A warehouse disaster is a large concern for the bourbon industry, but some people in the community make jokes and laugh at the situation. Should this be considered normal? Heaven Hill phased out their 6 Year Bottled in Bond product that was a true bargain brand to many bourbon consumers and launched a very similar product with a 3X price increase. Was this a good move by Heaven Hill? Are they competing in a high price bracket? Did they just cannibalize their own products? Is this the first #KentuckySnub? We tackle all this and more on Bourbon Community Roundtable #34.
Show Notes:
- This week Ryan talks about launching a bourbon brand.
- Look for a new segment called Whiskey Quickie launching next week.
- Brian Harra’s Sazerac Brands v. Peristyle: Bourbon History Matters as a Matter of Law – https://brianhaaracom.files.wordpress.com/2019/07/haara-bourbon-history-matters-as-a-matter-of-law-ky-jeanrl-2019.pdf
- Jim Beam Warehouse Fire
- Heaven Hill 7-Year Bottled-in-Bond
- Was it the right move to discontinue 6-Year BIB and relaunch with 7-Year at a higher price point?
- Do you think this product competes with the Woodford and Knob Creek price point?
- Is Heaven Hill competing against themselves?
- Why wouldn’t Heaven Hill launch in Kentucky on day one?
- How do you best support retailers that elevate prices for hard to find bottles?
Transcription:
0:00
My wife was like, I was like remember I got a podcast. She said ugh that’s so annoying.
0:07
Didn’t you just do one of those round tables and I’m like that was last month.
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Hey everybody it is Episode 209 of bourbon pursuit. I’m one of your host Kenny in the bourbon news cycle it moves quick. What’s Trending one day is going to become pretty stale soon. And I’m sure many of you are like myself wanna bourbon warehouse collapses or when 45,000 barrels of bourbon go up in flames from a lightning strike at a gym be warehouse. We probably get a lot of messages in our inbox about it. And I kind of want to focus on this and say, where are we at today on the current situation. So on july fourth, the Woodford County Fire Department waited to extinguish the fire for a few days because as they said, there is less environmental
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impact to allowing the ethanol just letting it continue to burn. Beam Suntory put out a press release saying that the barrels in the warehouse contain relatively young whiskey from the Jim Beam Asheville in the US, it will not impact the availability of the product to its customers. And they are going to be working with local state and federal agencies to conduct response operations. And now beyond just the whiskey, Jim Beam is looking at a $50 million loss. That would be the bourbon loss at around 45 million, with an estimated additional 5 million in the damages to the warehouses and the cleanup process. And that cleanup is going to be in response to a mass amount of bourbon that has entered the Ohio River after traveling more than 20 miles down the Kentucky River. And the Kentucky’s division of Fish and Wildlife is already characterizing this bill as a severe fish kill. The officials are still continuing to assess the damage to the aquatic life. In a Facebook post on Monday, the Kentucky Energy and Environment cabinets
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said that the department Fish and Wildlife Resources is on the river again, and they are continuing to assess the fish count killed and the results are continue to penned. They are also going to see dead and dying fish. People are using the Kentucky River in the area and they’re going to start seeing and smelling the dead fish as well. Robert Francis, the manager of the emergency response team said that the bacteria in the water is going after the food source, which is the sugar and the alcohol so it ends up depleting the oxygen, the fish start to become distress and they eventually die. According to officials, the dead fish will decompose naturally with no harm to the river, so there’s no plan to remove them, being Suntory is likely going to be handed a large fine once this comes to a close. If you’ve taken a drive in Bardstown, or Shively, Kentucky or really anywhere near a distillery or aging warehouses, you’ll notice this sort of black fungus or film that grows on the side of rock houses and even find itself attached to road signs and surround
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Holmes in 2007 when University of Toronto my colleges James Scott published an academic paper about the fungus, it pinned it on the whiskey industry. Dr. Scott discovered that this fungus which is he named but don’t Yeah, after the man who first studied it in 1872 Anton but don’t feeds on the ethanol vapor released by liquor as it ages. Since ethanol is denser than air, the evaporated Angel’s share doesn’t float up into the sky after all, but rather into the surrounding communities. In when it is airborne. Ethanol meets the slightest bit of moisture. It’s going to be common because distilleries and towns are usually near those water sources. You get whiskey fungus all over the place. You can read more about this fungus and how it’s plaguing neighboring towns from an article on but by Vice calm, which can be found in our show notes. This podcast, it’s always been about education and our focus is how do we bring the biggest personalities behind bourbon to the forefront and get
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listeners a chance to experience the hear directly from them. We never intended this podcast to be about Reiner. I am really what we think. And that’s why we never did bourbon or whiskey reviews as a part of our format. However, over the years, people are continually asking us what we think of a particular bourbon. So we wanted to figure out a way to do just that without impacting our pretty much our schedule routine here. So next week, we are launching a new content stream that will be available through your current podcast subscription you’re listening to right now, as well as YouTube and we’re calling it whiskey quickie. as we did with the podcast. We researched the landscape of bourbon reviews on the Internet to see which format will be best for us, YouTube, it’s a large segment and the reviews we watch went anywhere from five minutes upwards to almost an hour long. So we’re setting off to make whiskey quickie unlike anything out there today. It’s a whiskey review with no cutting and no editing and it will be
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Done with a 62nd countdown timer. Sure it may sound rushed. But at first, these reviews are going to give you something else to listen to on Tuesdays while you wait for the usual Thursday podcast release. We’re very excited to launch whiskey quickie. And the first episode will premiere on July 16. You can catch whiskey quickie right here on your existing podcast subscription. Or you can head over to YouTube and watch the video version. All right, I think I’ve talked enough. So let’s get on with the bourbon Community Roundtable where we discuss the cultural implications of the Jim Beam fire as well as heaven hills seven year bottled in bond release. But before that, let’s hear Joe from barrel bourbon. And then we’ve got a substitute for above the char with Ryan Cecil.
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Hi, this is Joe Beatrice from barrell craft spirits. Every batch we produce has a distinct flavor profile. We take pride in blending and preserving spirits for the people who enjoy them the most, you. use our store locator to find a retail or a bar near you at barrellbourbon.com
6:02
I’m Ryan Cecil. Yep, that that third show loop. Fred’s out of town and Portugal doing something really cool. So you have me this week, what I want to talk to you about is being in the whiskey business, and all the middlemen, and all the hands that are in your pocket. So when Kenny and I started a brand pursuit series, I had no idea how many hands and middlemen would be in our pockets, anywhere from ABC people, to the distributors, to the liquor store owners, to the lawyers, to the barrel brokers, to the label people to the cork people, to the glass people to every people in the world that gets their hand in our pocket, so we can bring someone some bourbon. But, you know, it’s kind of frustrating. But then you think about it. And when I was on the phone with a distributor, his kids got in the car. And I was like, well wait a minute. This guy’s a family has to pay for. Well, he deserves that. And then you start to
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Thinking about the ABC person that’s following your paperwork. And you’re like, well, they have a family. I guess they deserve it too. And then you think about the liquor store, and the landlord, and all the people who just make everything happen. And then I’m like, Well, I guess they do deserve it. And so while it is very frustrating, and very
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just greedy of me, selfishly, because I am a consumer, and I proprietor and creator of product that I want to bring the best possible product to my consumers at the best cost. But then, you know, there’s a lot of people that were supporting along the way, and it kind of gives me good perspective about why things are the final price they are as they sit on the bar, and that’s this week’s above the char. Hope I didn’t blow it. And we’ll see you next time.
7:54
Welcome back to another episode of bourbon pursuit the official podcast of bourbon Kenny and I
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Ryan here tonight on deep bourbon Community Roundtable number 34. This is where we talk about all the recent news, things have been happening inside the bourbon world and tonight is going to be it’s gonna be light on topics, but it’s going to be very, very heavy topic. So I’m kind of really excited to talk about this one. But before we jump into it, Ryan, what’s been what’s been new in your world recently? sweating a lot. It’s hotter than hell, the humidity. Like, I think it’s like our 12th or 13th day in a row 90 degrees, and it’s like, Oh, God, but now it’s, uh, I’m excited for the night we actually each of us will probably have some room to talk like, I’m looking at the tiles in front of me and there’s, you know, only 1234 you know, where there’s normally like, 10. So we all have our chance to chime in. So I like it. Yeah, that’s you and you know, you mentioned that humidity I look at is a good thing. Because I always like to think that I’m walking and I’m sweating. I’m losing weight, but maybe it’s just not that maybe it really is just the humidity. there and then
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You drink one of those stats and you’re like, right back.
