As a company Alfred Dunhill Ltd had grown into a luxury goods house and clothing brand with a network of 19 shops around the world by the early 1980s. It was perhaps best known for its own-brand cigarettes and in common with John Player Special decided in 1982 it needed a deluxe blended Scotch whisky to complete its portfolio.

The whisky was blended for the company by IDV and sold by its wine and spirits subsidiary, Morgan Furze & Co.