About Demijohn



A Little Demijohn History


Angus and Frances in our Victoria Street ShopMy Wife and I founded Demijohn in 2004 in Edinburgh's Old Town as the World’s first Liquid Deli.  It started as a family business and still is very much that.  As Demijohn has grown so has our family!  The idea for Demijohn came originally from a wonderful experience Our first shop at 32 Victoria Street in Edinburgh's famous GrassmarketI had while living and working in Naples, Southern Italy, in the early 1990's as a Student.  I would buy my wine for parties from a local Cantina, or winery.  We were allowed to take along a container of our own, try the wines on offer and have our jerrycan filled up.  It was a bit like filling up your car with fuel at a petrol pump, except a lot more fun!  Having travelled widely and eaten adventurous food all our lives, Frances and I decided it was about time Britain enjoyed the full freedoms of taste experienced on the continent, but with a focus on locally sourced British produce.  

Eureka!
Expansion at Demijohn, a new shop in Glasgow and new daughter Chloe!And so a new idea was born in July 2004, however mad people thought we were at the time.  We now have shops in both Edinburgh and Glasgow, a thriving international mail order business and a growing wholesale distribution of our products throughout the UK.  Inspired by our own love of good food and drink, we have brought together a remarkable collection of predominantly British products such as liqueurs, whiskies, wines, spirits, olive oils and vinegars and inspired others into understanding and loving them.  Our products represent an underworld of small artisanal British producers, ranging from retired PE Teachers to ex Bankers, who make some of the finest things known to mankind.  Click on "How is this made?" in each of our product notes to find out more about each producer.

How it Works
Just like an Italian Cantina, great fun!Just like my experience of the Italian Cantina, we allow our customers to try something completely original and delicious in an extremely fun way.  When you visit our shops you will not only be encouraged to taste what we are selling, but we will attempt to unlock the secrets about our products.  Our team of passionate Staff are so enthusiastic and friendly, you will feel as though you are being entertained at a private residence.  We then individually bottle your choice from our distinctive glass demijohns into our selection of attractive Italian glass bottles.  The only slight difference from my heady student days in the Cantina is that because UK law dictates, you must first purchase one of our bottles.  We cannot fill one of your jerrycans in the shop, sorry!  However, those lucky enough to own a Demijohn bottle, are encouraged to return to our shops and have it refilled for the cost of the refill only.  This is not only cost effective for you, but most importantly good for the environment.  If you cannot make it to see us in the shops we will happily mail order all our products to you, and you can even refill if you can get your bottle back to us.  Please read Your Questions to find out how to do this.

Caring for the Environment
Angus and Flora busy recycling our producers containers in the sun!Re-using materials and reducing our impact on the the environment where possible, has always made great sense to us and has been central to our trading policy from day one.  Being able to refill your Demijohn bottle is only one of many environmentally friendly policies we have in place.  We deliberately source products from producers close to us to reduce food miles.  Our producers are all vetted by us so that we can be sure they use clean, fair and sustainable methods of production, in line with Slow Food UK principles.  We are lucky, deliberately having only a small number of lines allows us the chance to get to know our producers personally and visit them as often as possible.  We are the achilles heel of a supermarket in this respect!  But it does not stop there.  We have tried to create a unique environmental cyclic loop in going about our resupply and retail.  The containers our stock is delivered in, where possible, are returned to our producers for reusing.  Those that cannot be returned for environmental health reasons are taken Recycle Fife and are 100% recyclable.  So both our producers and our customers can refill thus creating the perfect environmental cyclic loop, ingenious! 

Team Demijohn having fun sledging in Glasgow!There is more, however.  All our carrier bags are made by from Scottish recycled paper by Smith Anderson, a local company in Fife.  If we are going to use new materials, we favour the use of many natural, sustainable, and biodegradable products.  Unfortunately despite  their low impact on the environment, there is often a higher cost associated with their use.  For example, we use friendly Portuguese cork for sealing our bottles.  Our wicker hampers come from China and are made of steamed willow that has a water based sealant, rather than the normal less friendly dark varnish stain.  Our Demijohn Jute bags are made in accordance with Fair Trade production techniques in India.  It gets better still!  We decided to fit out our shops with reused materials where possible.  The wooden shelves that support our demijohns are made from Scottish Ash that was rejected by the commercial timber trade.  Our Octaves that we decant our whiskies from have been coopered down from recycled old Bourbon Casks, even the majority of our beautiful demijohn containers have been recycled from their first life of holding wine and olive oil.  Will it ever end this enormous list, no!  

The proud owner, Angus in his shopOur policy for continuing clever, low impact retail will be with us until the day we close the last door on our last shop, that is how much it means to us.  On behalf of us both, thank you for your great enthusiasm, support and custom.  

     Angus


Angus Ferguson
Managing Director