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It’s like I keep gaining weight but I’ve been actually sweating too much. That’s I don’t think that’s how it’s supposed to work. Yeah, just like working out or go into the sauna or the same thing. Yeah, and white but sweating out those demons. So exactly for sure. Alright, so as usual we’re going to do is we’re going to go around the horn. So I’m going to go start off my left are Cal Ripken of the bourbon Community Roundtable. Blake welcome back. Thank you. Thanks for having me. This is the what are we at 37th round table close. 34 is incredible. round tables. Yeah. So congratulations to everyone on that. Now always great to be here. I’m Blake from bourbon or you can find me on all the inter webs and social medias Bo you are Bo in our calm as well as seal box calm as well. For all your craft beer needs. That’s s e l ba ch s Thanks for having me. Spirit shipped right to your
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Door it’s about as easy as you can get. Yeah.
10:03
There’s, there’s no waiting in lines. There’s no car. No camping out, you just, you know flip, just go on your own and it’s there. It’s sometimes free too. So just
10:16
depending on the tear up
10:19
bad we messed things up. It made me show up free
10:22
billing system.
10:26
Nick, go ahead. Alright, I’m Nick from breaking bourbon, one of the three guys behind breaking bourbon breaking bourbon. com. Check us out Facebook, Twitter, Instagram at breaking bourbon. And, hey, glad Glad to be here. I’m kind of back and forth between myself and Jordan. And I think over the past weekend, we convince Eric to start joining in a little bit more too. So you’ll see that the man behind the man I think a little bit more here this year. Oh secret
10:55
coming off the bench, like it. And so Nick one thing that I noticed in your back
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Ground was, you all did a new roof pic recently that went through seal box yet a pretty funny yet a pretty funny sticker behind it. I also want you to kind of talk about that one. Yeah, so these are some of the pics here. It’s actually still still waiting on my bottles but it’s just a test sticker on there if you can see that. So we kind of wanted to play with the other end of the rift thing. So wrestlers mom, Striffler, you know, so Steve sticklers, everybody they can relate to that, interestingly, just had a 20 year reunion so that movie actually came out American Pie came out during the summer after graduation of high school and before college so needless to say it was a fun summer. But as soon as that kind of came up and and we started a band around the idea, I think it just stuck and so we went with so how many more riff ideas are there going to be out there?
11:56
I’ve had more inquiries about wrestlers, moms, people seeing the sticker inside
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Hey, so how do I get one of those? Like, well, you got to be the number one Patreon supporter I guess so.
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Drinking bourbon.
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They are sold out though now to think right Blake they sold out today through the major supporters, but
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it didn’t take long. No, no, no. I’ve seen Ken Griffey Jr. I’ve seen Rick James.
12:25
Yeah. So so we got a few more riff puns, I think still available but riff a mania. Yeah, there’s there’s so many out there. There’s a lot of good ones too. Alright. And so to our resident lawyer, Brian, how’s it going? Hey, thanks. Thanks for having me again. Great to be here. This is Brian with sip and corn. You can find me on Twitter Instagram now finally and and Facebook at sipping corn and online at sipping corn calm or bourbon justice calm and again. Thanks for having me. Looking forward to this one. It’s so before we dive into it, Brian did I see something it was posted by Brad at little bit earlier today. I guess
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There was a paper or something that was published that that you had done recently that he finally said, at least he put it on his Facebook for me that’s no bread Atlas. he’s a he’s a friend of the show he was on talking about four roses and barrel pics and stuff like that. But he said that he was quoted in one of your I don’t want to say like dissertation. I don’t know what you call it, but you know, whatever it is. Well, yeah, it’s it’s close to that. It’s basically the scholarly journal side of of what lawyers do. And I had an article published in a Law Journal from University of Kentucky and I for the bourbon history and to make a point about how much bourbon enthusiast dive deep into these issues, quoted some of his articles from bourbon and banter. I’ve had a breaking breaking bourbon citation on there had bourbon truth on there. So I was trying to make a few points about how deep we all dies and how into the weeds we get and those definitely pretty
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Did some of the best examples for it.
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Alright, so Ryan may need to step up our game and just not like bullshit about stuff but put some facts out there
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are optional.
14:12
I can understand why you leave us out. I wouldn’t want to be cross check the reference, you know, for for my facts. I appreciate being on that Brian, that was the two year storage experiment. And that was definitely our longest dive in anything. How it was a great deep dive, you know, the oxidation effects. I mean, that was that was fantastic. Yeah, I tried to find a quote from the round table and I just couldn’t find anything with factual support.
14:41
The only factual support was actually the stuff that you contributed to.
14:45
I don’t want to cite myself. So I caught myself from the Harrison podcast, although I didn’t have a plug for the book and the article, so I can’t say I didn’t quote myself, but
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yeah, so I’ll for anybody that’s curious about what that is. I’ll make sure I put it in
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Show Notes the podcast so you can go and check that out at your own leisure because it is it is a long long thing to read. I scroll through like the first two pages and I was like am I almost done? Oh crap is like 18 more to go so I I’ll put that out there if somebody else that wants to see it. Yeah, that’s the insomnia cure it is maybe just just go to the to the parts where I quote the fellow bloggers and then be done. That’s fine. Perfect.
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So there you go, Kenny.
15:29
I don’t know. Let’s let’s see how much I can drink tonight. We’ll see you go to sleep later.
15:33
There you go. Yeah. So let’s go ahead and let’s move on to our first topic of conversation tonight. And this one is really focused around that was it was the big news last week. In this was the Jim Beam warehouse fire. It’s estimated somewhere around like 45,000 barrels may have been lost in the gym be warehouse fire. And this is just down the road of castle and key in the Glens Creek distillery near Milledgeville, Kentucky. And if you put this into perspective
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That’s about half of the 92,000 barrels that were lost during the heaven Hill distillery fire of 96. And that’s when seven Rick houses had actually burned to the ground. And at that time, that loss represented about 2% of the nation’s bourbon supply at that time. And I think we can all kind of look at it and really say that this is a this is a big travesty, right? This is a tragedy for all that involved. There were people that were commenting and saying things like, Oh, it’s only white label, who cares are saying, Oh, I have pre fire odd 114 and I’ll go ahead and post it for sale. Or people were joking and saying as jack daniels starting the fire saying how Alcoholics Anonymous benefit from it. I mean, let’s take a step back and think about it like, is this really like the current state of affairs of what we see?
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In the bourbon community and what we should expect when something like this happens when there’s millions and millions of dollars on the line for a very large organization, there are firefighters that are sitting there trying to contain the fire that are trying not to spread to people’s homes in the area, and people are just just making jokes at him. I mean, is this is this natural? Like, is this what we could expect from here on out? I think one thing to point out is that no one got injured or died or anything in it, which is the key thing, I think the mood could have been very different. If that was the case and that scene right up front that was the message that was out there. And I think because of that, you know that the tone was able to be different or you know, people may be felt they could, you know, be different with the tone as a result of that. And that’s really probably the biggest thing is that you know, you have these what could be really pretty scary incidents happening that you know, fortunately we haven’t had you know, anything really seriously happen anyone to get injured or
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You’re killed, you know, more more recently in some of these more major, highly publicized ones. So I think that plays into it in this case as well. Yeah, it’s kind of been a blackout for bourbon warehouses the past two years. I mean, it’s like how many more can like, you know, get some, some natural disaster or something collapse? It’s like, it just kind of makes you realize that, like, how old this stuff is, and like, I don’t know, that kind of needs, probably some intervention, maybe to kind of protect them more like not just like, Oh, it’s been there. It’s been built forever. It’s all good, you know, so. Yeah, it’s just it’s just been happening too much lately, I think. And it’s kind of serious because we all go and barrel pics and we’re all in those things. And tons of tourists go in and out of them. I’m really just,
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you know, it’s just kind of scary. You know that all this has happened so much recently. So I think people need to take it more seriously than then than just, oh, it’s a white label or it’s
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Don’t drink the water that’s going in, you know, they’ll Fall River don’t drink it. You know, it’s it’s definitely more serious than that. So it’s something we need to the community needs take serious and you know, the the distilleries as well.
