Mark Lochhead
concise biography
24/08/2011
Mark moved to Talisker as Senior Site Manager in August 2008. Before that he had been Senior Site Manager at the Classic Malts’ famous North-East Coast distillery, Clynelish.
One of five football-mad brothers, Mark spent the early part of his childhood in Glasgow before moving to the new town of Erskine. Their father was, for a time, a professional footballer and played for Glasgow Celtic. Mark has been in the whisky industry for nearly 25 years and his first job back in February 1987, was as a Blending Clerk for J&B then part of International Distillers & Vintners (IDV). This position gave Mark many opportunities to learn the fundamentals of single malt and blended whiskies. It led into growing responsibility for stock analysis and production forecasts and ultimately, through a series of promotions, into inventory management and a responsibility for commercial relationships with distillers across Scotland. On one of his many business trips to the IDV distilleries on Speyside, Mark met his wife, Wendy who was working for the Heritage Visits Team at Drummuir Castle. They actually met at a Knockando distillery ceilidh in June 1997 and ended up having their wedding reception there 5 years later.
After the creation of United Distillers & Vintners, Mark worked on a project to integrate the J&B inventory into the DCL computer system. In early 1999 he moved north into warehouse production as a manager based at Auchroisk distillery on Speyside. In September 2001 he became the senior manager for Northern Warehousing, before moving up to Clynelish as Senior Site Manager in October 2005. Even though it’s now part of his job to promote Talisker™ and to understand the arcane distilling regime of this smaller distillery, Mark remains an enthusiastic advocate for Clynelish™.
Mark and Wendy have two sons: Matthew (8) & Simon (3). Matthew is now attending the village school not far from the distillery in Carbost.
