Rare Glenfiddich whisky sells for £68k

A bottle of The Glenfiddich Collection 1937 has sold for £68,500 at Bonhams’ latest whisky sale in Edinburgh, setting a record for the most ever paid for a bottle of single malt whisky at a Scottish auction house.

The bottle had been estimated to sell for between £25,000 and £35,000, but exceeded expectations by selling at almost double its top estimate at £68,500 on 5 October.

The whisky was laid down in cask 843 at The Glenfiddich Distillery in 1937, the year of George VI’s coronation, and bottled 64 years later In 2001.

Just 60 bottles were drawn from cask 843, which remain the oldest and rarest bottling ever undertaken at the distillery.

“The Glenfiddich Rare Collection 1937 is truly unique”, said Bonhams’ whisky specialist Martin Green. “Cask 843 is an unrepeatable phenomenon and the bottles from it are exceptionally rare and highly prized by collectors.”

The sale of this bottle has set a new record for the highest price ever paid at auction for a bottle of Glenfiddich and a Scottish auction house record for the sale of a single malt.

Bonhams confirmed that the rare whisky had been bought by a bidder in the Far East.

“The record price reflects the exceptional rarity of the Glenfiddich Rare Collection 1937 and its great appeal to collectors everywhere”, added Green.