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Yeah, I think that’s there’s there’s a few comments in the chat saying, you know, is this a Rick house problem ovulate like is it is it the age it’s catching up on these things? You know, the Barton side that most certainly could have been a problem because there was maybe lack of oversight in regards of maintenance or something like that. However, this this what happened to Jim Beam was a lightning strike. And from what I understand is that lightning poles are pretty ubiquitous anywhere. So they’re, they’re stationed around the properties and that’s what’s supposed to basically detract the lightning to go away from most of the warehouses. They’re installed in a lot of places. However, you know, it’s lightning. So by Reza lightning hopefully doesn’t strike twice in the right spot or the single sure, but the the
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warehouses are grandfathered. They don’t have sufficient sprinkler systems like the new ones. If you have a if you’re Rick is so many barrels, you’re not required to have them. It’s like, okay, you know, the these are like serious things that, you know that, you know, people can get hurt and I think they need to take it seriously. That’s just not some warehouse out there.
20:21
I don’t know. Yeah, this this used to happen a lot more historically. I mean, there were five I don’t know about the collapses, but there were definitely fires. And there were all kinds of injuries and in warehouses in it distilleries generally. So I think we’re probably looking at it in the context of the big bourbon boom lately, so we’re all more people are paying attention to it. I mean, if this happened 10 years ago, probably barely be a blip. But sure fires happen. And I think what we might see is is a change to have the the ground built up around them to contain
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The any spirits that get out because we’ve got a fish kill on the Kentucky River now i mean it’s it’s a real ecological problem when this happens so I expect to see some some of this grandfather and kind of get questioned and in some of these warehouses might need to be brought up to more current code yeah I think the you know the cynicism is kind of natural and in anything like this you know think just about anything serious that happens there’s going to be somebody in a lot of us take this as a hobby so it’s only natural to joke about it when you know in real life there’s people whose livelihoods and all that kind of depend on it which you know you look at this and while beams a massive Corporation This is probably still a $40 million plus loss so that that is a big thing that should be taken serious. I know David from rare bird was saying I think it was on Twitter somewhere just like
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This is just what happens with something like this. You’re just going to have the people joking around about it. And it’s unfortunate to an extent but at some point it’s like, you know what else are we can’t just sit here and mourn the loss of barrels as well you know, as long as nobody got hurt
22:16
I don’t know the I’m not going to be posting a bunch of pre fire Jim Beam jokes, but at the same time, we didn’t delete them from the bourbon or group either. I didn’t feel like it was that offensive? I guess I
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heard a whole lot more offensive stuff then then warehouse jokes. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, for sure. I agree with that. And I just kind of took it took it in stride. It’s going to happen.
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Any kind of news is going to get turned into a meme these days. And that’s not the bourbon world. That’s that’s anything you know, that very serious issues happen and somehow it becomes like, a funny picture with some words on it.
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And sometimes you need comic relief for service, what kind of helping me to pass that or it doesn’t
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seem like it’s been happening a lot. And maybe that’s just because we’re focusing on a lot more. Now, you know, it’s, it’s interesting to hear Brian say that this was very, was much more prevalent, you know, long time ago, you know, I guess maybe 30 4050 years ago
23:17
but you would think we’d have a little more safeguards in place to stop some of the stuff especially like the collapses you know, you think building codes and everything would and inspections would improve that kind of stuff, but lightning strike that’s pretty you can’t really avoid that unless you just have fire sprinkler systems and that kind of stuff.
23:39
Yeah, absolutely. And Blake you kind of reminded me something of like you know, you and you to to Ryan of saying like you have to make light of a certain situation, you know, and I don’t know like when the the too soon thing really, you know, supposed to like play a part into this. But, you know, it reminds me of like one of my favorite comedians is Daniel Tosh. And he says like, nothing is off limits.
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And it’s kind of funny it’s like I think about it now thinking back I was like yeah well maybe maybe when is that that boundary or that you know whenever Can you say something about it and and I guess in this light you look at it you say well at this point it is a financial loss there was nobody that was hurt there were people that put their lives on the line but it wasn’t to the point where you know it’s it’s not like any of us had like a barrel in there that was like our thing and we’re like running in there to go save it right it was it was just like it was a contained fire. They let it burn. I think I read a news article on who he is or something like that they were talking to one of the fire marshals and they’re like yes is the best smelling fire we’ve ever been to you know it’s like one of those things that even the fire marshals are kind of having a good time with it you know i but i think it might just be in in poor taste sometimes if it’s like 30 minutes minute Yeah, yeah. Like hey, let’s let I was gonna use upon us. Let’s let the fire settle or dust settle.
25:01
Now my digit but you know what I’m saying? Like, you know, give it a little bit of time. Make sure everyone’s Okay. And then it’s like, okay, it’s fine. Today’s Blake, you’re clear. I’m good. Okay, good. Good.
25:11
I mean, I’ve heard estimates says is like $270 million in losses.
25:16
That seems like a lot for 45,000 barrels. Well, I mean, you got think 5000 a barrel, you know, probably, I mean, it’s cheap stuff that they’re getting, like, probably 250 plus bottles out of I mean, and then you times about 40,000. So I don’t know that’s I was thinking replacement cost. Yeah, you gotta wonder what the
25:36
$250 a barrel, then they’ve got to rebuild the warehouse.
25:42
But, yeah, I could be way off in one opportunity costs too. So you’re just it’s just proud of you that they don’t take. I guess they do have a min sure. But you know, it seems like okay, I could spend 500 grand on a warehouse to get sprinkler or whatever you know, correctly to help. Save maybe I don’t know.
26:00
Maybe I’ll just lay off all our Donald music or Donald Blanco.
26:05
It was tragic to me those this and people keep calling it the beam fire, which of course it is. But it’s it’s Old Crow. And I don’t know when these I didn’t pay attention when these were built. But this is a distillery built in the 18 seven days I think it was 1870 I think is when old crows built. I don’t know if those date back that long. But if if ever we were going to have a revitalization of the Old Crow brand and if they were ever going to bring that distillery back as some kind of tour destination like they have that old Taylor for castle and key mean we’re losing out on those opportunities and and that’s, that’s what bums me out the most since there wasn’t any injuries about this. Brian, I think you bring up a good point too, because I know Fred, who couldn’t be on tonight. He kind of made a mentioned to me in a text message and saying like, this is this is scary.
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You know it was going was happening is like not just for the fire and everything he’s like he’s talking about the visitors like the people of bourbon and really what this can mean, saying that this should if if more of these things happen whether they’re fires, whether warehouse collapses, any sort of distillery mishap that makes headlines, he said this could completely change any visitor experience you ever go to. It could completely change any barrel pic experience you ever go on. Like they could eventually get to the day where they’re saying like no, like, we’re not allowing anybody else in the warehouses, like we’re getting a hard hat or anything like that, you know, I mean, Kenny and I experienced that for Barton pick 79 to pick and you know, there was lightning in the air and they’re like, no way we’re gonna do it inside and it’s not as fun, you know, being in a little tasting room, but luckily the skies cleared and they let us go back in there. But yeah, it’s your he’s totally right. And it’s for the right reasons, though. Sure, absolutely. is legitimately it’s it’s legitimate, but actually
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I always think when I think of the sterile experience, I think of the heaven Hill downtown. I mean, it’s, it’s like Disney Land, and you don’t get any sort of real experience there. And that’s, I mean, that’s could be what this turns into if the insurance companies won’t insure the distilleries if they let people in, I mean, that’s who’s going to drive it. It’s can you get coverage? Or can you get coverage that you can afford? And maybe you have to limit it to visitor centers and kind of the Disneyland look. Yeah. Right. There would be a detriment that would be a sad thing to see happen. Yep. But I would play this angle though to you know, I get sent a link in that from a lot of people are outside of bourbon who just know that I’m into bourbon and so they sent the link but from somebody’s perspective, that’s not really involved in bourbon. You know, they’re so bombarded with bad things happening all the time. You know, do you look at something like this and not really think anything of it? You know, because you’re not involved. No one was injured or hurt you
29:00
You see bad so much worse stuff than this happen on a daily basis in the news, depending on what you watch, you know, so in the big scheme of things, it the impact is really a lot more just, you know, the enthusiast and that specific kind of bourbon crowd or the potential impact is there, you know, in addition to the environmental stuff, you know, but again, that gets to kind of just all those bad things just cycling through the news on a daily basis. No, you’re totally right. And and who knows if this might have been a you know, a smaller craft distillery who knows if you made headlines especially around the nation just because of the size and the impact it what it was I mean, you know, if I saw a quote from john little from smooth Ambler he put on Facebook and you know, he said that it’s sad to see these kind of incidents like no matter the size of the company, and he says I often put myself in smooth anglers position and a tragedy like this would be completely devastating to his type of business. So it definitely is a scalar
30:00
too. Wow when it comes to it, so, yeah, they lose 45,000 barrels. They’re done. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So I think at this point I think we can kind of move on we’ve we’re all we’re all kind of fired up. Is it too soon?
