35-509: Johnnie Walker is a brand of Scotch whisky produced by Diageo in Scotland . It was established in the Scottish burgh of Kilmarnock , East Ayrshire in 1820, and continued to be produced and bottled at the town's Hill Street plant, once the world's largest bottling plant, until its closure in 2012, a decision announced by Diageo in 2009 which would bring the 190-year association between
70-765: A Gold and Grand Gold Quality Award. Johnnie Walker Gold Label Reserve won the World's Best Blended—Best Scotch Blended in World Whiskies Awards 2018. Johnnie Walker was the official whisky of Formula One , and was a sponsor for McLaren and Racing Point . Johnnie Walker is also the title namesake for the F1 Grand Prix race in Spa, Belgium . Johnnie Walker sponsored the Johnnie Walker Classic , an Asia-Pacific golf tournament, up to 2009 and
105-403: A bottle of Johnnie Walker Green Label, with his friends commenting on its quality. In the 1982 film Blade Runner , Harrison Ford 's character Rick Deckard is seen drinking Johnnie Walker Black Label, which he also drinks in the sequel, Blade Runner 2049 (2017). Coinciding with the release of Blade Runner 2049 , Johnnie Walker released a "Director's Cut" edition of its Black Label, which
140-480: A few blends. Since the turn of the century, there has been a spate of special and limited bottlings. The Walkers created their primary marketing strategy in 1908 with advertisements featuring Browne's Striding Man, using the slogan, "Johnnie Walker: Born 1820, still going strong". Photographs replaced the drawings in the 1930s, and the Striding Man was miniaturised to a coloured logo in 1939; it first appeared on
175-567: A new British comic book called Comic Cuts . Cheaply printed, it proved to be the ideal medium for Browne's bold drawing style. His comic strips soon became so popular that he moved to London and into a studio in Wollaton House at Westcombe Park . There, he turned out six full-page strips a week, but also produced illustrations for several British magazines. His cartoons appeared in Punch , The Tatler and other highly-rated periodicals of
210-472: A sober, almost melancholy, individual, and I started out in life with the ambition to paint big devotional pictures.” After surgery for cancer, Browne died at home, Wollaton, Hardy Road, Westcombe Park , then in Kent, on 16 May 1910. He left a widow, Lucy Browne, and an estate valued at £18,529, equivalent to £2,389,149 in 2023. He was buried with military honours at Shooter's Hill . A year later, his widow
245-566: A steady supply of single-malt whisky from the Cardhu , Coleburn , Clynelish , Talisker , and Dailuaine distilleries. In 1923, Walker bought Mortlach distillery , in furtherance of their strategy. Most of their output was used in Johnnie Walker blends, whose burgeoning popularity required increasingly vast volumes of single malts. Johnnie Walker White was dropped during World War I . In 1932, Alexander II added Johnnie Walker Swing to
280-399: A wedge of lime. A number of singers and songwriters have referenced Johnnie Walker in their works, from Amanda Marshall to ZZ Top . Elliott Smith 's Oscar -nominated " Miss Misery " has the narrator "[making] it through the day with some help from Johnnie Walker Red." Heavy metal band Black Label Society was named after Johnnie Walker Black Label whisky, as Zakk Wylde was very fond of
315-488: A year later. The site is now occupied by the Kilmarnock campus of Ayrshire College and HALO Urban Regeneration . In July 2020, Johnnie Walker announced plans to release a new environmentally-friendly paper bottle set to debut in early 2021. In October 2021, Johnnie Walker announced a new label, Jane Walker , created by the distillery's first female master blender. For most of its history Johnnie Walker only offered
350-603: The Johnnie Walker Championship at Gleneagles , a golf tournament in Scotland up to 2013. Diageo sold the Gleneagles Hotel and Golf Course, the site of the tournament, mid-2015 to focus on its core business. Winston Churchill 's favourite whisky was Johnnie Walker Red Label, which he mixed with a large amount of water and drank throughout the day. Vanity Fair writer Christopher Hitchens
385-570: The High Street in Kilmarnock, Ayrshire , Scotland. Walker managed the grocery, wine, and spirits segment as a teenager in 1820. The Excise Act 1823 relaxed strict laws on distillation of whisky and reduced, by a considerable amount, the extremely heavy taxes on the distillation and sale of whisky. By 1825, Walker, a teetotaller , was selling spirits, including rum, brandy, gin, and whisky. In short order, he switched to dealing mainly in whisky. Since blending of grain whiskies with malt whiskies
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#1732783067764420-399: The Johnnie Walker labels in 1960. In the late 1990s, the direction of the Striding Man was reversed as part of a "Keep Walking" campaign. The Striding Man icon was most recently redrawn in 2015. In 2009, the advertising agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty (BBH) created a new short film, starring Robert Carlyle and directed by Jamie Rafn, titled The Man Who Walked Around the World , which outlined
