Rum is his middle name: a chat with Ian Burrell

Ian Burrell is the Rum Ambassador, traveling the world spreading the Gospel according to Rum. He decided to represent an entire category instead of a single brand…. With huge success. 

My interview with Ian

Hi Ian! Can you tell me the story about your a-ha moment when you decided you were going to be a generic Rum Ambassador instead of representing a particular brand?

I was down in New Zealand in 2003 as a brand ambassador for Appleton Rum. I was actually only the UK Ambassador but I did a conference in Jamaica where the whole Appleton team from around the world was present and when they heard me speak, the guys from New Zealand said, “would you like to come out and talk to us?” That’s a long way to go to talk about rum but I said, “Yeah!” and flew out to New Zealand. Over there, I got to meet some great bartenders and visit five amazing cities. I said, “Well, this is what I want to do. I want to be able to talk about rum to bartenders and rum lovers around the world”. While I was there, people were asking questions about other brands, and I didn't have the answers. So my a-ha moment was, well, who is that person who goes and talks to people about the category of rum? And I thought to myself “Well, why can't it be me?”. After that, I dedicated my life to learning as much as I could about rum and tell the story of what I found to as many people that would listen.

So that started in 2003 — or was it a little bit later?

That was when I actually said I want to be a rum ambassador that traveled around the world. But I was already a part time brand ambassador. I was probably the first brand ambassador in the UK, because that role hadn't existed before, and that was in the late 90s. I can confirm that I am the very first rum ambassador in the world. I was kind of just giving myself an upgrade, going from UK brand ambassador to rum global brand ambassador.

Some spirits categories are very competitive with each other. Did you have any resistance from certain brands when you said you were going to represent a category instead of a brand?

No, far from it! All of the brands that I eventually started working with embraced it because the way they looked at it was that they would have an independent person as a champion for a growing category speaking on their behalf. I always say to the brands, if you want me to say that your brand is the best rum in the world, you have the wrong person. If you want me to say rum is the best spirit category in the world, then I'm your guy. That's how it develops. So yes, I gave myself my own title. But I earned the respect of the rum companies for what I do to help promote rum.

You hold many seminars and “edutainment” sessions about rum, and you're always careful to say you're not a certified authority, but you're always learning and I find that very refreshing. So I want to know, what is the latest thing you learned about rum?

Great question! I was having a conversation today with a potential rum maker in India. He was telling me about the Indian market today. What I learned today is how the Indian market perceives rum, whether it's the local stuff, whether it had an addition of a little spice and flavor like the Old Monk, or the big brands like Bacardi getting established in India. Brands like to make rum in India to save money on tax because the importation of duty and tax into India is quite a lot. India is one of the biggest rum drinking countries in the world, but they're not drinking premium rums. They're drinking very cheap rum, but there is the potential for premium rums to grow because there is a lot of whiskey drinking, and those drinkers are looking for a change. So I suppose the biggest thing I learned today is that there is a massive space for premium rums in the Indian subcontinent. If a company wants to take the chance to go there, they could grow it with discerning consumers. So as a global ambassador for those that don't know rum like we do in the UK, Europe or in the Americas, I always have to know what happens in Asia as well.

You created a rum shack on Antarctica so you could truly say you worked on all seven continents. Can you tell me a little bit about that experience?

That was the opportunity to go down there because someone had asked me, as a joke, how I could be a global ambassador if I hadn't made cocktails on every continent in the world, and I said, “You're right”. So I went online and I saw that there were ships going out there and I found the last spot left on a ship from Argentina, with two planes to get there. This was also around the same time I was looking to promote rum in cocktails. I had this mobile Tiki Bar that folded down like a flat pack and became two meters high, one and a half meters wide. So, when I looked at my schedule, I actually could go to all seven continents, and I said to myself: great PR, seven continents in seven months! So that's what I did. I took it to Antarctica. A couple months later, to South America, in Venezuela. And then I took it to North America, in Miami. That was amazing. Then I went to Hong Kong for the rum festival, then Sydney, of course Europe was the easiest because I live in the UK, and in Africa I went to Mauritius.

Ian in Antarctica.

And so, since you're representing a category and not a brand, how do you get funding?

