Chase Distillery was founded by William Chase, who you may know as the creator of best-selling upmarket crisps brand Tyrrells. Chase was the son of potato farmers who lived near the Herefordshire town of Leominster and he bought the family farm from his dad when he was just 20. He experienced mixed success until 2002 when he found out that US crisp-maker Kettle would buy the potatoes supermarkets rejected on the grounds they weren't cosmetically perfect and use them to create what was marketed as ‘posh crisps’.
Chase was inspired to set up his own upmarket crisps brand and built a crisp-making facility at the family farm. The brand he established, Tyrrells, became a huge success, but Chase eventually became unhappy with the big business ethos and decided to sell up in 2008 to a private capital business for almost £40 million. He set up a new venture with the profits and began to turn his spuds into premium vodka. Chase spent £3m building the distillery, including £900,000 on one of the world's tallest copper distillation column (70ft in size), and so Chase Distillery was born.
Chase Distillery still operates out William Chase’s farm in Herefordshire, where it maintains a sustainable approach to farming and creating spirits. All waste produce goes to feed its herd of pedigree Hereford cattle, and wherever possible, the fresh ingredients used in its products are sourced from the farm, including its King Edward and Lady Claire potatoes, as well as cider apples.