About usWHO WE ARE
Whisky is our business and our life. With whiskybase.com as a starting point, our goal is to help people successfully navigate the complex world of whiskies on their own personal whisky journey.
THE ORIGINS OF WHISKYBASE.COM
In 2007 Menno Bijmolt from the Netherlands created a database in which he could catalog and document his collection of whiskies and record his personal tasting notes. He then invited other whisky enthusiasts to make their own contributions. From there the online community was born and the database grew rapidly.
FounderMenno Bijmolt
Whiskybase Shop
In 2011 Cees Jan van Dijk joined Menno to open a specialized whisky shop both on and offline. The emphasis would be on Independent Bottlers and hard-to-find and rare whiskies.
At any given moment, one can find between over 1,100 unique whiskies in the Whiskybase shop located in Rotterdam and online at shop.whiskybase.com. And on some days, you can still find CJ in the shop helping customers learn about and locate some of the best whiskies of the world.
If you are ever in the Netherlands, they would welcome your visit.
Archives Whisky
Shortly after opening the Whiskybase shop and listening to members of the Whiskybase community, Menno and CJ realized there were not many independent bottlers with offerings in the Netherlands. But there was quite a lot of interest.
In 2011 they bought their first cask of whisky, this was a Strathmill from 1974, and bottled it under the label Archives.
The success of the first bottling prompted the team to begin searching for even more casks that would help meet the growing demand for exceptional single-cask whiskies, bottled at cask strength.
Because Whiskybase is the largest online community of whisky lovers, the feedback and tasting notes have provided an invaluable feedback loop to the team and this feedback and insights continue to be integral parts of the selection process.
To date, over 170 different Archives bottlings have been released and the Archives brand is now exported to 8 countries worldwide.