455-696: The San Francisco competition in 2008 and 2009 and won a gold in 2010. Spirits ratings aggregator proof66.com, which averages scores from the San Francisco Spirits Competition, Wine Enthusiast, and others, puts the Black, Blue, Gold and Green Labels in its highest performance category ("Tier 1" Spirits). Johnnie Walker spirits have several times taken part in the Monde Selection 's World Quality Selections and have received
490-436: The brand and Kilmarnock to an end. The brand was first established by grocer John Walker , a native of Kilmarnock, who originally established the business and a grocery shop in 1820, with his son Alexander "Alec" Walker and grandson Alexander Walker II , being largely responsible for establishing the whisky as a favoured brand. It is the world's highest selling Scotch whisky, sold in almost every country, with annual sales of
525-484: The brand's current owners, Diageo, decided to close all operations in Kilmarnock by 2012. This met with backlash from local people, politicians, and then- First Minister of Scotland , Alex Salmond . Despite petitions, public campaigns, and a large-scale march around Kilmarnock, Diageo proceeded with the closure. The Johnnie Walker plant in Kilmarnock closed its doors in March 2012 and the buildings were subsequently demolished
560-439: The brand's signature square bottle in 1860. This meant more bottles fitting the same space and fewer broken bottles. The other identifying characteristic of the Johnnie Walker bottle was – and still is – the label, which, since that year, is applied at an angle of 24 degrees upwards left to right and allows text to be made larger and more visible. This also allowed consumers to identify it at a distance. One major factor in his favour
595-722: The day. In 1898 Browne became a member of the Royal British Society of Artists and in 1901 was elected to the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours , which meant he could use the letters RI after his name. Browne was a founding member of the London Sketch Club , formed in 1898, and was publicly acclaimed. The stimulating experience of these regular get-togethers, alongside other founding members including Dudley Hardy and Phil May ,
630-457: The drink. George Thorogood name checks "Johnny Walker and his brothers Black and Red" in " I Drink Alone ".The name appears also in the song "Remember to Forget" by Passenger . Polish fictional humorous character Jakub Wędrowycz is a wordplay based on the Polish translation of "Johny Walker". In the 2007 film The Man from Earth , the main character John Oldman ( David Lee Smith ) produces
665-413: The equivalent of over 223.7 million 700 mL (25 imp fl oz; 24 US fl oz) bottles in 2016 [156,600,000 L (34,400,000 imp gal; 41,400,000 US gal)]. John Walker was born on 25 July 1805. His farmer father died in 1819, and the family sold the farm. Their trustees invested the proceeds, £417, in an Italian warehouse, grocery, and wine and spirits shop on
700-524: The firm's income; by the time Alexander was ready to pass on the company to his own sons, that figure had increased to between 90 and 95 percent. In 1893, Cardhu distillery was purchased by the Walkers to reinforce the stocks of one of the Johnnie Walker blends' key malt whiskies. This move took the Cardhu single malt out of the market and made it the exclusive preserve of the Walkers. Cardhu's output became
735-1144: The front page of Illustrated Chips from 1896 to 1953. Browne played a major part in the evolution of the British comic style, influencing Bruce Bairnsfather , Dudley Watkins and Leo Baxendale . His strip 'Airy Alf and Bouncing Billy' first appeared in The Big Budget around 1900, and was later continued by Ralph Hodgson aka "Yorick". His comic, Dan Leno , portrayed the Victorian English music hall comedian and appeared in Dan Leno's Comic Journal in 1898. More of his characters were 'Little Willy and Tiny Tim', 'Mr. Stankey Deadstone and Company', 'The Rajah' and 'Don Quixote de Tintogs'. Echoes of his impudent urchins can still be seen in The Beano and The Dandy today. In an article published in 1903, Browne said “I do alleged humorous drawings… I have done some thousands of them, probably, yet normally I am
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#1732783067764770-542: The heart of the Old Highland Whisky and after the rebranding of 1909, the prime single malt in Johnnie Walker Red and Black Labels. From 1906 to 1909, John's grandsons George and Alexander II expanded the line and had three blended whiskies in the market, Old Highland at 5 years old, Special Old Highland at 9 years old, and Extra Special Old Highland at 12 years old. These three brands had
805-577: The history of the Johnnie Walker brand. In April 2015, Diageo produced the Johnny Drama, named after the Entourage HBO series character Johnny "Drama" Chase, to promote the release of the movie version of Entourage . In October 2018, Diageo teamed up with HBO to produce "White Walker by Johnnie Walker" whisky, inspired by the army of the undead in the TV series Game of Thrones as part of
840-425: The line, the name originating from the unusual shape of the bottle, which allowed it to rock back and forth. The company joined Distillers Company in 1925. Distillers Company was acquired by Guinness in 1986, and Guinness merged with Grand Metropolitan to form Diageo in 1997. That year saw the introduction of the blended malt, Johnnie Walker Pure Malt, renamed Johnnie Walker Green Label in 2004. In July 2009,