30:18
For a pre fire heaven Hill. Alright, so, so I won’t do that. But yeah, now we’re going to go into kind of the the next topic and this is the one that I think it’s might have been a little bit old news by now but we’re going to go ahead and kind of spark the situation back up because it’s the roundtable and why not because this is gonna be a lot of the opinions of really what we see of what’s happening inside of the the bourbon community and everything like that. So everybody kind of remembers about, oh gosh, what was it about a year and a half ago, and this was something that we had talked about in the roundtable plenty of times. Nick had talked about it, saying you know, every time I come down to Kentucky what I do, I grab a few bottles of
31:00
Heaven hills six year bottle and bond and I take it back home with me it’s some of the best bourbon at $12 a you know 750 ml that you can get on the shelves. In a year and a half ago they had announced that there was going to be a I guess the retirement or the phasing out of this particular product. When that announcement happened shelves started clearing I mean gone and Kentucky here and there and everywhere. It ended up getting the point where I think now you can actually still get on the secondary market. It’s somewhere around like $40 for 750. So you get scarcity. People hoard it people buy it up. This is what happens. And now since they did discontinue a beloved $12 six year product and they haven’t Hill is now I don’t want to say relaunching they are launching almost a similar product. It is their seven year heaven Hill, bottle and bond. So with this comes a few different things, you get an additional year. It’s just
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Bottom bond so it’s still 100 proof however it comes with a 233% price increase about three times the price. So you’re going from $12 so around 3999 MSRP and with this It also comes in its initial launch is also limited availability only available in like I think eight states across the US. So before we start diving into kind of like the business side how do we compare this other things in the market but look at I’m going to kind of pose it to you all and Ryan I’ll I’ll kind of ask you first. Was this the right move by Heaven hill?
32:37
You know, I love heaven Hill, but man, they bought a lot of things like the logic Craig 12 year age statement, like moving into the back label, then moving it to the side and then saying, No, it’s not going away. And then it goes away, you know, and then this, it’s like, I don’t care what they do, just like see up for about it. Who cares? You know, like, I’m still gonna love you. But uh, I think
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Yeah, they should have just been like, Hey guys, given the market, we have a great product. You know, there’s stuff out there on the market. That’s whitelist age. Not as good. You know, with a bigger price tag, we feel like this is what it’s worth. And here you go, and I would have been like, yep, you’re totally right. I totally agree with you. Give me my seven year for 40 bucks, but not still will do that because it’s gonna be a great product but uh, yeah, it’s just I don’t know why they do that. I just don’t understand but but I will say that I am wearing my heaven Hill hat tonight to make sure that I am showing support for the brand because I still love the brand. Yeah, of course.
33:37
And yeah, I mean, it is. I don’t know I mean, I don’t know if it’s a dagger to the heart for a lot of bourbon consumers or bourbon lovers out there because you’re wrong like this is on the shelves for a very, very long time around here and it’s not like it was flying off. It was just, it was just a it was a great value for what it was. But before we do that, you know, dive into more of it. Blake kind of talk about your side. Do you think this was the right move by Heaven Hill to
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to kind of get rid of it and relaunch it. Yeah, I think it was definitely the right move. Not from you know, my perspective as a consumer, but from a business standpoint, it was the best move they can make. You know, I can’t imagine what the cost is on a, you know, six year old bourbon, but the margins probably weren’t huge. They’ve basically learned through all these other things of, you know, moving the the 12 year to the back labeled and pulling it off completely then kind of redesigning the laser Craig barrel proof and, you know, they took away Elijah Craig 18 year and reintroduced it a couple years later at four times the price three times the price around there, they realize they can kind of do whatever they want. And yes, a small group of us will kind of cry foul but overall the market still embraces it and still buys it and, you know, it’s just kind of keep doing what they want to do.
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And they know that the that the product was undervalued. So they said, Okay, let’s put it out at a higher price people will still buy in, it’s still a pretty good deal. You know, I have a different perspective on it because I’m not in Kentucky. So it’s not something I could regularly get.
35:17
So it’s not like I’m missing out on anything. It’s in my mind. I’m, it’s a plus to me, because I’ll actually now have a 30 to $40 What’s the retail 4040 $40 bottom, but in that I’m just going to go by Elijah Craig, which is, you know, slightly proof down but probably a little bit older.
35:39
So, I mean, from a business standpoint, I think that’s ultimately the right move. And we have given heaven Hill more than enough reason to believe that the market will not care and they’ll still go buy it. So yeah, well,
35:54
yeah, 90% of market that probably didn’t even know that it was like Kentucky, only six year product.
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999 or whatever so you know, who gives a shit about these Barkin few that now that could turn on them really quickly if things start to get a little bit tighter and they need, you know the enthusiast market again, but I still think we’re a little ways out on that happening. Yeah, so I don’t know. I mean, what I’ve loved to see another great value bourbon that’s still really underpriced. Yes, of course, I think we’d all want to see that. But at the end of the day, it’s a business and yeah, I’m guessing they made the right business move. I just have one more point before we move on Kenny to the next person. I think the biggest travesty here is that like you said, you’ll go by logic Craig for whatever or Henry McKenna whatever Well, they’re going up to so that’s just the nature of the progression that’s happening here and so it’s just gonna slowly move on. brands. You know, you look at it heaven hills had bought
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far the most value based Bourbons for the longest time you know you think of Henry mechanics in your you think of Evan Williams single barrel you think of Elijah Craig was 12 years for a light while even the ledger credit barrel proof in my mind is still a pretty good by depending on where you are. It’s a great you know, j w Dan bottled in bond like that is a great bottle for $20. So, you know, while we want to kind of cast that first stone, it’s kind of like there’s still a lot of other great bourbon out there.
37:35
So that’s why it’s like hey, Cashin make your money go make build some more warehouses or something.
37:41
Yeah. So Nicole, can I ask you a question? Like, do you think the the idea with this was to try and compete with other brands in the market like the Woodford and the knob creaks that are around that $40 price range? You know, I think it’s interesting thinking about before I answer
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That question thing about the progression that it took, which was the undiscovered, nobody talked about it. It’s in maybe dusty on the shelf for 12 bucks in Kentucky, and then it kind of got discovered. And that’s when you started at people were outside of Kentucky coming in, like me, I was one of them. And I would buy a lot of it just because quite frankly, the price was really the draw it was the value relative to the price, it was good for the price. And it’s not like I stockpiled it, that’s what I would take to a party and I would leave the bottle there. And then I’d get texts from whoever’s house it was those a party saying, Hey, I’m drinking this now. And I’d be like, fantastic. You know, it’s only available in Kentucky enjoy it, you know, that kind of a thing. And then I think what happened was you started seeing more people clear the shelves because it kind of became obvious that maybe this wasn’t going to go on forever, and it was such a good value. And so looking at the perspective from heaven Hill, you know, why sit there and let that happen. If the idea was it’s kind of always available for people in Kentucky, and suddenly kind of not available. It looks like it’s not going to be available. You’re not really doing
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Anyone any favor? So I agree, I think that was a smart move exactly how they went about doing it and why I think that’s kind of the next question that you’re asking Kenny is, you know, what is this product? What is it supposed to be? What’s their goal with the product? I remember them talking about Elijah Craig, and saying, well, we could have kept a 12 year on and just raise the price. But they said, We don’t want it. We want a product that’s successful, we really want to keep the price about the same. How do we do that we want to build a brand and have this really always on shelves, we don’t want it to be well, or 12. We want it to be go to the store and you can buy it, you know, that type of thing. So now the question is, is is this going to be their flagship?