I go to different brands that want to sponsor an event and tell them how much it will cost. The brands then divide the costs because I will promote them equally. A lot of brands don't mind working together with each other because rising tides float all boats. They see that I'm actually going to give them fair coverage and I'm not going to favor one over the other so they are quite happy to work together. Sometimes it's sponsored by various brands and other times it's just paid for by me. I’m quite happy to reinvest into myself, into my knowledge, so I'll get that back in the future. When I first became a rum ambassador traveling around the Caribbean, I paid for it myself; no brand paid for me to go to the islands to learn about rum. 

You see, now it has paid off for you, so that's great.

I was prepared to invest into my knowledge so that I can then pass it on to other people.

Can you tell me a little bit about RumFest and how it has evolved since the first edition in 2007?

For the first edition, I wanted to create an event that really showcased the diversity of rum from all over the world that all tasted slightly different or have their own flavor profiles. And I wanted to have all that under one roof, so people can come and compare, just like they do at a wine, beer or whiskey festival. There was no rum festival, no international rum festivals at that time, so the idea was to educate as well. So we had masterclasses, seminars, but also entertainment. I love to entertain, so we had some cocktail events, music, dancing… It was a fun event. Then it started to snowball and that led to other people organizing events in their countries, like my friend from France. He started as being part of the first event during a seminar. Three years later, he created the Paris RumFest. Another guy came over from Miami. He saw me and asked me if I could help him organize the Miami RumFest. Berlin was the same.

There seem to be many around the world, but you organize the one in the UK.

Yes, and I am also a part of a small event called Miami Rum Congress. Our event is in February to coincide with Black History month in the USA. It consists of educational seminars and presentations. We are looking to do something different for 2023—a big Miami rum event. Watch this space!

When is the RumFest held in the UK? 

It's always October because October is Black History Month here in the UK. So I always do it then because of the influence that Black history has had on rum. As we know, rum could never have been made, put in the place where it was, if it wasn't for the sweat and tears of enslaved Africans. So it's important to pay homage to the people that are so important to the category.

What is the wildest cocktail you've seen that includes rum, maybe something that normally wouldn't have rum.

An espresso martini with rum works really well together and adds more flavor to the drink.

One popular cocktail that bartenders might not realize—the old fashioned—was originally made with rum and cognac in the Americas. When you went to a bar, you'd ask for a cocktail made the old fashioned way, you’d stir down the sugars then you ask the spirit of choice. So you could have a whisky old fashioned or cognac or a rum made the old fashioned way. Whisky became popular in America after the Revolutionary war, because rum was associated with the Brits. 

I wanted to create a brand so people would discover the story, or as I say on the bottle, “a journey of discovery”.

You created your own rum. Tell us about it.

I've created Equiano. It’s only two years old as a brand, but it's also one of the fastest growing rums out there.

What is the parent company of that?

There's no parent company. I invested my own money. There are four founders. It’s the world’s first African and Caribbean rum; a blend of Cognac cask rums from Mauritius and bourbon cask rums from Barbados. Here it is, Equiano.

Ooh, beautiful bottle too.

So what it is, we get the 10 year old rum from Mauritius. We send it to Barbados, where it's blended at Foursquare distillery by Richard Seale. Some say he’s the best rum maker in the world. So Richard Seale blends those two rums together, his 8 year old rum from Foursquare with a 10 year old rum from Mauritius, and then bottles in Barbados and then sends it over to the US and sends it to the UK. And the reason why we do that process in Africa and the Caribbean is because my ethnicity is African Caribbean. More importantly, we called the rum Equiano because Olaudah Equiano was a freedom fighter. He was an abolitionist. He was an African that was enslaved when he was 11 years old, and he was taken from Africa to Barbados, and then came to England. By the time he was 21, he bought his own freedom for 40 pounds, 50 bucks, which was about four years’ wages, selling spices and rum in the colonies. And, with that freedom, he came back to the UK and vowed to fight for everyone else's freedom. So he wrote a book about himself, about what it was like to be kidnapped from Africa, being enslaved and winning freedom. And he called it The Interesting Narrative of Olaudah Equiano. And that book got published nine times in the 1890s and it was used to help in Parliament with a debate to create the abolition of slavery within the colonies. So he was instrumental in the abolition of slavery because that book he wrote that was used by all the abolitionists in the 1870s. 

