Favorite Whiskey?

Look at what happened during the pandemic. Supplies of various consumer goods began to dwindle as mfg restrictions increased. That drove the price up.

As the supply of a product like BT or anything else comes to minimums, mfg have to decide how they will respond. For distillers, they’re looking at 12 or more years out—what you distill today will be bottled in 2036. And if you think about it, distillers are deciding about 2024’s production allocation and watching sales and adjusting accordingly. How do you predict where the market is going? Never mind catastrophes like the Heaven Hill fire in 1996, Wild Turkey in 2000, and Jim Beam in 2019. Then you have the new products who are blending to generate income and won’t have their own product for at least 3 years.

It’s a business model that appears in other businesses as well. The auto industry is a great example. Sell a 100 Camrys, get 10 4Runners. Sell 100 4Runners, get 5 Land Cruisers. It’s shitty model because smaller dealers get squeezed out—that’s one of the reasons I try to shop my local liquor store.

 

Distilleries like BT that have invested in significantly ramped up production are taking pretty significant risks. As you said, impossible to know if the demand will still be there by the time the newly barreled whiskey is aged.

 

BT is in a better place. If they “over-commit”, they have a variety of outlets to sell. But if you underproduce, not so easy to recover.

Oh. And the Jim Beam fire took something almost 50k barrels….only a fraction of production

 

Maybe the whiskey epidemic of the 70’s and 80’s was a one-time fluke, but generally the spirits culture is global. Besides, North America alone is 40% of the whiskey market. If it took a whiskey dump BT would be in a bad place. It wouldn’t close, it’s too big and owned by a parent company that’s too big, which is in turn owned by a billionaire family, but there would most certainly be serious consequences for a lot of distillery employees.

Market experts predict the American whiskey industry’s value to increase by something like 50% over the next 7 years or so which blows my mind, it already seems so heavily saturated with product.

 

It seems with the recession already here, and something even worse looming...that folks will be spending their money on quality sippers at reasonable pricing. As much as I'd like to lay out $700 for a rare old Fitz...or even higher, lately I'm going after the $50 - $100 interesting offerings that bring something unique. Talked to a small liquor store guy today who is pretty knowledgable. He said he's only going to sell allocated finds for about 10-15 above MSRP because he doesn't have the capital to sit on bottles. I picked up a 2023 Storyteller Bookers today from him for $90. I feel dumb because I paid $135 for the same just a few months ago. I'll post up some trades/finds I had today. Really enjoying this lower priced, smaller distiller hunting. BTW, I'm picking up two bottles of Smokeye Hill for $110 each...AND...locally, a distributor has a mess of Stellum for cut rates. He relayed that Stellum gave him a deal because they are changing labels...don't know if that's true or not...but I scooped up 6 bottles, will send a pic with the prices.

 

Anyone ever tried it? $129 locally.

 

Today’s pickups along with some swaps for E/Times black caps. The Copper Sky Longmont CO wheater is local, time to give it a try, $55 bottle.

 

Never heard of it before….anyone else? $99 a bottle

 

that's Beyonce's "allocated" whiskey

 

Local shop blowing these out. Stellum Rye $27, Stellum Bourbon cask strength black label, $37. These are made by Barrel Craft

For price comparison, $99 down the street

 

Ahhhhh, pretty low proof for $99

 

Bought two of these store picks. Really good! I was quite surprised. A couple drops of water and the apple/caramel really comes out

 

When I say it would be in a good place, I mean they are in a better place to ride it out.

btw, appreciate your insight.

 

Re-labeled MGP.

 

....but it has a metal thing on the outside......

 

Finally found one of these today

 

23B here, definitely the least impressive Stagg I've had.

 

Also picked this up out of curiosity

 

I really like them no burn, no funky flavors, just sweet and easy to drink too many of.

 

agreed...and I bought two of them, both very, very overpriced.