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Balcones: Next stop, world domination?


timd
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I need to get down there ASAP so I can drool on them in person. Hard to believe Chip builds this stuff himself - and makes such damn good whiskey with them, too.

Haha. Well keep in mind funds were short when we first started out, we built the stills out of necessity more than anything else. We basically got our stills for 1/10th of what it would have cost us to have someone else build them...

BTW here's an updated pic:

coKYRZZ.jpg

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Picked up my first bottle of Brimstone and looking forward to opening it tonight.

Great! Do post your thoughts

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So looks like Balcones doesn't mess around when they say special event....

Just got email from them about Dec 7th event at the distillery. On sale will be;

- v2 of the 5th anniversary Bourbon ($95)

- 5th anniversary of the Brimstone Resurrection ($95)

- Texas Rum ($70)

- Rumble Cask Reserve ($70)

If i lived in the area, i'd surely stop buy for the tour, but prices just keep climbing. That being said, would feel really bad for the guys who bought the Bourbon from the UK (was about $150 landed cost). Some limitations on how many you can buy (1 of the 5th anniversary choices and 1 of the others) and only 100 tickets being sold.

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Haven't had the rum or the Bourbon but if I was close by the prices wouldn't scare me away. Both the Brimstone and Rmble CR are excellent.

Besides I like to support what appears to me to be sincere people.

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So looks like Balcones doesn't mess around when they say special event....

Just got email from them about Dec 7th event at the distillery. On sale will be;

- v2 of the 5th anniversary Bourbon ($95)

- 5th anniversary of the Brimstone Resurrection ($95)

- Texas Rum ($70)

- Rumble Cask Reserve ($70)

If i lived in the area, i'd surely stop buy for the tour, but prices just keep climbing. That being said, would feel really bad for the guys who bought the Bourbon from the UK (was about $150 landed cost). Some limitations on how many you can buy (1 of the 5th anniversary choices and 1 of the others) and only 100 tickets being sold.

Keep in mind that taxes on exported liquor also add significantly to the cost.

And yes, prices will always go up. Just economics. Our whiskies our vastly underpriced considering the demand.

And of course our process isn't inexpensive... never has been. It's time consuming and ingredient intensive. Oh, and copper ain't cheap either :D

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Well shit. Our tickets sold out in 2 minutes flat. I have been doing damage control for 3.5 hours now :(

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Well shit. Our tickets sold out in 2 minutes flat. I have been doing damage control for 3.5 hours now :(

Were i local, i'd be pretty pissed off to not be able to attend...only to see the bottles being snagged by flippers. What can you do though...could be that all 100 of those people just really like the product. Maybe next time spread the limited products out over a few events/weeks. Then at least everyone gets something.

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I have an extra ticket for face value for fellow sber that wants to go. Not for a new member who joins site just for this; must have been a member for a month.

Edited by wadewood
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Were i local, i'd be pretty pissed off to not be able to attend...only to see the bottles being snagged by flippers. What can you do though...could be that all 100 of those people just really like the product. Maybe next time spread the limited products out over a few events/weeks. Then at least everyone gets something.

Yeah we did not expect it to be so crazy. We'll definitely do it differently next time. And ticket/bottle flippers will be dealt with accordingly ;)

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I have an extra ticket for face value for fellow sber that wants to go. Not for a new member who joins site just for this; must have been a member for a month.

As I said Wade I already have a waiting list. You need to tell me which slot to refund ASAP.

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As I said Wade I already have a waiting list. You need to tell me which slot to refund ASAP.
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Technically since you STILL don't have anyone to give the ticket to, you violated the "one per person" rule. To boot, there's obviously not a lot of demand for it through your channels, whereas I have 50 local people on a list who would give up a vital organ to get a ticket. But hey, if you don't want to give me a hand here and help out the distillery, that's your choice.

For the record, next time we will only award tickets through a lottery. It will be strictly one per household, and secondary sales of tickets (face value or not) will result in a refund being immediately handed down to the ticket holder and their spot given to the next in line. Thanks for helping us understand how we must do things in the future.

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Yeah, I love it when a company argues with a customer - esp. in public! :slappin:

I'm hoping it goes just a bit longer as my microwave popcorn just finished. Slightly off topic but I sense more than a few stores/brands not thinking these events through as of late. Some of the lottery/raffles for limited releases have been very well thought out and fair, others just haphazardly designed and didn't benefit loyal customers in any way. Putting random people who didn't support you up to this point on equal footing sure screams short term gain.

Who better than a brand owner to recognize the demand in the marketplace and design accordingly around long term?

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I'm hoping it goes just a bit longer as my microwave popcorn just finished. Slightly off topic but I sense more than a few stores/brands not thinking these events through as of late. Some of the lottery/raffles for limited releases have been very well thought out and fair, others just haphazardly designed and didn't benefit loyal customers in any way. Putting random people who didn't support you up to this point on equal footing sure screams short term gain.

Who better than a brand owner to recognize the demand in the marketplace and design accordingly around long term?

We did a sales event back in September and it went extremely smoothly. Unfortunately we didn't expect this kind of volume for our next event. There was a buzz about it on Facebook, similar to what we had before, but instead of selling out in 12 hours we sold out in 2-3 minutes. Being that the law that allows us to sell bottles only just passed and this is our second event ever, it's still a learning experience for us. So we'll have to do it differently next time. None of us at the distillery have ever had to organize something like this in the past so I blame our naivety for not making this next go around as smooth as the last. Plus there were some technical hiccups out of our control that led to a few people getting hosed. It's unfortunate, but nothing we can do now that wouldn't cause more frustration.

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I mean, we had a guy in Chicago trying to buy a ticket from us long after they were sold out. He wanted to get one so he could fly from IL and come to Waco. I don't think anyone could have hardly expected someone to fly 5 states away to buy a bottle of whisky, but apparently some are willing.

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