British Columbia has built an international reputation for gin and whisky. Rum is not on that list — the climate is wrong and the raw material does not grow here. Global BC came out to the farm to see how a Vancouver Island family got around that.
What “estate-grown” actually costs
Most spirits are made from bought-in raw material. Estate-grown means the crop is grown on the same ground the still sits on — and on four acres in North Saanich, that is a real constraint rather than a marketing line. The size of the harvest sets the size of the release. There is no ordering more.
The crop is sorghum cane, hand-cut in October, pressed on site and distilled into agricole-style rum: made from fresh cane juice rather than molasses, in the tradition of Martinique. It is, as far as we know, the first estate-grown agricole rum produced in Canada.
Four generations of the same job
The Hastings family has farmed this property since 1927 — a dairy farm first, subdivided down over the decades to the four acres that remain. The distillery is not a change of direction so much as a change of product. The same family is still out in the same field in October, doing the harvest by hand, kids included.
That is the part of the story the Global BC segment is really about: not a novelty spirit, but generations of farming work being pointed at something new.
See it for yourself
The segment runs about two minutes and is worth the watch — it shows the harvest better than any description does.
You can read more about how the rum is made in the Victoria News coverage, or find the bottles in our shop.
Segment by Jay Durant for Global News BC, aired June 29, 2025 on This is BC. Reporting is Global News’; please watch the original segment in full.