Source of Sazerac Canadian Whiskey?

[jinenjo]

A friend of mine recently showed me yet another Canadian whiskey put out by Sazerac, called Legacy. He got it in Oregon. It was a good pour and distinctively spicier and bolder than Rich and Rare Reserve, Caribou Crossing, and Royal Canadian--all of which I've tried many times (the CC still is an excellent pour IMO). He thought it may have been sourced from Corby (i.e. Wiser's Legacy), but I didn't think Sazerac would name an expression directly after it's source.

Anyone know where Sazerac gets their Canadian juice? How could one find out, the TTB colas?

[oknazevad]

Just speculating here, but I'm guessing it is from the Hiram Walker plant, as it is probably the only one large enough to make enough whiskey to cover all of Sazerac's brands, as well as the Canadian Club line, and the Wiser's line, and Gibson's. The place is huge. They probably make so much of the light base spirit in a day that they could supply smaller brands for a year. The other reason I think it's Walker is that historically, R&R and a few other brands now owned by Sazerac were made there.

Edited March 5, 2015 by oknazevad

[squire]

Prior to the Sazerac purchase Barton owned two distilleries in Canada, one in Valleyfield, Quebec and another in Lethbridge, Alberta. Originally built by Schenley, these are large facilities with a combined capacity of close to 10 million gallons of spirit per year. In addition to whisky the Quebec plant also (or at least it did) makes contract rum and vodka for Diageo.

[oknazevad]

Good point. Didn't think about the Constellation Brands connection with the Black Velvet distillery in Lethbridge. And the Valleyfield distillery is also a massive facility in terms of capacity, so it too is a possibility. Or it could be all of them, considering the nature of Canadian blends; they may have multiple contracts supplemented with spot buys from whoever is selling. Truth is, we may never know, but they're definitely getting all that base whisky they're ruining as Fireball somewhere (I seriously doubt Fireball contains any flavoring whiskies).