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Do they want this available? Always, you know, everybody, do they want you to comparing it to like, is that a Woodford or something like that? I think that’s yet to be determined. You know, I think they had to do something to it, you know, changing the price a lot. They added a year to it. It’s kind of like we can’t just do the exact same thing. And then it looks a lot more I think what would be iconic or symbolic of where their branding and
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Where everything is going, you know, where it does really come across as here’s a representation of us. They push bottled in bond, I start to wonder if how much they push value versus we perceived value. It’s kind of a curious point of mine is, where does that come from? Because it does step outside of that boundary. And I think it does step outside that boundary of everything’s overwhelmingly high value. Now, you’re asking the question, saying, well, this maybe isn’t, you know, and you know, to that the price might be the same for the next 10 years. And they may know that to that you don’t see a lot of these really creep up in price unless the retailers are doing a lot of times they’ll keep them the same. So I think that’s yet to be determined, where we’re really going to see this and how it’s going to be, you know, kind of viewed and consumed in the marketplace and where they want that, you know, the consumer today, Brian, I want to kind of let you kind of give your your opinion. I mean, do you think this is this is competing within those those different price points of the woods and they’re not creeks that are out there?
40:58
Hey, it’s Kenny here, and I want to tell you
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Brian, I want to kind of let you kind of give your your opinion i mean do you think this is this is competing within those those different price points of the woods and the knob Creek center out there? Well $40 is the new $25 and everything that we used to be able to get just five to eight years ago now is going to be $40. So as consumers we just have to accept that. What really struck me the most about this is is a few days after this happened. I was at a continuing legal
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seminar and the Katie a was had a presenter there. And she was and I’d heard this before but totally forgot it. She was saying that 60% of $1 for your spirits purchase in Kentucky goes to Texas. So you’ve got a you’ve got a $12 bottle and you’ve got just over $7 of that goes to some way shape or form to Texas. Heaven Hill can’t can’t make I mean, I’m sure they’re doing fine. But hold on, hold on. You forget the retail who makes money off the retail who makes money in distributor? And then so you have what’s left of the actual producer? Yeah, that’s right. Yeah, I mean, it’s you can’t you can’t sell bourbon for 1199. You just can’t. I always treated the the six year as sort of my, my,
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my bar if you had a craft whiskey. That was that was however old and you couldn’t be better than a 60 year heaven Hill bottle of
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Bond wasn’t going to be worth spending $60 on it when you can get it when I could get at least in Kentucky a $12 bottle of fantastic bourbon. So I as a consumer, I’m sad about it as looking at it from heaven hills perspective, it’s a no brainer to Nick’s point I totally agree this is so much better than if they had done the exact same product exact same bottle exact same label, cheap plastic white screw top and increase the price to $40 that they couldn’t do that they had to do some premium make some premium changes to it. And and they’ve done that you know that with with the cork and the label and everything else. So it’s people are going to buy it, it’s it’s going to be worth it, you know, air quotes worth it. But as a consumer, I’m sad about it, but it makes sense. I just don’t understand why can’t they just be honest, like I just don’t get what’s the advantage of
46:00
Like, let’s pull it off the marquee and we’ll pretend like we just hit it and we’re not
46:07
there they forget about people forget about it. And then it’s like, I want to
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like go to bye bye present with your kid at Target and be like, okay, I’ll go hide in the closet some Christmas. I mean, I just want to go on these border meetings and be like, Are you serious? Like, do you think we’re that stupid? Like, like consumers? I stupid? I guess. It’s my point that most of these distilleries just don’t care about consumers. But uh, anyways, I don’t care. I totally understand why they’re doing it. Yes. $12 a bottle. I mean, we sell bourbon. We can’t sell. I couldn’t even sell it for $90 a bottle and make money so it’s, I totally get it. Just don’t be. Don’t fool us. We’re not idiots like it. Was that the case though? Or was it just you know, I guess looking at it. I’m not at all surprised even when it happened. I really kind of assumed this was coming. I was just not sure what it was going to be exactly. And all
47:00
Lot of cm, I’m surprised the prices as low as it is I kind of thought they were going to go more the old Fitz route and have more of a premium thing and kind of step it up that much. So because it is more of the every day price of what you’re seeing now, like you said, the new 40s, the new 25, it actually had me a little excited of Hey, this is something hopefully, I can go by now and it’s a little bit older, I assume it’s going to taste a little bit different than what the six year was. And I’m not really sure. You know, with all these discussions, they knew exactly what the plan was going to be for that they would want to say anything until it was coming. You know, do you want to say it a year before it’s ready, you know, because they went from six to seven, you know, or was it
47:43
you know, they just thought the time would be the key that they just thought Oh, after a year people were would forget that’s it. I think they got mad as her Brooks won some awards that said,
47:53
you know, screw this was when we all appreciate a press release at this point that just says
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Guys we’re gonna make some more money so right
48:04
in your blindly buying anything on the shelf and anything with hundred dollar price tag your dumb uncle’s definitely buy in so
48:15
y’all pay way too much attention to bourbon like just take a backseat on this one. It’s okay. Yeah, I actually think there’s a whole brand opportunity there Blake versus that brand. They just jokes about everything. It’s called it and it’s
48:29
Yeah.
48:31
That would be incredible though. I would be like, I don’t know. I think it would be so awesome if they did that. But instead they gotta do this. You know, play behind the scenes. Ping Pong match. I don’t know. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you’re right. like nobody, nobody that pays attention to stuff whatever. Forget it, especially for a product that was iconic to I would say a lot of us but at least people that are well known or should I say really know the bourbon landscape very well, like they know about the product. They
49:00
They know where to find it and they know about it. Now the other side of this is perhaps it wasn’t their favorite, right? It’s a value budget bourbon like that’s what they loved about it. It wasn’t necessarily say like, Oh, this is this is my unicorn, right? It’s not that’s what it’s supposed to be. It’s supposed to be that this is a budget bourbon. But Ryan you’d also mentioned the Ezra Brooks point of view, and I kinda want to look at the competing l side of the market because anybody that okay I mean, well, let’s say like as a Brooks barrel proof is basically contract is still haven’t helped, right? It’s the same exact thing. And now so we’re looking at the difference of a barrel proof products from heaven hill at the seven year age David, versus the heaven hell product bottle and bond less proof and the same price point.
49:50
Like, yeah, like, like what gives? So that’s that’s comes another point like, now who are they competing with? Are they competing against themselves?
49:59
Yeah, no.
50:00
There’s no question there’s a high value. So to with the Ezra I think that was recognized right away you know, so part of that is that value proposition you know just just just thinking about what you know he always comes into play when you when you think value and you know you get this weird dichotomy with smaller craft distillers where stuffs coming out for higher prices but then in some cases people like God’s its craft it’s not kind of recognized yet I’m unless you want to support them. It’s in some cases it’s not really not really there yet. You know, other cases you have, you know, somebody like new riff who’s killing it, you know, with a four year and you know, bottled in bond, you know, so here you go is a four years a seven year you know, you look pricing, I mean, do you put them on the same platform for I’m going to compare this to that, or do you say, Well, no, there’s a different comparison here because the distillery size and you know, those kinds of things. So that’s the questions you always have to, you know, kind of look at and it’s only it comes down to just how much you like it, how good it tastes, but it also comes down to
51:00
How they’re speaking with you. And I think Ryan, you made a good point, you know, for the enthusiast side because maybe some other people, the general public doesn’t care, but you never want to be lied to, and you never want to feel like the world was pulled over your eyes, which, unfortunately, with the Elijah Craig age statement, that was how everybody felt, you know, and so I think, you know, lesson learned, avoid doing that, like think proactively to speak to that group so that you don’t you don’t lose that, you know, that faith in that community that’s behind the distillery.
