The Sunday Times Lifestyle Gin Awards, in partnership with Makro and Fitch & Leedes, is proud to announce the celebration of creators and retailers of locally and internationally crafted gins and variants.
Our panel of expert and celebrity judges will acknowledge excellence and guide readers on the best gins and distilleries in the industry.
Finalists will be announced on September 2, and the top four entries will be invited to the awards event on October 19 2018 with great prizes to be won for the highest scoring gins as voted for by Makro consumers.
Deadline: August 21 2018
About the competition
To be considered for the competition, your product will need to fulfill the below criteria:
- The basic definition of gin is that it is a clear alcoholic spirit distilled or redistilled from neutral spirits and flavoured with juniper berries. The most important criterion is that the predominant flavour must be juniper or the gin entered should contain juniper.
- In South Africa, gin must be bottled at a minimum of 43% alcohol by volume (ABV).
Judging process
- All spirits entered will be handled by our professional mixologist and organised by category.
- The gins will be tasted blindly to determine their quality.
- Where appropriate, they will be assessed by type, style and country.
- Judges will be given a briefing document setting out the gin’s price and target consumer. Only then, will judges be asked to give their score for quality based on the initial blind tasting.
- The judges will then be handed the bottle or format for them to be able to assess, in detail, the design, label, and packaging and determine how well that matches up to, or complements the quality of the gin and its price point.
- The judges will then discuss the spirit as a whole to help allocate scores in the three judging areas.
Alcohol not for sale to persons under the age of 18. Drink responsibly.
Just R20 for the first month. Support independent journalism by subscribing to our digital news package. 