875-486: The magazine Scraps , and called "He Knew How To Do It". At the time of the census of 1891 , Browne was twenty and was living in lodgings in central Nottingham. He was described as a lithographic designer, and living at the same address were John Clarkson, a lithographic artist, and Lucy Pares, a lace maker, who was a visitor. On 14 May 1892, Browne married Pares in Nottingham. In 1890, Alfred Harmsworth had founded
910-601: The marketing for the series' final season. Diageo then released a collection of Game of Thrones –inspired single malt whiskies, followed by two more whiskies by Johnnie Walker in mid-2019. Johnnie Walker spirits have received strong scores at international spirits ratings competitions and from liquor review bodies. The Green Label received a string of three double gold medals from the San Francisco World Spirits Competition between 2005 and 2007. The Gold Label received double gold medals from
945-431: The standard Johnnie Walker labels, the only difference being their colours: white, red, and black, respectively. They were commonly referred to in public by the colours of their labels. In 1909, as part of a rebranding that saw the introduction of the Striding Man, a mascot used to the present day that was created by cartoonist Tom Browne , the company re-branded their blends to match the common colour names. The Old Highland
980-441: The whisky as a favoured brand. The Spirits Act 1860 legalised the blending of grain whiskies with malt whiskies and ushered in the modern era of blended Scotch whisky. Blended Scotch whisky, lighter and sweeter in character, was more accessible, and much more marketable to a wider audience. Andrew Usher of Edinburgh , was the first to produce a blended whisky, but the Walkers followed in due course. Alexander Walker had introduced
1015-548: Was an extremely popular English strip cartoonist, painter and illustrator of the late Victorian and Edwardian periods. He often signed his work as Tom B . Born in Nottingham , the son of Francis Browne, a painter, the young Browne started earning a wage as a milliner's errand boy in 1882. From there he was apprenticed to a lithographic printer and eked out a living with freelance cartoons for London comic papers. He received thirty shillings for his first strip, published by
1050-663: Was bottled at a higher proof. 55°36′52″N 4°30′04″W / 55.61444°N 4.50111°W / 55.61444; -4.50111 Scotch whisky Too Many Requests If you report this error to the Wikimedia System Administrators, please include the details below. Request from 172.68.168.236 via cp1112 cp1112, Varnish XID 945349338 Upstream caches: cp1112 int Error: 429, Too Many Requests at Thu, 28 Nov 2024 08:37:48 GMT Tom Browne (illustrator) Tom Browne RI , born Thomas Arthur Browne (8 December 1870 – 16 May 1910),
1085-410: Was partial to Johnnie Walker Black Label cut with Perrier sparkling mineral water and referred to it as "Mr Walker's Amber Restorative". At the height of his fame in the late 1960s, New York Jets quarterback Joe Namath said, "I like my girls blonde and my Johnnie Walker red". Johnnie Walker Blue Label was a favourite of US president Richard Nixon 's; Nixon used to enjoy it with ginger ale and
Johnnie Walker - Misplaced Pages Continue
1120-597: Was renamed Johnnie Walker White Label and made at 6 years old, the Special Old Highland became Johnnie Walker Red Label at 10 years old, and Extra Special Old Highland was renamed Johnnie Walker Black Label , remaining 12 years old. Sensing an opportunity to expand the scale and variety of their brands, Walker acquired interests in Coleburn distillery in 1915, quickly followed by Clynelish Distillery Co. and Dailuaine-Talisker Co. in 1916. This ensured
1155-562: Was seminal in its influence on British commercial art. His cycling trips took him all over the world, while illustrations of these exploits appeared in the newspapers. Returning to Nottingham, he started a colour printing firm and joined the Territorial Army . The logo of Johnnie Walker whiskey, the strutting, monocled character, was created by Browne in 1908. He also created the comic strip Weary Willie and Tired Tim , inspired by Don Quixote and Sancho Panza , which appeared on
1190-512: Was still banned, he sold both blended malt whiskies and grain whiskies. They were sold as made-to-order whiskies, blended to meet specific customer requirements, because he did not have any brand of his own. He began using his name on labels years later, selling a blended malt as Walker's Kilmarnock Whisky . John Walker died in 1857. The brand became popular, but after Walker's death it was his son Alexander 'Alec' Walker and grandson Alexander Walker II who were largely responsible for establishing
1225-423: Was the arrival of a railway in Kilmarnock, carrying goods to merchant ships travelling the world. Thanks to Alec's business acumen, sales of Walker's Kilmarnock reached 100,000 gallons (450,000 litres) per year by 1862. In 1865, Alec created Johnnie Walker's first commercial blend and called it Old Highland Whisky , before registering it as such in 1867. Under John Walker, whisky sales represented eight percent of
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