Idea 136 of 500. Cluster 6: Food and drink as export, not just hospitality
Ceylon arrack as a premium spirit with a distillery tour, the way whisky is sold in Scotland
The mechanism, from the book
Dilmah says it earns over 3 times the national average price for tea, because it does its own blending, branding and packing. The proof has been sitting inside the industry all along.
Every idea in cluster 6 uses this mechanism.
A first step
Visit a small arrack distillery near you and ask whether they would open for a paid 90 minute tour with a tasting, then agree a price per head and a split. Put the tour to three hotel concierges and a tour operator. Run it for the first group they send and ask each guest whether they would buy again online from home. Bottles sold at the door prove it.
- Who pays first
- A visitor who has done a whisky tour in Scotland and wants the equivalent here, with a bottle to take home.
- What leaves today
- Arrack is drunk cheaply at home and rarely sold abroad as a premium spirit, so the story and the markup belong to other countries' drinks.
The idea and the mechanism are from the book. The first step was written for this site as a suggestion; if you know a better one, say so.
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
The only test any idea on this site has to pass. The four rules that go with it are here.
In the book
- Ch. ElevenThe Mechanisms
What a brand and an owned variety are worth, from the kiwifruit growers - Ch. TwoAn Island Nobody Has Counted
The island's spices: pepper, cardamom, cloves and nutmeg
More from cluster 6
Idea 136 of the 500 in the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? Every one can be started by one person, one family or one small firm.