Never Never Distilling Co. have released the 2024 version of their Carn the Pear Gin in partnership with the Port Adelaide Football Club, featuring a slick new label that pays homage to one of the club’s most iconic guernseys.
First released in 2023, the limited-edition pear flavoured gin sold out quickly, proving to be popular with the club faithful. Similarly, in 2024 the run will be limited, and made first available to Port Adelaide members.
The updated label features Port Adelaide’s Tri Bolt design first worn during the 1998 pre-season.
The Tri Bolt quickly became synonymous with the Port Adelaide brand and continued to be popular with True Believers throughout the early 2000’s as the club’s pre-season and clash strips. Last year, the nostalgic design made a highly anticipated return during the Power’s Retro Round.
Similar to the inaugural batch, this year’s gin features the famous South Australian Williams Pear, in combination with other botanicals including lemon peel, orris root, cinnamon and mountain pepper.
BUY A BOTTLE OF THE 2024 CARN THE PEAR GIN NOW
The gin uses over one tonne of the local Adelaide Hills pears all processed by hand at the Never Never distillery located in McLaren Vale, a task that took over a week and several distillation runs to complete.
For the past two years the distillery has been the main sponsor of Port Adelaide’s game day experience, the ‘Perfect Pear’ at Adelaide Oval with the limited-edition 2024 product to be launched during the segment in the coming weeks.
Never Never Brand Director and Co-founder Sean Baxter is excited to see the next iteration of the seasonal gin in market.
“We love this time of year,” says Sean, “it’s exciting to see the team up and about and playing well,” he says.
“Carn The Pear Gin is a fun collaboration that truly champions the iconic “pear” flavour profile that the Port fanbase celebrate so passionately,” he says.
“Last year’s release was incredibly well received, so we wanted to do it again, and just make it better than ever before,” he says. “The flavour that Tim and the team have created this year is absolutely first class, it bursts from the glass like Ollie Wines through a tackle.”
“It’s a cracking representation of juicy, local Williams pears bursting with fresh fruit flavour.”
The use of the Williams Pear name adds extra significance when considering the Port Adelaide historical connection to the Williams name through Fos Williams.
“It seemed fitting we continued to remake the seasonal gin using Williams pears given the history of the name and ingredient,” says Sean.
Even the signature drink is an ode to one of the biggest rock songs of the 80’s and is the unofficial anthem of the Port Adelaide Football Club.
“The signature G&T is called ‘Never Pear Us Apart’ and uses the gin paired with a quality tonic water and a slice of fresh pear,” says Sean. “It’s a cheeky nod to the fans and the songs they sing when toasting a classic Port win,” he says.
From the outset there has been an incredible synergy between the local brands, both born from a work ethic that demands results of the highest order.
"Our brand was born in the west.” says Sean. “Back in 2017 we first started in 16 square metres of shed space in Royal Park, just a couple minutes down the road from the historic Alberton Oval. With a decent wind you basically could have kicked a torp into the carpark," he says.
The Never Never Gin Marquee has been a part of Port Adelaide’s AFLW home games at Alberton Oval ever since the first bounce, with their famous ‘Never Pear Us Apart’ G&T being one of their most popular serves. It was at this moment that Never Never realised they needed to give the fans what they wanted.
“The Never Never Gin Marquee was always filled with passionate fans who loved supporting their club in whatever way they could,” says Sean. “Our G&T garnished with fresh pear was a massive hit, to the point where we really wanted to take the serve to the next level,” he says.
The limited gin will first be available for Port Adelaide Football Club members on the 28th of May. Any remaining bottles will be available through the Never Never website and through the Never Never distillery door.