51:30
Haven’t got it. Sorry. Oh, sorry, Nick. What’s up riff bottle and bond cost. $55 or no? The bottle the bottle?
51:39
What is it Blake 4040. Yeah, 44 year, Lori. And I think I think a great value. I think it’s a great product. Yeah, I guess this caps the secondary price of the six year bottle and bond. Right. 40. Well, now it’s the old label though. They changed it. So now it’s
52:00
You know, like discovering your phones in a way, right? So you gotta buy on the shelf anymore. Yeah, I want to throw another one out.
52:10
There. Oh, go ahead run. Well, I’ll say here you go heaven Hill. I know you’re going to do this within the next year, when you write one to raise hundred McKenna’s prices, and you change the packaging, and you change the cork, so that you can justify a $20 increase, just say, we are going to change the cork and the label and we’re going to raise about 20 bucks because we think it’s undervalued. And I will say, Amen, I will go buy it still.
52:33
I think that’s a good Brian. It’s it though. Like anyone who’s paying attention is somebody who cares. anyone’s not paying attention doesn’t care. So you got to speak to that group. Yep. Yep. And that was Brian, you kind of teed up the next question right there is is we now see an aspect with inside of heaven hill that they’re kind of cannibalizing themselves, where they have products that have higher age statements and higher
53:00
was a perceived value and sometimes even higher proof settling for less money then this product that they’re putting out so you know, you look at the, the Henry McKenna bottle and bond as you mentioned, you got Evan Williams you got GTS brown you’ve got GW Dan, you have all of these different products and mind you that is less the less something’s changed and I don’t know recently but they’re they’re bourbon not we didn’t match up with a regular bourbon mash bill is one bourbon Nashville, like, nothing’s changed. So it’s the same product that’s going into all these just different aging warehouses, locations, so on and so forth. So do you all see themselves as kind of like cannibalizing and like making themselves like, like, they’re, they’re fighting against themselves in the market with their own products?
53:46
You know, in a way, maybe I think fewer people are going to tie those things together. Then, you know, when you think of the mass market, I’m not sure a lot of people walk in and realize they’re coming from the same place at the store. So
54:00
It’s still a pretty small percentage that even acknowledges that. It’s like, why do you have a CVS on, you know, two blocks away from each other. And it said, well, you’re more likely to stop in at the CVS or Walgreens, if it’s, you know, right next to you, as opposed to two miles away, it’s still not that big of a deal. So if you go into a store, and it’s like, all right, what’s on the shelf, if you know they only had one product, you’re less likely to grab that bottle when there’s 100 products on the shelf. So they put eight to 10 out there, you’re more likely to grab it. So I think I think the answer to your question Kenny, when I was out at a bourbon event at a different city, and I met some people that just started drinking bourbon six months ago they had no ideal that Eagle rare Buffalo Trace and all you know under that same Nashville were the same exact Nashville and they’re like what you’re kidding me. Like it’s the same Nashville they have no idea that like, all these brands are the same magical, just different prices, different age, whatever. So they just
55:00
Like the modern the everyday consumer has no idea and you pointed them to the bourbon or Nashville breakdowns
55:10
cheat sheet Thank you. You go we give away posters that shit now.
55:16
Thanks for coming here’s your match. Oh, yeah, but but I do want to give a shout out to Dave overboard one on one because I know he’s he’s he’s been talking a lot in the chat here is always saying like wild turkey one to one it’s still their prices and change so he could always go there. I saw $10 Yeah, comment on that $10 Right, exactly. So he’s trying to put his deck in the ground and hoping with bourbon a choice. Yeah. Well, he’s also hope with the Campari folks don’t start taking a note out of heaven hills playbook here. But then the also kind of thing is, you know, when we look at this, and we look at it from the enthusiast point of view, you know, we are the bourbon enthusiasts. This is if you’re listening to this podcast, who are a bourbon enthusiast, it’s there’s no way getting around it right. You are You are
56:00
The few people that really care, maybe not as much as us, but you care a lot, you care a lot of a niche of a niche. Exactly. And so you kind of look at it and you’re like, well, if heaven Hill really wants to make money off the enthusiasm really care about them. This is what David at rubber one one says, maybe should sell single barrels at more than 90 more than 94 proof. Right? Do something more than than just what you can do it Eliza Craig and he’s, I think he might be onto something.
56:26
Yes, they were in those single barrel pics, but but selling them at 94 proof. It’s, it’s a travesty, really. But you know. And so the last kind of thing I want to hit on with this as it’s kind of running out this topic here is we have noticed inside of the press release this is this is almost like unheard of to be able to have a bourbon that’s being launched, coming from a prestigious distillery inside of Kentucky and it says it’s available in eight states and you start looking down and you start looking and there’s one or there’s there’s one abbreviation you don’t see. That’s k
57:00
You do not see ky as one of the first states that are out there. Now, Ryan and I have a kind of a good inkling of why this might be. And I’ll kind of let Ryan take it here. So Ryan, kind of kind of give your your thought and your process of why wouldn’t you go and make Kentucky and available market on day one?
57:20
Because I know they’ll sell it no matter what, whenever it gets here. So I gotta go spread to the masses and
57:28
get the new consumers, which I understand, you know, it’s totally cool. But it’s like Fred always talks about you can’t forget the people that brought you to the dance. You know, it’s like, Yeah, I don’t know. I it’s, it’s frustrating, but, you know, that’s totally Wow. But it’s just great to see you know, okay, why not get something that the rest of us
57:54
in New York is on that list. So that means you three to six months after it’s released. We’ll see you next
58:00
Yeah.
58:02
It’s like, you know, Florida all the fun releases are going to come after everyone’s Instagram has been flooded with with pictures of these new releases non stop button. Yeah, I’m excited. Yeah, I mean, right now we were talking about this because he recently took a trip and it’s kind of like, Kentucky is very, very small in the picture things. You know, we Yeah, yeah, I mean, saying that, you know, yes, there’s there’s 4 million plus barrels of whiskey aging and Kentucky. That’s more than the population of Kentucky. Guess what? That’s a that’s about half the size of Dallas. Yeah, it’s like there then you got these like Houston and LA and New York that are, you know, just even bigger. It’s like, yeah, yeah. So even even when you look at per capita buying, which I’m sure is higher here, you’re still not touching, not even close to the bigger markets. Yeah, because I think California and Texas obviously because every
59:00
The biggest population but, you know, I mean, they’re just crushing Kentucky and far as you know, consuming power and booze.
59:09
Trying to change one bottle at a time. You know, that’s very interesting, just kind of going back to these brands are realizing they don’t need the enthusiast nearly as much as kind of as the initially Yeah, as we hope. You know what starts happening when this stuff stops hitting Kentucky as much because overall, Kentucky still gets the lion’s share of a lot of the allocated bourbon. And to my knowledge, this is the first one that kind of gave the Kentucky snub. So
59:40
it’ll be interesting to see what happens, you know if if that’s kind of hurts the brand overall, or they just find a new market and never looked back. So it’ll be interesting.
59:52
No, I think you’re totally right. I think this is going to be it could be one of those pivotal moves we start seeing in regards to the market and how things
1:00:00
Shifting when somebody is going to launch a product where they’re going to launch it and they’re going to look at the target markets they’re going to look at where do where do the most bourbon consumers live. Now granted Kentucky is there but Kentucky is also a large state Kentucky isn’t the size of Houston right like Houston’s a pretty big populace actually it’s a much bigger populace than Kentucky is a state right? So yeah, that might be the that might be the the idea of like maybe that’s where you go like that’s where the money is. And not only that is there’s this is this is not a game of you know, trying to target a particular kind of consumer like this is a game of people with disposable income that are buying Kentucky’s a poor state. I mean, they’re one of the you know, probably top 10 poorest states in the if not even higher than in the in the country. So I mean, there’s not a lot of people with disposable incomes that can just drop money on expensive Barb’s all the time, but we spend it on rep tickets and bourbon and that
1:01:00
Sorry.
