Since 1870 we’ve lived and breathed malting. With this passion and expertise, and by combining traditional and modern techniques, we create an impressive range of malted and non-malted products, including several unique and exclusive barley malts.
There is nothing more we love than talking to brewers and distillers so if you have any questions, or would like to arrange a call with a member of our team, please feel free to get in touch – we would love to hear from you!
All the malting plants of Crisp Malt are situated in prime malting barley producing areas in Scotland. These areas have long traditions of consistently producing high-quality malting barley.
Consequently, it makes sense to procure our malting barley requirements from within the locality of each plant.
To ensure low food miles and carbon impact, all our Scottish Malt is 100% grown, malted and packaged in Scotland. Our state-of-the-art bagging facility in Scotland means that we are able to put locally sourced malt into our Scottish customers’ hands without the unnecessary fuel costs associated with hauling it to England for packaging.
The map below illustrates how close our Scottish farms are to our Scottish maltings in Alloa.
“From a farmer’s point of view, we’re pleased to work with a company like Crisp Malt which is committed to developing a lasting relationship and shortening the supply chain.
It’s good to know that our barley stays in Scotland and through Crisp there is a direct connection with a Scottish brewery. Provenance has become so important for consumers and brands and having this focus on a local supply chain allows provenance to be tracked from the field right through to the beer.
For farmers, this preserves the identity of the barley and it becomes not just part of the brewing process, but part of the story of the beer itself.”
John Hutcheson, who grows barley at Leckerstone Farm, Dunfermline, has been supplying Crisp Malt for five years.
John Hutcheson from Leckerstone Farm, Dunfermline
Our Alloa packaging line was constructed during the spring of 2020 and is located at Kelliebank in Alloa. The area is steeped in malting history, with Alloa once being a centre of Scottish brewing. During the Victorian age, there were many maltings and breweries located in the town, not least of all, George Younger’s Candleriggs Brewery. The brewery was supplied by two maltings owned by Youngers; the Craigward maltings (which was demolished in the 60s) and the Ward Street Maltings, which is now the Crisp Alloa Maltings.
Ward Street was built in 1899 and was originally a floor maltings. These days it is a Saladin box maltings and has been producing distilling malt (for grain and single malt whisky) and brewing malt for local craft breweries, since Crisp took over the maltings in 2003.
We took a good look at the Scottish supply chain in 2018 and while Scottish bagged malt is available, it is either Scottish barley which is taken to England for malting, or it is Scottish produced malt that is taken to England for bagging.
It also happened that in 2018, two key issues around sustainability and supply chain were identified in a report on the brewing sector published by Scotland Food & Drink (Brewing Up A Storm, December 2018).
The report set a goal for the Scottish brewing sector to reduce its environmental footprint, and also highlighted a lack of local product in the supply chain.
With our Alloa production facility we are able to package a variety of formats including 25kg sacks, 500kg sacks, 1 tonne supersacks and we are also able to load containers for international shipping. In addition, for the 25kg sacks we can crush the malt for those breweries that don’t have the luxury of a mill. The malt is made at the Alloa maltings and is then moved 700m along the road to the new bagging facility. The malts that will be produced in Alloa are our Scottish Pale Ale, Scottish Extra Pale Ale Malt and our Scottish Pot Still Malt. The bagging facility also has its own warehouse which stocks all of our most common coloured and speciality malts.
The added advantage of the facility is that the cost of pallet transport from Norfolk to the North of Scotland can be prohibitively expensive. By sending Scottish made malt from Alloa to say, Aberdeen, the freight costs are significantly reduced for small customers.
To find our more about our Scottish produced malts, click on the malt icons below. If you’d like a quote then get in touch with us directly.
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