Fuji Gotemba is a distillery on the southeastern flank of Mount Fuji that began operations in 1973 and can make both malt and grain whisky.1,2,3 Kirin Brewery, J E Seagram and Sons and Chivas Brothers set it up through a joint firm, Kirin-Seagram, formed in August 1972.2,4,5 Kirin has wholly owned it since 2002.6,7,8
Kirin's whisky sales peaked in 1983, and in the slump that followed the distillery sharply cut how much it made.9,10 After Seagram began selling its drinks businesses, Kirin became the sole owner, and Kirin-Seagram took the name Kirin Distillery.6,7,8
Jota Tanaka became chief blender in 2010 and master blender in 2017, only the second person to hold that post.6,11,12 In 2019 Kirin paid for bigger cask warehouses, new stills and small fermentation tanks to make a wider range of malt whisky.9,13,14 The new equipment has run since 2021.9,13,14
Its malt spirit has kept a "clean type" style since the distillery's founding.12 A "fruity type" followed in the 2010s, and in the 2020s a "rich type" made in wooden fermentation tanks and small pot stills.12
The distillery uses only underground water from melted snow on Mount Fuji.6,12 The water spends fifty years filtering down to an aquifer 100 meters below the distillery.6,12 In 2023 all its whiskies were aged in bourbon barrels from its sister distillery, Four Roses.7,15 In 2013 most of its whisky went into the company's blends, so little was bottled as single malt.4
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