Distiller's random act of kindness with wild elderberry elixir giveaway

Buck & Birch, based in Macmerry Industrial Estate and owned by Tom Chisholm and Rupert Waites, makes ready-mixed, bottled cocktails, elixirs and liqueurs.

To mark Random Acts of Kindness Week, which ran from February 14 to 20, the business teamed up with FareShare Glasgow & The West of Scotland, and local care homes and charities, to donate hundreds of bottles of its elixir.

Tom, director of Buck & Birch, said: “For millennia, elderberries have been used to minimise the risk of catching cold and flu, as well as alleviating the symptoms.

“So, in response to the Covid-19 outbreak, we teamed up with Monica Wilde of Napiers the Herbalists to make our elderberry elixir, suitable for the whole family and the perfect, tasty way of getting your daily dose of this beneficial fruit. 

“The whole point of us launching the elixir was to help boost physical health and wellbeing, so surely the point is that it reaches those that are in need of it most.” 

FareShare Glasgow & The West of Scotland, run by the charity Move On, received 500 bottles of the elixir, worth £7,500 in total.

In addition, and spreading the kindness just that little bit further, for every bottle of its wild elderberry elixir sold, Buck & Birch will donate a bottle to frontline workers.

Jim Burns, director of operations at Move On, said: “Here at FareShare Glasgow & The West of Scotland, we take surplus product

from across the food and drink industry and redistribute it to organisations that support the most vulnerable, including children, the homeless, refugees and elderly people.

“When we receive donations from the likes of Buck & Birch, it means that we can provide more varied deliveries to our charity partners, who can then in turn offer a wider range of food and drink to the people they support.”

And he added: “This is exceptionally important when we are in the midst of a global lockdown, when life for many is already harder than before.”