beauty and the bottle

1280 853 In Good Company | Northern Rivers
husk distillers logo

Husk Distillers
592 McAuleys Rd, North Tumbulgum, NSW 2490

www.huskdistillers.com

Visit Tweed Northern Rivers -01
beauty and the bottle

It wouldn’t be the first time someone wanted to bottle their Northern Rivers experience, but Husk Distillers is actually doing it.

Paul Messenger heads up the family-owned rum and gin distillery in the Tweed Valley with its paddock-to-bottle philosophy.

“Tumbulgum village is at the confluence of two rivers with views to Mt Warning in the prettiest valley in the country, possibly the world,” Paul says. “That’s what we’re trying to extract and put in a bottle.”

The Husk Distillers story starts in the tropical paradise of the Caribbean. Paul and his wife Mandaley Perkins were on holiday in 2009 and discovered an array of rums, including the traditional agricole rum, made from the local sugar cane.

“Many of these were better than top shelf single malt whiskies,” says self-professed whisky connoisseur Paul.

The cogs started turning – “There’s so much sugar cane close to home” – and within three years, the Messenger family found their property in the Tweed Valley and Husk was born, distilling Australia’s first and only agricole rum, made from their own sugar cane that is grown, crushed, fermented, distilled and barrelled on their farm in the Tweed Valley.

Husk Australian Agricole Rum was Paul’s initial passion project, but it’s what happened next that has the world talking about Husk Distillers.

“When we set out we were only focused on the rum. Harvest season is June to November and we had all this equipment sitting there. It didn’t take long to think: ‘Let’s make a gin’.”

husk distillers tweed 005
husk distillers tweed 006

While the idea came quickly, the development of the product took three years to perfect.

Paul started with two questions: “What have we got to offer and why is someone going to buy gin from us in the Northern Rivers?” The answer to the first question led him to local ingredients, particularly lemon myrtle, which is native to the region, and Tasmanian pepper berry.

But it still didn’t have that wow factor. “We wanted something unique and unusual,” Paul says.

“We heard about the butterfly pea, a flower that’s been used in Thailand for thousands of years in cooking and herbal infusions.”

The flower is pH sensitive and changes colour when something acidic – like lime or tonic water – is added, Paul says.

“We started building the recipe around that flower – I became a little bit obsessed with it,” he says.

The result? In 2015, Husk launched the world’s first colour-changing gin, Ink Gin, made from 24 traditional, exotic and Australian Native botanicals. In the bottle, the gin is a dramatic indigo liquid, which transforms into a light pink hue when tonic water or lime are added.

“We’re pretty happy with the reactions people have to it,” Paul says, clearly delighted that years of hard work have paid off.

“We wanted something unique and unusual”

Ink Gin won the Northern Rivers innovation award, quickly followed up by the Australian Drinks Industry Best Innovation in Spirits Award, up against some of the biggest spirit companies in the world. Ink Gin is sold in Singapore, Thailand, Japan, the UK and Italy and will be launched on the US market later this year.

But there’s no resting on their laurels for Paul and Mandy, whose three daughters are also employed by the business. The eldest, Harriet, runs sales and marketing, middle daughter Edwina looks after logistics and despatch and youngest Claudia, works part-time on the bottling line while she’s still studying.

husk distillers tweed 001
husk distillers tweed 002
husk distillers tweed 004

The family are launching a visitor centre, with the cellar door set to open in the middle of 2018, with the final stage café and kitchen next year.

“The cellar door will offer tastings and little tours through the distillery, and eventually we’ll do extended tours through the property – start off down in the untouched, uncleared lowland rainforest, then come back through the sugar cane, up to the sugar mill – taste the juice – and watch the fermentation and distillation process,” he says.

“People are more interested in understanding how the things they eat and drink are made,” Paul says.

It’s a bonus for visitors that Ink Gin and Husk Distillers Agricole Rum are bottled in one of the most beautiful valleys in the world.

