Cardhu has a long history, dating back to
1811. Cardhu is the first distillery
that Johnnie Walker bought in 1893. I
think it's fantastic
how the Johnnie Walker brand is growing.
We're very fortunate here because we
bring people from all the markets in the
world; they come to Cardhu to get
immersed in the history, in the heritage of
Johnnie Walker and the making of malt
whisky itself. We're really fortunate to
have some great, colourful characters in
the history of our brands. I guess what
we're doing at the archive is uncovering
hidden gems and unlocking brand stories
and just little nuggets of information,
which might lead to a new product or a
new marketing campaign. It's important to
pay homage to the past especially with
Tanqueray. Charles Tanqueray was a pioneer in
1830, and me as a brand ambassador, I feel so
passionate about all the work Charles
Tanqueray has done and I want to make sure
that I do that justice. It's so important
that we see ourselves as custodians of
those brands; the quality, the nature of
the liquid, perception of those brands
within our consumers minds.
I feel a tremendous sense of pride that
I get to say I work for Diageo, not only
because of the brands that we represent,
but more importantly our relationship
and our reputation in the market.
Working for marketing is like the dream
job because I knew about the brands, this is
what you want to do in your life, you
know. Manage these great stories from
great people that created all these
brands, so yeah, this is my dream job.
It feels super exciting to be in a
position where you're being asked to
develop the future in drinks and in the
experiences that our consumers are going
to enjoy in years to come.
50% of all growth has been delivered by
innovation in the last five years. I am
so excited by the prospects of us really
pioneering in our industry.
We're constantly looking for what's
going to set us apart in the future.
We're trying to establish these
really deep strong relationships with
our customers and internally with our
teams. When I see our brands on shelves, I
get so excited, I'm really like a
kid in a sweet shop. I love seeing a
product, especially one I've worked on.
I love saying "I did that", and seeing it on
the shelf for the first time is
really, really rewarding and it's really
nice to see that people are getting to
enjoy our drinks and they can enjoy all
of our hard work. You put passion in
because you're proud of what you're
doing and you want other people to kind
of recognise the amount of effort that
you put in. You know, that's for me why I
come to work, I want to be proud of what
I do, both in the brands we sell but in
how they represent themselves in the
community as well. Working for a company
that goes beyond what is expected is
really important to me. Learning for Life
is a program designed to transform and
inspire the life of young people through
education. I'm lucky to have been
involved with Learning for Life since
the very beginning and now I feel very
proud to see that the more we grow as a
company, the more determined we are to
invest in our communities and to do it
in a very meaningful way.
Water is one of the challenges we have
in Nigeria, so what better way to
contribute in community by providing
safe potable drinking water. India is an
emerging market, the potential is
unlimited, and USLB being the market
leader, Diageo saw
that as a tremendous
opportunity to create its footprint
globally. Diageo has such iconic brands,
which have reached the status that they
are at today by placing a fundamental
human truth at the heart of their brand
strategy and I think it's
tremendous that we get the opportunity
to work with such brands. It's one thing
that I would say everyone's driven to
push this company forward and do it in
the right way.
I think the Diageo values of "be the best"
and "be proud of what we do" really
sort of rings true with everyone.
I think it's only natural for me to work
for a company like this. Values and
ethics and standards have always been
what have guided my life. If you go
around and ask people in the company,
most people will tell you "you are an
owner", you are not just an employee. What
you are doing is part of your DNA. So
once a Guinness employee, once a Diageo employee,
always a Diageo employee.
It's that constant delivery of being good all
the time, it gives you that real sense of
continuous fulfilment. You're part of
history and you're adding something and
you're adding your personal spin on
something that's been around hundreds of
years. There's lots of amazing stories in
the archive many of them have been told
but there are lots of them still hiding
away and I'm sure our favourite story
will be the one that we uncover tomorrow.