1:01:03
But what was that the thinking though? Or? I mean, does something play into? I didn’t because it is. I mean, it is really odd that it was a Kentucky only release. And and kind of coming back, you know, you think like that’s the narrative that it was Kentucky only and we’re going to start in Kentucky. So you know, was it because they wanted more momentum in other states first or, you know, was there a concern that it was going to be received or perceived really negatively? Because, you know, you took it away and then and then brought it back at at the price that’s coming back at you know, you gotta wonder if there’s more to it, then just, this is what’s going to give them most momentum. As much as you know, was there a PR play that got banter back and forth about where do we start here? Because it seems like it’s going to be everywhere. And it seems like wherever it is, it’s new. It’s talked about, it’s probably going to do pretty well.
1:01:54
So it is really odd that it didn’t start in Kentucky. I gotta admit that despite thinking it’s a smart move
1:02:00
Not being in Kentucky is really, it makes me wonder how they came to that conclusion. Well, I mean, it could be like, Oh, well, it’s been in your state for the past. How many years? Have
1:02:12
you been here about a year and a half ago? Like, let’s go somewhere else? You know, it could be that you didn’t care until we said we were going to pull it and then then it got popular. Yep.
1:02:24
Absolutely. So let’s go ahead and let’s let’s kind of finish this one on a on a fun little touchy subject too, because why not? Right. So this was a question that kind of came in over Twitter and it was kind of in regards of secondary market pricing and retailers and how do you justify buying stuff and so Kurt Bella Lawsky said, How do you support retailers that are struggling to elevate prices in regards of allocated or limited and hard to find bottles? Said I live in western South Dakota, and they hardly get any. Yeah, exactly. Literally, you just took the words out of it said all right.
1:03:00
We hardly get any allocated bottles of good bourbon ever. I went to the store the other night where I saw Mr. T leaf on the shelf for $60. I had, if I had not already had two bottles at home, I probably would have bought it. However, the first bottles that I did buy were $35 each. I ended up buying store pics at the retailer the other night instead. And they’re delicious, but I just couldn’t pull the trigger on the elders, especially at that inflated price. He said, What do you think, I figured is any business I give them better than none. But it just kind of leaves a bad taste in my mouth about their business. So I guess I’ll kind of hand it over to you all. Is there a reason there? Is there a time that you you should support these retailers that are
1:03:42
and this is can’t even go into? This is actually a recent thing. We’ve had Jamie Ferris from Lincoln Road on the podcast before he just recently released his will at family estate bottles. He had a 17 year barrel that he had I was I think an 11 and a five year but the seven
1:04:00
Teen year he was selling for $1,000 a bottle. So
1:04:04
everybody knows Lincoln row really loves him. However, should you support businesses like this and
1:04:12
why or why not? Yeah, I mean, so I guess I’ll jump straight into it. But I mean, to me if it’s selling for that, you know, that price point on secondary market? Why shouldn’t the the retailer take advantage of that? Now granted, you could say that he could offer it to other retailers or other customers who were frequently buying but the whole market in general right now is pretty underpriced. And you know, even with the link of roads, was there a single bottle that went unsold in the first? I don’t know, 48 hours? I’m pretty sure they’re all gone. So probably not, man. Yeah. So
1:04:53
that’s where the market drove it in. Just at this point seems a little naive to think that
1:05:00
You know, why would Jamie sit there and sell it for $300? When he knows some guys gonna buy it and put it for $1,000 on the marking lot and he’s already got it. Yeah, I mean, I imagine that’s the most frustrating thing ever and you kind of got to find a balance while I think some of these guys you’re finding the balance and they have these, you know, trophy bottles that are just going to sit on the shelf, you know, it’s a, it’s a, you know, quote unquote, Pappy 10 year for $4,000 or something, it’s like, okay, you obviously don’t understand what’s actually going on. But for guys who are who are really into bourbon, they know the market. Like I don’t have a problem with them. You know, being the ones to to get the good margins from this, you know, better than the guy just sitting in his car, taking a crotch shot and throwing it on a Facebook group. So, I mean, it’s a procession changing and all this, you know, Brian or Nick, where do you think is the procession changing over time that you know, if we run the clocks
1:06:00
back two or three years ago, were like, Oh, you know, screw these retailers like they should be selling it, you know, retail price like they keep doing this. But now we’re kind of like a like, you know you gotta will it it’s got Pappy its value undervalued got beats it has no value like you should be charging secondary market prices like what do you think?
1:06:19
Yeah, I was really frustrated five years ago when I would go to a store and I would see it something that you know, wasn’t be tech wasn’t wasn’t a Pappy 23 of the year would be something like Elijah Craig 12 year barrel proof I remember at a store outside of Lebanon, was charging something like $200 for five years ago. And that’s just outrageous. And there’s another store just outside of Lawrenceburg that charges jacked up prices. And now you look back at that and you wonder, Well, you know, it’s it’s who’s in you know, air quotes, again entitled to that money. So I don’t necessarily blame a retailer for charging
1:07:00
I mean, it’s not people use the word gouging. It’s really not gouging it’s it’s what the market bears. And and similar to that are heaven Hill discussion as a consumer, I can’t stand it. I hate it, you know I want the value. I want to be able to get my $55 Elijah Craig barrel proof I want to be able to get my six year heaven Hill bottle and bond for 12 bucks, but I can’t do it anymore. And then I think the other thing we need to think about is, is reliability. There’s been enough problems on the secondary market about who you can trust and who you can’t trust. And you should be able to trust a store more. I mean, I know a lot of people talk about bar pores and you can’t trust an open bottle. But if you’re buying a sealed bottle from a store, at least you know, you should be getting what what the bottle is. Yeah, so I’d from from that standpoint, I don’t blame them for charging that. That doesn’t mean I’m going to buy it.
1:08:01
Someone will buy it, but I won’t. But I don’t blame them. Yeah, I think there’s a difference in seeing like a $500 Well, or 12 and 2000 or 20 $500 Pappy 23 like, you know, they’re one of the things is not like the other where I think kind of say yeah, you’ll probably get somebody to walk in who buys the Pappy but the winner 12 that’s just a dumb by no matter who you are. So, yeah, the world reserve that’s used with a well or 12
1:08:34
guys to me.
1:08:36
I wrote something about this. I was just looking it was almost three years ago now. And I use the word gouging in there and I and I know and I know at the time it’s not technically gouging It was a point of the the context of the of the right up just the case for MSRP but this was even three years ago. I feel like it was very different than it is right now. I do. I do think it’s it’s come to be more accepting
1:09:00
Where I think maybe over the past 567 years, you can get back to a point where that’s to say it wasn’t happening at all, but it was much less frequent. And you certainly still had a lot of opportunity for MSRP. And you had a lot of retailers that didn’t realize what they had yet. And now you’ve really seen I think, two directions. I think, one they’re getting more educated about what is what, but you do have those that are putting the stupid price on something thinking it’s something else that knowing, you know, it is a little frustrating in some cases, the flip side is is, you know, go where they have the things that you want, go where they treat you good and don’t go to the other places and, you know, retailers can still be creative. You know, there’s a local retailer here that’s a little bit off the beaten path, had the best selection, you know, pretty much in the area and decided this year is going to sell all his allocation at MSRP basically, but you’re going to get basically a ticket to buy it by buying a bottle. So he cleared out a bunch of great stuff on a shelf for the most part at
1:10:00
MSRP and then sold the stuff for basically MSRP. So he actually did pretty well with that. And he generate a lot of goodwill with the community too, because it was a fun thing that he did. You know, so I still think there’s opportunity there. But it’s where you want to position as a retailer, your store, you know, you’re seeing retailers online, you know, if you want to have a wide selection, you can’t put everything on at MSRP because it’s going to be gone and you don’t have a selection. Same thing with bars, the Pappy is gone. If you’re doing it for 15 bucks at Port, you’ve got a price a high enough that you have enough, it lasts until your next allocation there. That’s the way they’re thinking. So depends on where the retailer is going to, you know, and so what are you doing that position? Yeah, if you’re a retailer, you’re looking at that and saying, why should somebody go sell it somewhere else illegally, when I’m the one who’s you know, taking all the risk, put all the money out and it really is pretty small percentage of what they’re doing anyway, you know, where you have that opportunity to make a few thousand bucks pretty easily. Kind of hard to blame them for doing that, you know, so it’s this it’s frustrating to see though because it does pull
1:11:00
This stuff that was within reach before, a little bit further outreach and further out of reach for a lot of people too. Yeah. And you make a good point, like this small percentage of what they did. I mean, these liquor stores, I mean, they make they make profit off these limited releases, but it doesn’t pay the bills for them. You know, it’s just, it’s a nice thing to do, but they could care less. I mean, not care less, but it’s just something nice that they can offer their premium customers and so, yes, is it frustrating? The annoying thing is like the winners and like the Elmer tease that you’re like, seriously, like, I get the pack fees and like, well, it’s being like, the everyday that we’re like, 30 bucks a bottle like, why is it 120 $200 a bottle that’s just stupid. But
1:11:43
anyhow, I don’t know where I’ll go as far as what’s happened on the secondary when, for example, Drew started charging higher prices at the at the gift shop. Yeah, they just went up. Basically, flipper just doubles, whatever the retailers like and that’s
1:12:00
And people still pay it. Absolutely. Yeah, I mean it. And maybe it’s maybe there’s certain brands that just fall under this umbrella, right that are the, I don’t know, like the The Untouchables, right? Maybe we’ll it’s one of those brands that just says like, hey, it doesn’t matter, whatever it is, like, you’re gonna, you’re gonna sell whatever.
