age of current OGD 114

[NOBourbon]

Thanks for the responses. Here's the deal. I gave up bourbon for Lent (partly as a sacrifice and partly just to prove to myself that I could) and have been stocking my bar with a bottle a week for my Easter Sunday tasting. The OGD 114 was this past weekends addition.

Man this is a long Lent this year.

[matthew0715]

My guess would be once a year, and they might make two days of it, maybe three. Then they spend another three or four days making all of the rye whiskey for the year.

I'm mildy surprised that they spend less time making OGD, (which gets bottled at 86, 100, 114 proof and as Basil Hayden) which seems to have very wide distribution, than making ryes (for JB rye, ri1, and Old Overholt) which have more limited distribution. Perhaps some of the rye ends up in Beam Global's blends: Kessler and Calvert Extra.

Matt

[T Comp]

One thing to remember about NAS products, especially good ones, is that they typically contain whiskeys of several different ages. Because it is a straight and NAS, everything in the bottle must be at least 4-years-old, but mixed in could be some 6, 8, 10, 12 -- who knows?

That's an example of blending as an art, but we don't want to call it 'blending' lest it be confused with GNS-packed 'blended whiskey.' Brands like OGD can do this better than Jim Beam white because Jim Beam white is so huge, it's inevitably mostly 4- to 5-year-old, with a dollop of older stuff here and there.

My sense of Beam, and Daniel's the same way, is that pretty much they have to start dumping on the whiskey's birthday. They have some wiggle room to let some age a bit longer, but not much.

Because they don't make much OGD, they probably make it infrequently. My guess would be once a year, and they might make two days of it, maybe three. Then they spend another three or four days making all of the rye whiskey for the year.

In both cases they don't want to make too little so they tend to make too much, which means they always have some to keep aging at the end of the year.

Setting up the distillery to make a different recipe is like a car factory re-tooling for a new model. They don't want to do it any more often than they have to. If they're running OGD and the rye more than once year then it's once each season, i.e., twice a year.

OGD is a win-win. It's a good value for us but it's actually very profitable for Beam. It sells for more than Jim white, is maybe slightly more expensive to make, but they spend zero on marketing it. Obviously they make a lot more on Beam because of the volume, but OGD has a better margin.

It is posts like these that make my day and make me glad to be a part of SB. It gives great insight to those of us (or at least me) who have never been involved in the marketing or making of any product, let alone bourbon.

[cowdery]

I'm mildy surprised that they spend less time making OGD, (which gets bottled at 86, 100, 114 proof and as Basil Hayden) which seems to have very wide distribution, than making ryes (for JB rye, ri1, and Old Overholt) which have more limited distribution. Perhaps some of the rye ends up in Beam Global's blends: Kessler and Calvert Extra.

Matt

It was just a guess and you might be right. They might use some of the OGD juice in the blends as well. The point, though, is that they make rye and OGD for a handful of days, and probably at Clermont, the smaller of the two plants. The rest of the time they're cranking out the standard Jim Beam recipe, which is used for everything else.

[JamesW]

Absolutely....no doubt about it.

I concur as well. I'm having a snort right now and for $20 it's the best value around.

[AVB]

Come to the state of PA and pay $30 each by special order. Oh, and you have to get six at a time. Yet another reason why the PLCB sucks.

Also, would you consider $20 a good price for that bottle?

Thanks,

Larry