Craft distilling is an art that balances tradition with innovation. It’s about innovative flavours, cocktails and entrepreneurial spirit. But once you get past media headlines, fancy packaging and price positioning – once everything is said and done – most of all it’s about quality. No matter how long your legacy is, nor how captivating your idea is, it won’t matter unless it tastes great!
To achieve this, understanding the nuances of quality management is crucial.
This article delves into the world of quality control, outlining essential processes and systems you can implement. It aims to provide practical insights into maintaining product quality and process efficiency.
Quality management in distilling
Quality management, encompassing both the processes and the final product, is pivotal for several reasons.
Firstly, it ensures product consistency, one of the major factors for customer satisfaction and brand loyalty. Secondly, rigorous quality management helps in maintaining high standards, which is essential in a hyper competitive market that values craftsmanship. Lastly, it plays a significant role in compliance with safety and regulatory standards, which can be stringent in the food and beverage industry.
Quality Control vs Quality Assurance
There’s a difference between Quality Control (QC) and Quality Assurance (QA).
QC involves direct inspection and measurement of the product against set specifications. In distilling, this might include testing alcohol levels, assessing flavour profiles, and ensuring clarity and purity. Quality Control is the frontline defence against quality issues – it sets a pass / fail metric with defined goal posts.
On the other hand, Quality Assurance is more comprehensive. It encompasses the entire process of production, ensuring that each step meets the standards required to produce a high-quality product at the end of it. QA is about managing quality throughout the business operations, from sourcing raw materials to the final bottling process. It includes establishing procedures, conducting internal audits, and implementing continuous improvement strategies. See Process Control for more on this.
In other words, Quality Control is about catching mistakes, Quality Assurance is about preventing them.
Key aspects of quality management
By understanding and applying principles of quality management ideas like ISO 9000 or TQM, distilleries can ensure they produce high-quality whisky, rum, or gin that meets customer expectations and stands out in the market.
Each are slightly different from the next, and picking the right format for your system is subjective and dependent on experience, scale and commitment.
ISO 9000 standards
The ISO 9000 family of standards provides guidelines and tools for companies to ensure that their products and services consistently meet customer’s requirements and that quality is continuously improved.
For distilleries, adopting ISO 9000 can help structure their QMS effectively, covering aspects like leadership, process approach, and evidence-based decision making. The main principles are
Customer focus: Distilleries should prioritise customer satisfaction by understanding and meeting customer needs and preferences. For instance, creating whisky, rum, or gin that aligns with the taste preferences of their target market.
Leadership: Strong leadership ensures a unified direction and environment that promotes quality. In a distillery, this might involve leading the team towards crafting spirits that embody both tradition and innovation.
Engagement of people: Encouraging team involvement at every stage of production ensures better quality outcomes. This includes involving staff in decision-making processes, from selecting raw materials to final product testing.
Process approach: Managing processes as a single system optimises performance. In distilling, this could mean ensuring seamless integration from fermentation to ageing and bottling – with feedback loops built in.
Improvement: Continuous improvement is key to maintaining an edge in a competitive market. Distilleries might experiment with different aging processes or ingredients to refine the taste of their spirits.
Evidence-based decision making: Making decisions based on the analysis and evaluation of data. For whisky, rum, or gin production, this might involve using data from taste tests or market research to guide production choices.
Relationship management: Building strong relationships with suppliers ensures a consistent supply of high-quality raw materials, like grains, yeast, or botanicals for gin.
Total quality management (TQM)
Similar to ISO 9000 – Total Quality Management represents a philosophical shift from merely detecting quality issues to preventing them. It’s about embedding quality into every layer of the organization.
TQM principles include company-wide responsibility for quality, continuous improvement, and striving for zero defects. In distilling, this means everyone from the suppliers of ingredients to the bottling line workers plays a role in ensuring quality. The principles are as follows:
Customer-centric approach: Similar to ISO 9000, TQM stresses understanding and meeting customer needs and expectations.
