Speyside single malt G. Grant and William Grant & Sons and by The Edrington Group (majority owned by a charitable trust). Scotland's Malt Whisky Trail is a tourism initiative featuring eight Speyside distilleries and the Speyside Cooperage. Speyside also hosts an annual whisky festival known as "Spirit of Speyside". Speyside whiskies can generally be classified as light and grassy (e.g. Glenlivet) or rich and sweet (e.g. Macallan). Speyside is a "protected region" for Scotch Whisky distilling under UK Government legislation. In addition to those single malts sold under the distilleries' names, brands associated with Speyside include Allt-á-Bhainne, Casg Annamh, Glen Turner, Lismore, McClelland's
Badenoch and Strathspey (in the county of Inverness) the burgh of Kingussie and the district of Badenoch with (in the county of Moray) the burgh of Grantown-on-Spey and the district of Cromdale. The traditional area of Strathspey was thus divided between the Highland region and the Grampian region. In 1996, under the Local Government etc (Scotland) Act 1994, the Highland Region became the Highland Council Area and the districts were abolished. The Highland Council (in law a new and different entity), as the successor authority, then adopted the areas of the former districts as management areas and created area committees to represent them.