessed with followers, we prefer to Follow No One.

The best things in life are found far from the well-trodden path… by those who have a healthy disregard for the status quo and seek a superior alternative.

It’s why we’ve been making Ireland’s best whiskey with a steadfast commitment to our own way for over 400 years. In a world obsessed with followers, we prefer to FOLLOW NO ONE.

Bushmills is named for the mills that made the barley and the River Bush, which remains the water source to cut our whiskey to proof today.

First to do it. Second to none. Triple distilled.

River
Rock
Barley

The Moment Irish Whiskey Forever Changed

In the 1850s, the Crown imposed a tax on those distilling in Ireland through a tax on barley. Even then, malted barley was known throughout the world to make the finest whiskey, known as “pure malt” whiskey. When only malted barley is used in distillation, and made at a single distillery, you have the very definition of “single malt” whiskey. That tax, however, forever changed Irish whiskey, as almost every Irish whiskey distillery began substituting corn or other more inferior grains for barley. To this day, the biggest and most infamous Irish blended whiskeys use only corn.

Not Bushmills.

Bushmills continues to distill malted barley and is the only Irish distillery still using malted barley in all its whiskeys.

We're not the best because we're the oldest, we're the oldest because we're the best.

Colum Egan, Head Distiller

Renewing our vow to our craft and proving our resilience, we went on to win the only gold medal for whiskey at the Paris 1889 Expo, once again affirming our credentials as a great whiskey of the world.

1920s

Weathering Prohibition

The U.S. had become such a big market for Irish whiskey, that when Prohibition hit, it brought US shipments to a screeching halt, and the Irish Whiskey industry took a big hit. Hundreds of distilleries were reduced to a mere handful. We had a hunch this dry spell wouldn’t last forever, and, like the fires, famines or wars that came before, we kept the whiskey flowing. When President Roosevelt signed the bill repealing Prohibition in 1933, the ink had barely dried when we sent our biggest shipment of whiskey yet to America’s shores. While Bushmills was back in business, records suggest that we were 1 of 2, maybe 3 whiskey distilleries still in operation after Prohibition.

1950s

Bombs and Boom Time

The Second World War brought new challenges, when a German blitzkrieg reduced our headquarters in Belfast to rubble. But we were proud to do a part in the war effort, and actually slowed production to billet American troops at the distillery. We get a sense that most didn't mind a “free bar” during their stay. As with the many adversities before, we soon returned to full capacity at the war’s end. For the curious, you can still see signs of our old Belfast office as you walk the Cathedral Quarter today.

Bushmills fame grew and exports rocketed in the 1950s and 1960s, making Bushmills a fixture in popular culture, appearing in classic films and memorable advertising campaigns.

Bushmills in Print

1950s Advertising for the American Market

MADE, MATURED, AND BOTTLED ON-SITE. BUSHMILLS IS THE ONLY PLACE IN IRELAND THAT DOES THIS.

-"Bushmills: 400 years in the making"
By Peter Mulryan

1983

Irish Single Malt Returns

Never content, we set our sights on making our most complex whiskeys to date, and three of the iconic whiskeys of the world. Between 1983 and 2001 we launched three single malt whiskeys – aged 10 years, 16 years, and 21 years. Regularly, these Bushmills single malt whiskeys are three of the most awarded whiskeys of any type (bourbon, scotch or Irish).

In 2017, we released RED BUSH, a special new whiskey aged in former bourbon casks. Aging our rare, triple-distilled malt and grain whiskeys in bourbon barrels imparts a bold bourbon flavor to the whiskey.