Total employee involvement: All employees, from distillers to sales staff, are involved in striving for quality. In a distillery, this could mean training staff in every aspect of the production process even if they are not involved in it day to day. The idea is that through exposure to all sectors of operation they can better understand what impact their respective roles might have on other parts of the operation down the line, and what to look out for. It forces a more holistic view of any given role and fosters better understanding between colleagues. Another, more simple example is everyone packing orders to meet a deadline, or being available to host a trade stand…
Process-centric: Focus on process optimisation to improve the quality of the end product. For example, optimising the distillation process to ensure consistent alcohol content and flavour.
Integrated system: All components of the organisation need to work together effectively. For distilleries, an example of this is integrating marketing, production, and distribution seamlessly.
Strategic and systematic approach: Long-term planning is essential for continuous improvement. This may involve researching new methods or technologies to enhance production, or new ideas to improve employee wealfare etc.
Quality management systems (QMS)
If both of those – ISO 9000 and TQM sound too intense for your scale of operation, there is a third route.
Less holistic and more operationally focussed, QMS is an organised framework that documents processes, procedures, and responsibilities for achieving quality policies and objectives.
It’s a good start point for very small distilleries. It’s also helpful for those looking to organise quality control / assurance at a distilling level or within their working pod (read: distilleries where senior leadership take longer to buy in but you care about what you do and want to improve what you can).
A well-designed QMS for a distillery can streamline processes, reduce errors, and ensure consistency in every batch. It includes defining quality control measures, standard operating procedures (SOPs), and employee training programs. The principles are:
Documented procedures and standards: Having a set of documented procedures for every aspect of production ensures consistency. This includes specific recipes and methods for creating each spirit.
Quality audits: Regular audits help identify areas for improvement. For distilleries, this could involve auditing the aging process or the consistency of each batch.
Supplier quality management: Ensuring the suppliers of raw materials, like grains or botanicals, meet certain quality standards.
Corrective actions: Implementing corrective actions in response to identified issues. For example, if a batch of gin does not meet the desired flavour profile, identifying and correcting the issue in the production process.
Customer feedback: Regularly gathering and analysing customer feedback to improve the quality of the spirits produced.
Compliance and regulatory considerations in quality management
Regulatory compliance is a significant aspect of distilling. Distilleries must adhere to various local, national, and international regulations concerning production, labelling, and distribution of alcoholic beverages.
Understanding these regulations and integrating them into the distillery’s quality management system is essential to avoid legal issues and ensure market access. Quality here, is less about flavour and more about meeting the agreed criteria to be able to use certain terms, the ABV tolerances, or food handling requirements set out in law.
Many countries also have mandatory training requirements (certificates / qualifications) for those working in food and beverage, and some even insist on personal liquor licensing for those who operate front of house. Be sure you are up to date at both a distillery and individual employee level.
Don’t forget the documentation and record-keeping part of it all! Maintaining detailed records of production processes, ingredient sourcing, and quality control measures is essential for demonstrating compliance during audits or inspections.
Providing quality service and being a high calibre partner
The spirit industry is continually evolving, and while much of this is about producing quality products that meet consumer demand – don’t forget about the route to market.
Are you meeting the new preferred standards of retailers, wholesalers and import partners?
For example, some countries have maximum bottle weight for spirits mandated by law and being implemented in 2024. While that’s something that local producers know about, it may not be well publicised elsewhere. There are many other examples like this – check in with importers in local markets to see what’s on the horizon to avoid a panicked phone call.
On a domestic level, some wholesalers and retailers now have carbon targets they apply against all suppliers. Are you meeting the next wave of expectation, or will you be downgraded to a less desirable supplier (or even black listed)?
It’s worth taking a moment to remember that quality management isn’t just about flavour and consumers drinking your product. It’s in the service level you provide, the approach you take to maintain your route to market approach and through anticipating the next hurdles long before you need to surpass them.
Continuous improvement and innovation
Continuous improvement and innovation, mindful of evolving standards and market expectations, are crucial for success.
By embracing ISO 9000, TQM, and / or QMS principles, distilleries can produce high-quality spirits that resonate with customer preferences and market trends. Ignore these systems at your peril!
