51�Թ�

Duties can be deferred for up to five years and are paid based on the rates in effect at the time of withdrawal from a bonded warehouse, which is the main attraction for businesses trying to avoid being financially drained by current tariffs.

Currently, though, “the interest in bonded warehouse has skyrocketed compared to what it was a year ago.”

Martin Armstrong runs Whisky Broker, a bonded warehouse in Creetown, near Dumfries, which stores 48,000 casks.

The company has responded by "ring-fencing" enough alcohol in its bonded warehouse to meet anticipated demand for its alcohol sanitiser and infused spirits products until at least the end of the calendar year, including the Christmas period, the peak time for spirit sales.

Day-to-day oversight by government agents has pretty much vanished over the years, but even today, for a spirit to be labeled “bottled in bond,” what’s in the bottle has to be made by one distillery during one distilling season, not adulterated with anything but water, aged in a federally bonded warehouse for no less than four years and bottled at 100 proof.