The Rum on Our Menu That Removes Carbon From the Sky

We think carefully about everything we put on our menu. Where it comes from, how it was made, what the real cost of producing it is. That's true of our fish and it’s true of our rum too. 

Two Drifters is a Devon distillery making carbon negative rum. Not carbon neutral, carbon negative. Every bottle they produce permanently removes more CO2 from the atmosphere than it ever created. 

That's not a marketing claim, it's a scientific process. And it all starts with a first date. 

A rum tasting, a honeymoon in St. Lucia, and a chemistry PhD. 

Russ and Gemma Wakeham founded Two Drifters in 2019. Their honeymoon was in St. Lucia and by the time they got home, the idea for a distillery was already forming. They named it after a line from Moon River, the song Gemma walked down the aisle to. "Two drifters, off to see the world."  

Russ's background is in chemistry research, specifically carbon capture, storage and utilisation. The science of finding ways to give CO2 actual value, rather than just letting it accumulate invisibly in the atmosphere. Unlike plastic, which is visible and increasingly hard to ignore, CO2 is colourless and builds up in the sky with no obvious warning. Raising awareness of that invisible problem became part of what Two Drifters is built around.

So what does carbon negative actually mean? 

Most businesses that make sustainability claims are talking about carbon neutral at best. Offset what you create, end up at zero but Two Drifters go further and remove more CO2 than they generate in the first place. 

They do this in two stages. First, they avoid as much as possible. The distillery near Exeter Airport runs entirely on electricity from a 100% renewable tariff. Every vehicle used for deliveries is electric, their packaging is carbon neutral, the bottles are lightweight British-made glass, the labels are 95% waste sugarcane fibre, the cork is FSC certified, the tamper seal is 100% compostable and there is a closed-loop chilling system to keep production efficient.  

Then, for the emissions they cannot yet eliminate — things like molasses shipping and glass production — they partner with Climeworks, a world leader in carbon capture technology, and Carbfix, who turn the captured CO2 into stone and store it permanently underground. Between them, more CO2 is removed than was ever created. 

They describe it as a self-imposed carbon tax. Producing CO2 costs them money, so they do everything possible not to produce it. That's a different kind of accountability from simply buying offsets. 

And the rum itself? 

Made entirely from scratch, on-site in Devon. The whole process happens under one roof, which means Russ and Gemma control every step of production. They started at 80 bottles a week and the distillery now produces over 2,000. 

We stock two of their rums: 

Pure White. Triple distilled, smooth and clean. Crisp vanilla, apple, white pepper and lime zest. Excellent in a cocktail, excellent on its own. 

Signature. Fuller bodied, aged in ex-Madeira French Oak. Buttery, with gentle orange peel and muscovado sugar. The kind of rum worth pouring slowly. 

Two Drifters are also a certified B Corporation, independently verified against high standards of social and environmental performance.

Why does this sit well with us? 

We spend a lot of time thinking about the sea we depend on and what kind of future it has. Tomorrow's fish are still in the sea, as we say. That long-term thinking extends to who we work with and what we put on our tables. 

Two Drifters are Devon neighbours and they make something genuinely excellent. They've built a whole business around doing it properly, with the science to back it up, not just the language. 

Both rums are on our menu across our restaurants. Find out more about what Two Drifters are doing at twodriftersrum.com.