Ruddington based artisan gin maker, the Ruddy Fine Distillery, has been shortlisted amongst major drink brands for its locally foraged Lockdown Gin at The Grocer New Product Awards 2021.
Regarded as the number one event of its kind for food and drink, The Grocer New Product Awards recognise and applaud extraordinary innovation across the UK’s FMCG sector. Previous finalists have included nationwide brands such as Sipsmiths Gin and Westons Cider.
Lockdown Gin is the brainchild of Cheryl Stretton and Rory Thorpe, who fully established their craft distillery, in Ruddington, Nottingham during the first lockdown.
After several years of being enthusiastic hobbyists, when Rory’s day job in events took a dip due to the pandemic, they quickly diversified and accelerated their plans to open the distillery as a going concern.
Cheryl Stretton, co-founder of Ruddy Fine Distillery said: “Our Lockdown Gin is very special to us and for it to be recognised as a finalist in The Grocer’s New Product Awards for best new alcoholic drink is phenomenal.”
Its key ingredients include crab and bramley apples, bay leaves, nettle and raspberry leaves and lavender. All are foraged from within the village when their regular ingredients became scarce during multiple lockdowns.
Cheryl, added: “To create it we foraged botanicals not only from the village, but several came from our garden, during the three national lockdowns. This blend of ingredients has made for a hugely exciting and unusual gin, which has proved really popular and makes a great addition to our existing range of handcrafted gins, all made at our Ruddington distillery.”
Demonstrating innovation also through its packaging, even the label has a nod to the home of the alcohol entrepreneurs. Created by Ruddington artist, Katie Derry, the bottle’s back label shows a treasure map of the village. An ‘X’ marks the spot where their flavours are developed at home in their kitchen, which can be seen through the clear centre of the front label.
Rory Thorpe, co-founder said:: “It’s been an incredible first year for us, selling over 5,000 bottles in under 12 months. We’ve been overwhelmed with demand for all our gins and the large bottles of Lockdown Gin sold out in less than 30 days. We have now got to wait for nature to take its course and ripen up the crab apples before we can start a new batch. Don’t worry though, there’s plenty of others to sample in the meantime.”
The food and drink products at The Grocer New Product Awards were judged and scored on a rigorous 10-point criteria. These included appearance, aroma, taste/flavour, texture, quality of execution, value for money, targeting and insight, product as well as packaging innovation and design and instructions.
The Ruddy Fine Distillery has developed a delicious range of gins since it was founded by Cheryl and Rory in early 2020, including London Dry, Summer Berries, Navy Strength and a limited-edition Christmas Gin, as well as creating a thriving Ruddy Fine Gin Club.
All blends have been developed from a passion and fascination for the flavours and methods involved in creating new and exciting recipes. They are still meticulously developed in their own kitchen, before being taken down the road to the Distillery to be cooked up in smal batches of just 350 bottles at a time.
The winners will be announced at a ceremony at the Hilton Bankside in London on Tuesday 16 November 2021.
- West Bridgford – 2nd and 4th Saturday of every month
- Ruddington Village Market – first Saturday of event month
Explore the full range from Ruddy Fine Distillery visit: https://ruddyfine.co.uk/
