From biscuits to barrels

How a failed factory helped Paul John reshape India's reputation in the whisky world

- NAVIN J. ANTONY

Paul P. John’s first business venture crumbled, quite literally, like a cookie.

“There was a biscuit factory,” he recalls, “owned by a friend’s father that had shut down. I had just finished college, and was looking for something to do. I thought, ‘Why not biscuits? Everybody eats biscuits!’ So I took over and tried to run the factory, but it was a disaster. After two years, I had to close it down.”

That is how John, now a whisky pioneer known for his eponymous single-malt labels, entered the alcohol industry. In the 1990s, when he started out, alcohol was still taboo business. “In movies, especially Malayalam, [alcohol businessmen] were always portrayed as villains,” he laughs. “Back then, country liquor dominated the market—I would say most of the business was focused on that. The business model was… different.”

John’s father, T. John, a former Karnataka minister with roots in Kerala, had interests in plantations and liquor. With his family’s support, John converted the defunct biscuit factory into a distillery, launching the Original Choice whisky in 1996. It became a bestseller, with millions of cases sold, although its popularity was confined to India—long the largest whisky market by volume. Despite the commercial success, Original Choice did not win over the connoisseurs. A European Union trade official visiting India in 2003 said the blurry line separating Indian whisky from rum—both being distilled from molasses—could make for a “nice academic session”.