Arthur Bell & Sons was a company with a long history, dating back as far as 1840 when Arthur Bell set our on his career in the drinks business by joining Thomas Sandeman, a wine and spirit merchant in Perth. He quickly rose through the ranks, eventually becoming a partner in its parent company, which became known as Roy & Bell.
Arthur Bell was ambitious in his whisky dealings, and is believed to have been the first in Scotland to appoint a permanent agent in London, selling two of his blends. He became sole proprietor of the company following the retirement of partner James Roy and a brief and acrimonious stint working with his nephew. The company became Arthur Bells & Sons after Arthur Kinmont and Robert Duff, his two eldest boys, joined the board in 1889 and 1896.
It was these two men who took the company to the next level. Their father had infamously shunned branding and advertising, somewhat stunting the growth of the company. However, his death in 1900 opened the door to new practices and their first branded blend, Scotch Fir, was brought to market four years later, shortly followed by the first iteration of the famous Bell’s Extra Special. Despite a devastating fire in 1919, the company grew steadily, opening new premises in Edinburgh six years later and in 1932, purchasing its first distilleries, Blair Athol and Dufftown, from P. Mackenzie & Co. They later added a third, Inchgower, in 1936 after acquiring it from the Buckie town council.
The company passed out of Bell family hands in the 1940s after the deaths of the Bell brothers, with control passing to W.G. Farquharson and after his death in 1973, by Raymond Miquel. The latter oversaw a period of intense growth, cutting costs and upping production through the construction of Pittyvaich distillery in 1974 and acquisition of Bladnoch in 1983. At this point the company controlled over one-third of the domestic market, making it an attractive proposition for suitors like Guinness plc, who were looking to invest in Scotch whisky. They did just this in 1985, succeeding with a hostile takeover bid for the company which they subsequently merged with the Distillers Company Limited the following year, creating United Distillers.
In its time, Arthur Bell & Sons had been proponents of the single malt product of their distilleries, bottling Blair Athol, Dufftown and Inchgower. Under United Distillers these brands were shelved however, with all three eventually made part of the Flora & Fauna range in 1991. In part this was due to the new entities instructions to centralise control of its brands and production, reducing the role of its subsidiaries which, on the DCL side, had operated largely independently. Arthur Bell & Sons was similarly side-lined, and while its branding is still used by Diageo, who also market the Bell’s blends, the company itself is no longer a trading entity within the organisation.