“People are more interested in understanding how the things they eat and drink are made”

Share this story

Read more stories
grafton to yamba houseboats clarence

take me to the river

 2048 1536 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Grafton to Yamba Houseboats
The Clarence River, at the southern end of the Northern Rivers, is known colloquially as the ‘Big River’, while its Aboriginal name is ‘Breimbah’ or…

Mount Warning Tours Tweed

a natural business adventure

 1920 1080 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Mount Warning Tours
Despite only existing for four years, Mount Warning Tours’ short life has been eventful: from purchasing the ex-Murray River ferry Spirit of Wollumbin…

The dream team

 2560 1707 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Joel Jensen Constructions
Despite the pressures of running an award-winning construction company, there’s one thing Joel Jensen strives to do every day.

wrightway products 001

right place, right time, right way

 600 436 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Wrightway Products
The greatest challenge for Jennifer Joy and John Donnelly, the driving force behind Wrightway Products, was getting the world to see the value of…

Passion, patience and protein

 2400 1350 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Hemp Foods Australia
When Hemp Foods Australia founder, Paul Benhaim, discovered hemp as a food choice in the early 90s during his global travels, he had his own preconceived ideas.

nimbin valley dairy 003

love, peace and artisan cheese

 666 500 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Nimbin Valley Dairy
Not every goat in Australia has its own nutritionist and its own vet. But the goats at Nimbin Valley Dairy definitely do. Bill, the nutritionist…

tripadeal_byron_bay

fastest growing, remains humble and local

 1000 667 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

TripADeal
For TripADeal, the figures speak for themselves: revenue in excess of $100million for 2017; 75,000 travellers sent to various…

horizon motorhomes ballina 002

when opportunity knocks…

 1600 1067 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Horizon Motorhomes
When a campervan arrived on Clayton Kearney’s used car yard in 1995, and sold in seconds flat, he realised there was a gap in the market…

an epic adventure into healing honey

 1191 893 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Gather By
Gather By is a closed-loop regenerative agribusiness that works with beekeepers and landholders in NSW and Queensland, and investors around Australia to produce and market rare, pure and potent Australian Manuka honey…

Nurtured by nature

 2560 1723 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Greenx7
For the past 10 years GreenX7 has been running workshops and retreats internationally and in the Tweed for clients as diverse as McDonald’s, Deloitte, Six Senses, and the Australian Defence Force, to inspire both individuals and teams to tap into the healing power of nature.

From cobblestones to all-terrain cranes

 1200 900 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Wicks and Parker
Fast approaching 100 years old, the Wicks family business has helped build motorways and carry out emergency bushfire repairs, but it once hammered out steel bands for horse-drawn carriage wheels.

lights, camera, action in ballina shire

 2560 1750 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Byron Studios
Northern Rivers has long been a hub for film makers and a popular backdrop for film and television productions. But there has been one thing missing to tie it all together…

Cool to be kind and cans it

 957 1277 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

The Kind Coffee Co.
The KIND Coffee Co, reflects its name in everything it does.

Community connection runs deep

 1644 848 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Connect Business Solutions
Connect Business Solutions can be thought of as the glue that holds a business community together.

A collaborator at heart

 940 627 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Table Under A Tree
Georgina Inwood credits the evolution of her business, Table Under a Tree, to her ability to “take stock while still running at a million miles an hour”.

meme productions featured image

world class creatives

 1000 750 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Mememe Productions
The piece of advice that dirtgirlworld creator, Cate McQuillen, likes to share with other creative entrepreneurs in the region tells much about her story…

island collective yamba

collectively creative social heaven

 1080 823 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Island Collective
If you are looking for contemporary artist and stylist Fleur Yorston, you’ll most likely find her among fiddle leaf figs and cane furniture, in her Yamba…

Flexing the entrepreneurial muscle

 2560 1707 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Summit Sport & Fitness
Like many Northern Rivers businesses, Summit Sport & Fitness has undergone immense change in 2022 – except, rather than being buffeted by floods or pandemic, these changes are positive, and mark a new chapter for owner Matthew George.

Aurora Suspended Fires_Ballina in good company image 4

all fired up for global attention

 960 600 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Aurora Suspended Fires
Aurora Suspended Fires arose from the perfect marriage of Chloe Allan’s creative talents with Neil’s engineering background. But building a successful…

In Ventura we trust

 2500 1667 In Good Company | Northern Rivers

Ventura Brewing
Ventura is a symbol of luck, chance and good fortune – and while Ventura Brewing’s two founders have had a good dose of all three – it’s mostly been a lot of hard work and focus to launch this craft kombucha brewery amid a global pandemic.

Start Typing

X