A SCOT is auctioning one of the last glass bottles of original recipe Irn Bru – for £120.
Ryan Allen has already raised £50 in tickets for the full sugar drink which would have sold last year for £1.
Stocks of the much-loved original drink have dwindled to almost zero after a controversial recipe change swapped sugar for artificial sweetners in a bid to dodge the government’s sugar tax.
Bottle of original Irn Bru sell on the “black market” for around £20 but Ryan, from Ayr, hopes to get six times that with is charity raffle.
Those hoping to win the bottle of “gold dust” pay £2 to pick a number and enter the raffle draw. Ryan raised £50 by selling 10 tickets at £5 each but has cut the price and revised the target down from the original £295.
Ryan intends to give the proceeds to Whiteleys Retreat, a respite house in Ayrshire which helps families with cancer in the UK.
The joiner is also part of the “Bring Back Real Irn Bru” campaign group, and hopes the raffle will bring more attention to the cause – which calls for a boycott of Barr’s products until the recipe is changed back.
Sharing his Justgiving page on Facebook, Ryan wrote: “Real Bru Bonus Ball Raffle.
“Original recipe 750ml glass bottle being raffled to raise money for Whiteleys Retreat – a new centre in Ayrshire providing therapeutic short breaks for children, young people and their families with cancer and life altering illnesses in the UK.
“Pay £2 per ball directly to Whiteleys Retreat via just giving link to help raise £120.”
Speaking today, Ryan said: “I’ve seen people getting to the last of the real bru and getting desperate. Also prices are going up and greedy people are chancing their arm for crazy prices.
“I thought I could channel that into something that supports a good cause as well keeping some exposure to the campaign to Bring Back Real Irn-Bru.
“It’s one of three that I have left, down from 24 bottles and 48 cans I had at the recipe change.
AG Barr stopped production of their full sugar recipe in January this year, ahead of the UK government’s soft drinks levy which kicked in in April.
The sugar content was slashed from 10.3g per 100ml to 4.7g and artificial sweeteners were added to the recipe.
In May this year punters were stunned after a woman on Facebook offered two litre bottles of the fizzy orange drink at £15 each.
