Trading tequila for Aussie agave: Trent Fraser of Top Shelf

Drinks Adventures - Wine, beer, whisky, gin & more with James Atkinson

Our guest this episode is Trent Fraser, who is heading up the groundbreaking Australian Agave Project for Top Shelf International.

When we spoke in early September, Trent was getting ready to unveil the brand identity for the project, which has since been revealed as Act of Treason Australian Agave Spirit.

It’s the first agave spirit produced at scale in Australia, and the largest agave spirit project outside Mexico.

Top Shelf — the ASX-listed company behind Ned Whisky and Grainshaker Vodka — has planted more than 500,000 blue weber agaves at its Eden Lassie farm in Far North Queensland, with one million to be planted by the end of 2024.

It was the project that lured Trent home after 20-plus years in New York, where he worked for LVMH — Moét Hennessy Louis Vuitton — first on Dom Perignon Champagne, and then the Volcan Tequila brand, which he helped build from scratch.

So this isn’t Trent’s first rodeo. And coming up, you'll hear why he’s so confident about the prospects for an Australian product that isn’t trying to be tequila or mezcal, but rather our own regional expression of agave, a spirit category that is currently booming worldwide.

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