The book cover of The Interesting Narrative of Olaudah Equiano.

What a powerful story. 

It's a story that most people don’t know much about, but once they read about it online, they wonder why no one knows about this. I wanted to create a brand so people would discover the story, or as I say on the bottle, “a journey of discovery”. We want people to discover not only that there's such a thing as great tasting rum, with no spices, no sugar and 86 proof. It’s won a gold medal in every single competition it’s entered in two years. We just wanted to create a rum that everybody could drink: a rum for the many but not for the few I like to say-- . We also tell a great story of Olaudah Equiano, an inspiration to many leaders around the world who read his books and were inspired by him, whether it was Martin Luther King or William Wilberforce, who campaigned for the abolition of slavery in the colonies in the 1800s. They were inspired by him as we pay homage to him.

How much traveling do you average per year?

I was probably on the road about a total of seven months out of the year. Even during COVID in between the pockets where we were allowed, I traveled a lot because of my double vax, so I was able to go into certain countries. And that way, I was still able to spread the Gospel according to Rum as opposed to just doing Zoom calls. So 2020 was a big shutdown for me between March and August. In the three months before the first lockdown, I'd done Jamaica, Australia, and New Zealand, Jamaica, Denmark, Cayman Islands, long before then. As soon as we're allowed back on the planes again in August, I was in Genoa. I was in Czech Republic because they had a Rumfest, I was in Poland…

So you still get in there whenever you can. Good. So how does this affect your home life?

Well, I mean, it's great. I've got two boys, 7 and 4, but they love the fact that they see me online or on TV talking about rum. Great, wonderful family that will help as well at home looking after boys when I'm away and things like that. So yeah, they understand what I do, they know that as the only person in the world that has my job, it means I have to go around the world.

They’re still young, maybe it’s too early to say if your sons are going to be following in your footsteps?

They are already telling people they are rum ambassadors. They know the smell of rum but they haven’t tasted it fully yet. 

Do you work with charities or causes?

I do. Equiano was an entrepreneur and also a freedom fighter. I decided if I was going to create a brand or work with a brand we have to have some sort of philanthropic mindset. So we pledge 5% of our profits that will go to our foundation which works in various different equality organizations around the world. But as we are only two years old we're not going to make a profit for a while. So what we do is donate 2 dollars 2 euros or 2 pounds for every bottle that we sell that goes to our foundation. The foundation is working with Anti Slavery International because the people who founded it were actually were inspired by Olaudah Equiano. So it's the oldest human rights organization in the world. We didn't expect to sell as much as we did in our first year, even with the lockdown, so we were very happy when we were able to give them a nice big check.

Yeah, that's a really inspiring story. I love that. And even though you haven't made a profit, you’re still contributing. 

Yeah, on our website you can see a small video that dealt with anti-slavery International to show some of the some of the projects they have going around the world. And the thing is, when we think of slavery, a lot of people might pick up the old images of slavery but slavery is happening today. Modern slavery, women being held in Eastern Europe against their will, that is slavery. There are people here in the UK that are in sweatshops and people are being smuggled over here and that is slavery. So we're trying to basically bring light to all of that. Just through a glass, a glass of rum and a drink. It can be a tough discussion for some people, it's hard to actually get them to think about this, but if you can get them to enjoy the drink and the bottle and let people know that the money is going for a good cause, then I've achieved what I wanted.

Five questions for Ian

If Jamaican rum were a person, what personality trait would you give it? 

Adventurous. 

What about agricole rum?

Refined.

Spiced rums, same question?

Jovial.

What is your favorite food pairing with rum?

Dark chocolate, but also cold cuts and cheeses.

Okay, last question. What is your nerdiest hobby?

Watching Marvel Comics related TV shows.

Where you can find Ian

On Instagram

Ian: @therumambassador

Equiano Rum: @equianorum

UK RumFest: @ukrumfest

Anti Slavery International: @antislaveryinternational

Websites

Ian Rum Burrell: ianrumburrell.com

Equiano Rum: equianorum.com

Ian is a regular guest on Sunday Brunch, a show airing on Channel 4 in the UK.