Our ongoing observations about whether the boom has peaked

[kevinbrink]

Sign of the times, in NY PM Spirits released Mic Drop 3 yesterday a 4 year old high rye MGP priced around $70, the local bourbon group is going nuts over it and it has already been put up on the secondary auctioning for a STUPID price.... I still contend that the market will come back a bit but luxury Bourbon is here to stay just like luxury Single Malt, and of course "Luxury" is defined by less tangible characteristics that whats on the back of the ol' baseball card.

[Marekv8]

6 minutes ago, kevinbrink said:

Sign of the times, in NY PM Spirits released Mic Drop 3 yesterday a 4 year old high rye MGP priced around $70, the local bourbon group is going nuts over it and it has already been put up on the secondary auctioning for a STUPID price.... I still contend that the market will come back a bit but luxury Bourbon is here to stay just like luxury Single Malt, and of course "Luxury" is defined by less tangible characteristics that whats on the back of the ol' baseball card.

 

Amazing but believable. I shudder to think what the 140 bottles of Mic Drop 2 are changing hands for these days, probably Brora money. I'm pretty sure there's a Mic Drop 1 sitting with my name on it behind a counter in NYC, I might need to do a bottle check next time I'm up.

[HoustonNit]

Sign of the times, in NY PM Spirits released Mic Drop 3 yesterday a 4 year old high rye MGP priced around $70, the local bourbon group is going nuts over it and it has already been put up on the secondary auctioning for a STUPID price.... I still contend that the market will come back a bit but luxury Bourbon is here to stay just like luxury Single Malt, and of course "Luxury" is defined by less tangible characteristics that whats on the back of the ol' baseball card.

Perfect analogy.

[mal00768]

2 hours ago, kevinbrink said:

Sign of the times, in NY PM Spirits released Mic Drop 3 yesterday a 4 year old high rye MGP priced around $70, the local bourbon group is going nuts over it and it has already been put up on the secondary auctioning for a STUPID price.... I still contend that the market will come back a bit but luxury Bourbon is here to stay just like luxury Single Malt, and of course "Luxury" is defined by less tangible characteristics that whats on the back of the ol' baseball card.

4 year old bourbon for $70? Wtf!? I can get Russels Reserve for $55-$60 any day of the week.

[The Black Tot]

Sounds like a waste of money, effort, and time to me.

[mal00768]

A local store is releasing multiple barrel picks tomorrow. Normally that would be a great thing in this day and age but..

 

$69.99 for Blantons 

$54.99 for OWA

$59.99 Knob Creek Rye 

$39.99 Eagle Rare

$31.99 Buffalo Trace

 

They also bumped the Bookers up to something like $89.99 a bottle. Everything just keeps going up.

 

[PaulO]

55 minutes ago, mal00768 said:

A local store is releasing multiple barrel picks tomorrow. Normally that would be a great thing in this day and age but..

 

$69.99 for Blantons 

$54.99 for OWA

$59.99 Knob Creek Rye 

$39.99 Eagle Rare

$31.99 Buffalo Trace

 

They also bumped the Bookers up to something like $89.99 a bottle. Everything just keeps going up.

 

I haven't seen OWA for a long time, so can't comment on that.

The others seem way out of line, compared to my local prices.

It could be a regional thing, or that store gouges customers, or both.

[0895]

12 hours ago, mal00768 said:

A local store is releasing multiple barrel picks tomorrow. Normally that would be a great thing in this day and age but..

 

$69.99 for Blantons 

$54.99 for OWA

 

$39.99 Eagle Rare

 

 

 

Those store picks would likely be same day sellouts here, even at $10 higher per bottle than the prices you posted. 

 

Edited August 24, 2019 by 0895

[macdad]

2 hours ago, 0895 said:

 

 

Those store picks would likely be same day sellouts here, even at $10 higher per bottle than the prices you posted. 

