In the 1970s, Pip Hills organized a huge number of tastings of cask strength whiskies in Scottish distilleries. This was unusual at the time, as the industry generally considered them too rugged and strong for consumers. Having fallen deeply in love with the style, Pip Hills persuaded some friends to band together and help him buy casks directly from distilleries, later founding the Scotch Malt Whisky Society in 1983. The society sources whiskies from more than 140 distilleries in Scotland and abroad, bottles them at cask strength and distributes them to its members. Today, the Scotch Malt Whisky Society has over 270,000 members in numerous countries around the world, all of whom can meet up for tastings and events in their own private clubs.
Casks are carefully selected by a panel of experts and released with inspiring names. Tasting notes are included that help members make an informed choice from a selection of always delicious, always unusual expressions.

The Tar Pit 9 Year Old is a blended malt matured in bourbon casks, bourbon hogsheads and Pedro Ximenez butts. The Scotch Malt Whisky Society (SMWS) was founded in Edinburgh in 1983 by a group of friends with a particular passion for whisky. The club selects casks whose bottles are then only available to members. The name of the distillery is not mentioned on the label but each distillery is given a number as the malt is bottled. The first cask selected by the SMWS, for example, was Glenfarclas, and it therefore uses the number 1. The second number refers to the number of bottlings from each distillery. The club was sold to Glenmorangie in 2004 and then to a group of investors in 2016.