1:12:19
Yeah, but I still wonder about the percentage that really are actually buying in secondary. And how much of that percentage is outside a restaurant or bar? Who’s the ultimate purchaser who’s actually still going to have a markup even at a secondary price? In a lot of cases? You know, I see friends go to local stores and buy stuff that’s way overpriced. You know, they don’t, they’re not at all even involved in the secondary, you know, so I think that’s, I think that’s just becoming more prevalent now. And I think that’s probably a much larger percentage of the higher priced purchases, is they are happening at retail now and in a way that’s where they should be happening. You know, it’s it’s ultimately
1:13:00
What makes sense, but part of its an educated consumers part of is just that demand and part of its in some cases 250 bucks. It’s not the end of the world for some people, you know, so if they overpaid for it, they’re happy because they got something they really wanted. It is what it is. Yeah. All right, I know we can we can talk about retail and pricing and secondary and all this kind of stuff for I think probably for another Roundtable, maybe another hour, who knows, we might stick around afterwards and talk about it some more. But I think it’s a good way to kind of cap this in, in this because, you know, for a lot of us as as hardcore bourbon consumers, we have to we have to we’ve given out the tips. I know that you all with blogs, like there’s there’s tips on how to be a good barber consumer, you know, shop at the same store, making sure that you’re buying the right place and manner. And well, I mean, you really like you establish a relationship and that’s really what it’s about, you know, don’t, don’t sit there and you know, because in the day, you know, some of the big blockchains they might not take care of you. You’re going to
1:14:00
In the you’re going to be in the I don’t know what you would call it but basically the rat race with everybody else trying to get these allocated bottles and you’re you’re paying whatever thousands of dollars to get your names on these lists and and it’s tough you know it is it is a pay to play kind of game and at the end of the day maybe if you’re spending all this money getting all this other kind of stuff maybe should just be buying into the secondary anyway. So but like I said, well we’ll save that for another topic on another night but you know, gentlemen, I want to say thank you again for joining us on tonight’s roundtable was a good discussion talking about the you know, the Jim Beam stuff that heaven Hill stuff and then as well as this so as usual, I’m going to let you all kind of give a ability to give a shout out of where you are blog and where they can find you and everything like that and we’ll start off how we started like with you first. All right, you know, always a good, always good discussion. So glad to be here. Again, I’m Blake from bourbon or calm that’s Bo you are Bo in are calm as well as sealed box calm, S e
1:15:00
LPA ch s. Yep. And now before I realized that one of the things that Kurt had asked, should I bought those, and we’re at least $60 I would have said yes, I probably would have bought them at 60 Yeah, I mean, I feel like that’s, you know, you got to look at it like, even at $60 that bottles probably better than the majority of stuff that is out there right now. So
1:15:25
yeah, night 60
1:15:28
I think it’s like 3530 3035. And that varies a lot by state though too, because I’ve seen the New York prices there quite a bit more. And I know retailers get hit with like a split case charge and in some cases where they’re paying an extra three bucks a bottle or something. And they don’t have a choice. It’s this is what you’re paying, you know, type of thing. So prices move around a lot. That’s not too far off. I’m thinking more when you’re paying 154 Elmer that’s where you don’t do that. I mean, I don’t want to be a jerk but I haven’t bought Elmer probably
1:16:00
In five years since it’s been very dollars, I mean, it’s just not it’s good and all and I’ve got some so that’s what makes me a jerk sand. I’m not gonna buy it. Yeah, but you have to camp here to get it. Oh, it’s like not worth it. It’s not worth it. You can’t yet do not camp for Elmer. Yeah. That’s the armor campaign. That’s what you do.
1:16:21
Exactly. That’s exactly right. There you go. flip the script on it. Nick. Go ahead and close it out for us or
1:16:27
Nick from breaking bourbon. Check us out on breaking bourbon, calm and social media at breaking bourbon. And I know that this guy isn’t going to go Can we for Elmer So Brian, go ahead. Alright, thanks. Brian was sipping corn Si, p p n c o r n. You can find me mostly on Twitter a little bit on Instagram and Facebook. And you can also find me on corn calm and bourbon justice calm. Thanks guys begin Belmar. I think the last bottle I got was the granny panties.
1:17:00
Whatever tastes like a basement, like I got one of those. I got one. bad ones. Yeah, I got one. I got one. And since then I haven’t opened anymore. I’m a little nervous. But yeah, that’s I think it’s a throwback to our roundtable back in 20, late 2015, maybe 2016, something like that. Yeah. And they basically basically just said, like, no, it’s fine. Yeah.
1:17:26
It’s our profile perfectly.
1:17:30
For that mothball sent
1:17:33
by laser codes are important people. There you go. You heard it. You heard it from the man that if you need evidence, that’s what it is.
1:17:43
Alright, so let’s go ahead and we’ll kind of round this out. You know, Jim, I want to say thank you again for coming on the show tonight. And everybody that was on the chat. Thank you so much. There’s a lot of good comments in there and talking about, you know, wild turkey and talking about heaven Hill and kind of everybody that that has everybody has a
1:18:00
Kind of a stake in in this sort of game here. And it’s good to see a lot of the comments really come through because it really does show the passion that this community does have behind a lot of these brands and really what it does mean to it. And then Ryan, I’ll let you close out here in a second. But people make sure that if you do like the show, leave us a review on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast. It’s always great to kind of see that coming through. And we’re always trying to make this show better every single time with good guesses as such as we’ve had on tonight. Alright, so I’m up. Yeah, that’s kind of how it works.
1:18:34
Yes, it’s not like you’ve done this 200 or something.
1:18:37
Power of console.
1:18:40
Now it’s great discussion. You know, it’s it’s, it’s irritating as it is what like the way heaven Hill has done this. I mean, it is pretty cool though. And like, it just shows you like how much potential bourbon still has to go every year. I’m like, all right, it’s maxed out like we’re gonna hit you know, it’s but and but now I’m kind of stilted.
1:19:00
It’s just the beginning. And it’s just, you know, stuff like this just shows you that there’s still some trajectory and a lot of growth, which is good for all of us, even consumers. And I think we’re going to hit the glory period in about five years where we have tons of great Bourbons a great values and but, uh, no, it’s just cool to see and, and I just hope they invited me on their next press com or not press conference, but on their their next conference table board meeting where I can give them a little advice, but uh, anyway, but thanks for everyone to listen in tonight. We appreciate it in the chat. Always have been following it all night. I love the chat. It’s awesome. So thanks, Kenny. Wrap it up. Why? Well, like that. Cheers, everybody. And we’ll see you all next week. Cheers.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai