About Us

The Scotch Whisky Experience sits at the top of Edinburgh’s famous Royal Mile, right next door to Edinburgh Castle. We’re on a mission to make the world fall in love with Scotch whisky. Having first opened to the public in 1988, The Scotch Whisky Experience was created when 19 individual Scotch whisky companies jointly invested money towards showcasing the Scotch whisky industry to international visitors.

An interactive exhibition, not a working distillery, the Experience represents 90% of the Scotch whisky industry, making it the ideal first stop for whisky enthusiasts. We welcome around 300,000 visitors through our doors each year, 80% of whom are international.

Expertise in all things Scotch

The team at the Scotch Whisky Experience comprises some of the most highly-regarded figures in the whisky industry, across both our Board of Directors and company management. Two members of the management team are Keepers of the Quaich and two of our directors hold the prestigious title of Masters of the Quaich.

Every member of staff undergoes rigorous training on the production, regions and flavours of Scotch whisky, including a day at our industry-recognised Scotch Whisky Training School, weekly whisky tastings, brand tasting sessions and frequent training modules in exceptional customer service and accessibility. We’re also incredibly proud of our team’s extensive knowledge on the city of Edinburgh and Scotland as a whole: they’re always ready to answer questions and give recommendations to visitors on where to go and what to do in this beautiful country. Many of the team are also regular contributors to our blog, which covers whisky, things to do in Edinburgh, and a peek behind the scenes here at the Experience.

staff at aroma wheel in the whisky shop

Work with us

Find out more about careers here at The Scotch Whisky Experience

Careers Careers

Corporate Social Responsibility

We believe that giving back to the local, national, and global communities is an important part of our business. At each of these levels we support charities related to people and our planet. Our ongoing partnerships with charities and social enterprises represent our principle activities, in addition we also support many other organisations with one off donations, or support through our staff requests.

You can see more information about our charity and community support here.

We are proud to support the following organisations as our main charity partners:

The Grassmarket Community Project

The John Muir Trust

SAMH

The Scottish Wildlife Trust

We recently supported the following organisations to which our staff have links to by providing free tickets to support fundraising activities: Frogston Primary School, Leith Academy, the Scottish Ornithologists’ Club (SOC), a charity dedicated to the conservation and enjoyment of Scotland’s birds with headquarters in East Lothian.

We have donated Gold tour tickets to the American Scottish Foundation’s Annual Dinner in New York this November.

In February 2023, our brilliant team held a Talent Show to raise money for SAMH. From magic, to ballet, reading poems to a variety performance and singing, the staff had a great evening celebrating their talents together – a great team building experience too for them all! We also held a Halloween quiz and a ‘Bake off’ event for staff, also raising money for SAMH.

In December 2022, we supported the following organisations to which our staff have links to by providing free tickets to support fundraising activities:

Pinkie St. Peter’s Out of School Club, Gilmerton Primary School, Frogston Primary School, Shetland Swim Team Guernsey 2023, Aegon Pensioners Association, Our Hearts Charity and Craigentinny Sheltered Housing.

Shop Collection Tins – these rotate each quarter in our Whisky Shop. Charities are nominated and chosen by our staff. Revenue taken for our carrier bags (20p per bag) is also donated to these chosen charities.

In tandem with our Corporate Social Responsibility activity we continue to work to keep up with best practice and invest in our team and their development.

Providing a warm welcome to everyone is at the heart of our business, in addition to facilities for 18 foreign languages, ASL & BSL, plus facilities for families, the Scotch Whisky Experience is fully accessible, see our accessibility page for more information.