Whisky tour

[Acksboy]

Hi all

Having a bit of a mid-life crisis at the moment where my job is giving me such grief that I’m seriously considering packing it all in. Like most of you my passion is whisky and I would love to do nothing better than run a mini-bus tour around speyside as I know the area well and have visited most of the distilleries.
When I’ve looked online most of the tours I find run out of the major cities and last several days, whereas I’d be looking to cater for tourists visiting speyside itself and just lasting one day. Makes sense to me that people often make one day trips so why not cater for them?
My current occupation is in healthcare where I deal with the public regularly and I’d like to think I would be able to do a decent job of being a tour guide, but maybe I’m jumping the gun a bit! I take home about £40000 a year but I also realise it’s unlikely I’d make anywher near that amount. I also have zero experience of running a business...
Anyways... I just wanted to gather some ideas and opinions from others on whether I’m mad or stumbled across a niche market that this old soul might be able to make work.

[Charlie]

Have a look at what is already available in and around Speyside, see what they offer, what they charge, take the available tours yourself, experience what they offer. Try estimate what you would charge and what the profits would be if you run a tour, remember there will be peak times and off peak time for example I am sure you could make a lot of money during the Speyside festival but you may end up feeling like you have changed jobs to become a taxi driver/chauffer .

[dramblersanonymous]

First you need to do some market research and understand the appetite for such a service. It would surprise me if you can't find something similar, then ask why? I imagine it's difficult to do more than 2 or 3 distillery tours in a day so people prefer to split over a couple of days. By running longer tours from cities the operators negate the necessity for a hire car or public transport, the costs of which they probably build into their model to make it more profitable (and feel better value to customers).

Contact the distilleries - ask if it's something that they would be interested in or are asked about. Do you live locally? What does it cost to buy a minibus? Insurance? Fuel?

As Charlie mentioned, I'd do a couple of tours, complete some market research, identify what makes your service different, plot the costs in terms of outlay and operational costs, build a competitive pricing model, determine if the business will generate enough revenue for you to earn a living, then weigh up financial risk vs lifestyle change. Basically, run the numbers. If you can easily slip back into your current or similar role, consider trialling the idea for X months - if you can afford to take a 6 month sabbatical, then the financial risk might be small(ish).

[deadz101]

Hi there,

We were recently in the Margaret River in WA and had a guided tour for 4 of us around a few different wineries, I thought it was great idea and was thinking something similar to you (also in NHS and finding work disillusioning at times).

The girl who ran the tour did this with her husband, they had another vehicle for bigger groups and both of them packed in their jobs in Perth to do the tours full-time. We were picked up at our accommodation, she provided some water and some food was available if needed, we were out for about 5 hours and she arranged lunch at one of the wineries, it was amazing. She was very passionate and knowledgeable about the indusrty and the history of the area.

The Margraet River area seemed a bit how Speyside is with its close proximity of distilleries and it would be easy to encorporate a tour of one place and maybe sampels/drams at another (touring at balvennie and drams at cardhu) and maybe a pub or distillery lunch.

I just thought I would let you know of someone who was making a go of something similar for a bit inspiration, good luck if you do venture into it, there has been some sound advice so far.

[Acksboy]

[Uncle Bobby]

I believe there are one or two businesses already doing this on Speyside. Suggest a bit of research there.
Something tells me somebody offers distilleries and castles. That might work.
If I was a tourist I might want an itinerary of my choosing. Couple of distilleries and a castle maybe. Shouldn't be too difficult.
Or golf maybe? Round of golf in the morning and a distillery in the afternoon?
I'll be your driver! All on my doorstep! Multi lingual. 40 years with distiller!