The end of the year is approaching and the special rum Advent calendar is back. This year, the calendar is full of surprises … Joshua Singh, the creator, reveals some of them!
Rumporter: Joshua, It is year 3 of the Advent calendar adventure. What is new this year ?
Joshua Singh: Well, actually it is the 5th year but our 3rd in France. First we are adding a second tasting glass to the package as we have realized that a lot of customers are sharing the experience. You can imagine wife and husband sharing a dram every day, or just friends.
The calendar is becoming an event in the rum world and we get more and more rum producers willing to enter the game. Imagine this year we are producing 50 000 calendars. It means that 50 000 people are going to taste your product on the same day, no festival can achieve that. Therefore we have big names coming on board this year. I won’t reveal them but for instance, expect some incredible Barbadian.
Rumporter: Still one of the great asset of the project is that you get to taste some rums from unexpected origins. We hear more and more about African rums for instance. Is there an africain rum in this year’s selection ?
Joshua Singh: Indeed we have started working with a Ghanean distillery whose master distiller happens to be danish like us, some luck for us but their rum was not ready yet for this year. Though we have some surprises this year. Without lifting completely the secret we have rums original from Nepal, Philippines, Seychelles within this year calendar. Then hopefully we can have some African surprises next year.
Rumporter: the secret is part of the game. How do you keep it ?
Joshua Singh: It is a game of cats and mice but once we send the first calendars, there is always a guy to open all the boxes and post a picture on social network. It is impossible to keep it 100% secret when it has become big like this. So try not to look at FB while you have your 24 rums.
Rumporter : 24 rums is quiet a challenge to retrieve and bottle. How do you handle it logistically ?
Joshua Singh: as I told you here above, the rum producers are really keen in being part of the adventure and we have a much easier access to the best of their production and they are even keen on sending us some batches. The calendar is really becoming super qualitative.? Though we don’t want to enter the game of asking for free juice to lower the price. This is why the calendar is still retailed at 80 € but really it is worth it !
Rumporter : is there any project of doing some thematically set calendars : an agricole one, a white rums, etc ?
Joshua Singh: We receive quite a lot of inquiries about different themed calendars, however it is not part of our plan just yet, planning a new edition of 24 Days of Rum takes almost 2 years and hundreds of working hours so we simply do not have the time for something like this at the moment. We did however launch our “Gin Box” this year that contains 10 different gins from 10 differetn countries, so if you like a good G&T here is the perfect option to explore and taste the styles next to each other.“
Contact & information : monika@bruant-distribution.fr