Exclusive Interview with Mr. Gordon Clarke, Managing Director and CEO of Worthy Park Estate Ltd.

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Q: What is your full name, title, company name and location? 

I am Gordon Clarke, Managing Director and CEO of Worthy Park Estate Ltd., I am also the great grandson of Frederick Clarke who purchased Worthy Park in 1918. Worthy Park is located in the Northwest corner of St. Catherine Parish close to the center of Jamaica. We are in between Kingston and Ocho Rios with either drive being under 1 hour. I have been with the company for 20 of the last 25 years and have been a Director and Shareholder of the company for the past 25 years.

Q: How much has the sugar operation changed since originally purchased by your great grandfather?

Sugar has always had its ups and downs, mostly to do with international markets and pricing. This has affected most sugar factories in the Caribbean, but Worthy Park has concentrated on efficiency and prudent management to stay on top of the others. Our efficiency has been recognized by all in the industry and it exists in both field and factory operations. We continue to lead and as time goes on by larger margins. 

Worthy Park has been the most efficient sugar factory in Jamaica in more than the past 50 years. In the last 100 years, we have upgraded equipment, sometimes with second hand vessels, boilers, generators, and other machines and sometimes with new, however the technology of sugar production is quite similar to what it has been during that time. We have however increased capacities, introduced much more automation and electronic controls, improved material handling infrastructure and employed more advance equipment and agricultural practices in the field. 

The introduction of mechanical harvesters (combine type) also began more than 25 years ago. However due to the sloped terrain, preference for hand cut cane, and other reasons those machines cut a maximum of 15% of the cane we crush. 

We have also expanded every piece of our own land to maximize our own supply to the factory, while the deliveries from the small independent farmers have receded by 60% in the last 25 years. Worthy Park supplies 55% of the cane crushed at our factory, the rest comes from outside farmers. 

The cane quality from all suppliers to Worthy Park is significantly better than anywhere else in Jamaica and they are paid based on sugar content/cane quality. 

Q: The distillation operation at Worthy Park is more recent, correct?  What was the driving force behind starting the distillery?

Worthy Park made rum from as far back as 1741 and up until 1962 when we stopped.  All of the rum was sold to brokers and traders and WP did not have its own brand. In 2004, I convinced my family that we should get back into the rum business and have our own brands. By the middle of 2005 we were set up with a state-of-the-art pot still Distillery.

Q: What is the current distillation capacity and what types of bulk rums do you sell? 

We can distill about 1.8 million liters of alcohol per annum and we sell Jamaican pot still distilled rums with varying ester/congeneric levels. Apart from own own brands, we sell bulk rum to other bottler/blenders and also to bulk rum traders. It is estimated that our rum is in over 30+ brands worldwide.

Q: Can you tell us about your fermentation methods and how they separate you from other Jamaican distilleries? 

We have different fermentation streams and methods to make different marks of varying congeneric levels. The ester levels range from 50 to 900. The times for fermentation range from 30 hours to more than 3 weeks. We do not use dunder in any of our fermentation streams. Some of the other Jamaican Distilleries use dunder in some of their fermentations and get ester levels up to over 2,000. We use temperature control on our light pot still rum fermentations and not so, for our higher ester fermentations.

Q: High-ester rums are synonymous with Jamaica, how important is it for Jamaica to define, protect and enforce the Geographical Identification and the chemical composition of these rums? 

The “Jamaica Rum” GI is registered in Jamaica and Switzerland and we would hope to register it in Europe asap. It represents a set of rules for the making of “Jamaica(n) Rum” with the most common practices that contribute to the uniqueness of our rum and would protect the reputation of Jamaica rum for the Jamaican producers and their customers. It is extremely important and that is why in recent times when there are stakeholders who are trying to loosen the rules when we should be tightening the rules, it has resulted in frustrating debates and negative attention and distraction. 

Q: As our readers know very well by now, fermenting alcohol on an island faces very specific challenges.  How do you address these challenges at Worthy Park?

We are currently using our dunder as fertilizer for our cane fields under a 5 year license of the National Environment and Planning Agency. We hope that this practice can continue as the dunder is advantageous to our fertilizer program for the cane. 

Q: In addition to selling bulk rum, you also bottle your own brands, correct?  Can you tell us more about them?

We have:

  • Rum-Bar White Overproof rum (Unaged 63% alc./vol), 
  • Rum-Bar Silver (Unaged 40% alc./vol.)
  • Rum-Bar Gold Rum (aged 4+ years, 40%)
  • Rum-Bar Rum Cream (15% alc.)
  • Worthy Park Single Estate Reserve (aged 6-10 years, 45% alc./vol) and 
  • Worthy Park 2006 – 12 year old (56% alc./vol.) in addition to various special cask series under the Worthy Park brand.

Q: In which countries are your brands available? 

USA (25 states), Jamaica, Cayman, Bahamas, UK, Italy, Germany, Denmark, China, Greece, Spain, Bermuda, France, Poland, Portugal, Netherlands, Sweden, Czech Republic, Japan, Thailand, South Africa, Puerto Rico, Hong Kong, and Dominica.

Q: This year marks the 350th anniversary of the plantation, congratulations!  Do you have any special plans, such as product releases, celebrations, etc., to mark this momentous occasion? 

Yes, the original property in the existing location was patented in 1670 as land owned by Lieutenant Francis Price, who was a Colonel in Cromwell’s Army who took over Jamaica in 1655 from the Spanish. Price was gifted the land for his services to the British. We are planning a special release and some publicity features and events.

Q: What type of experience can visitors expect when touring your facility? 

We do offer tours, M-F, 10am and 2pm by appointment only. Bookings are through “Jamaica Rum Tours” for non-residents, CHUKKA for cruise ship visitors, and directly through us for Jamaican residents. 

The tour is limited to groups of 25 or less an it lasts 1.5 hours with a video presentation, cane crushing demonstration, distillery tour, tasting session and the opportunity for some shopping. 

Anyone can visit www.worthyparkestate.com/tour to get more info.

Q: If people want to contact you, how may they reach you?  

g.clarke@worthyparkestate.com 

Q: Is there anything else you would like to share with our readers? 

We are really optimistic about the direction of the rum industry and Jamaican Rum’s part in it. Consumers are becoming more educated; palates are changing and we are seeing a shift towards acceptance of the higher ester rum styles coming out of Jamaica. Also, brand “Jamaica” is such a valuable brand in many categories of products and we can see why many companies outside of Jamaica are trying to capitalize on it without any real connection to the source. This is why the Jamaica Rum GI is so important to us. Consumers need to know when they are picking up a bottle that says Jamaica Rum that it’s been produced in accordance to what the market knows as Jamaica Rum. 

Margaret: Again Mr. Clarke, thank you so much for this interview and I wish you and your team much success.

Wishing you all the best this 2020!

Margaret Ayala, Publisher