 

My guess is they would in Ohio too.  At least the Blanton's.  I can't find it anywhere.  There was apparently a shipment a couple weeks ago, but I think most were gone before they even hit the shelves for public sale.

[mal00768]

Oh everything sells same day alright. Later this year they are getting two barrels of Weller full proof in.. wonder what those will cost. They are already going for $750 on secondary.

[0895]

3 hours ago, mal00768 said:

Oh everything sells same day alright. Later this year they are getting two barrels of Weller full proof in.. wonder what those will cost. They are already going for $750 on secondary.

I can't help but wonder who would buy that, when you can get WLW for about the same price?

I mean, if you're gonna buy at sucker price, buy the best one at least.

[PaulO]

People need to keep in mind, until proven otherwise, most barrel picks are indistinguishable or surprisingly close to the standard brand profile.  It may even seem worse to some people.  Good stores let you sample.

I remember not long ago, a store would get a deal on buying a whole barrel.  Then they had a lot of bottles to move.  Customers got a price of a buck or two less than normal.  

[Kepler]

2 hours ago, PaulO said:

People need to keep in mind, until proven otherwise, most barrel picks are indistinguishable or surprisingly close to the standard brand profile.  It may even seem worse to some people.  Good stores let you sample.

I remember not long ago, a store would get a deal on buying a whole barrel.  Then they had a lot of bottles to move.  Customers got a price of a buck or two less than normal.  

^^This

[Kepler]

14 hours ago, 0895 said:

Those store picks would likely be same day sellouts here

 

 

As long as this keeps happening then expect  prices  to continue  to rise. There are new whiskey enthusiasts joining every day.

[Hawk13]

Long time lurker, first time poster so yeah I know my words don't carry weight. However, what got me to post was the post about the store pick Blanton's for $69.99 and someone else commented how they would sell quickly in their area at that price.  Blanton's has disappeared from my area a while ago. A local store has brought in about a dozen store picks of things over the summer.  One was Blanton's.  $100 bought you a ticket for the night it was handed out, food and samples, and gave you one bottle of Blanton's.  If you bought a ticket you got the option to buy another bottle at $69.99, and any left from that night went on sale to the public. I think there was 70 tickets available (there was like a 40 ticket more expensive private tasting party on top of the 70), sold out in less than 4 days.  As for the remaining bottles from the barrel left from the night before, well the store opens at 9 am and it was gone by 9:10 I believe.  This same store is now advertising Weller Special Reserve is coming, not a store pick, and that has never been available in our area as far as I know.  Who knows what it will price at.

Edited August 26, 2019 by Hawk13

[Clueby]

5 hours ago, Hawk13 said:

Long time lurker, first time poster so yeah I know my words don't carry weight. However, what got me to post was the post about the store pick Blanton's for $69.99 and someone else commented how they would sell quickly in their area at that price.  Blanton's has disappeared from my area a while ago. A local store has brought in about a dozen store picks of things over the summer.  One was Blanton's.  $100 bought you a ticket for the night it was handed out, food and samples, and gave you one bottle of Blanton's.  If you bought a ticket you got the option to buy another bottle at $69.99, and any left from that night went on sale to the public. I think there was 70 tickets available (there was like a 40 ticket more expensive private tasting party on top of the 70), sold out in less than 4 days.  As for the remaining bottles from the barrel left from the night before, well the store opens at 9 am and it was gone by 9:10 I believe.  This same store is now advertising Weller Special Reserve is coming, not a store pick, and that has never been available in our area as far as I know.  Who knows what it will price at.

Yeah $70 seems to be the new norm for the minimum price locally. I see it often for higher. One store I know has it for $118. My "honey hole" for $54 has dried up.

[EarthQuake]

On 8/2/2019 at 4:07 AM, The Black Tot said:

 

It depends. A lot of what we love about well aged MGP has to do with who aged it, and where. 

 

MGP are great distillers, but rack house experts? I doubt it. At least based on the nearly universal "meh" reviews for the times when MGP has tried to release their own limited edition products.

 

It's a real shame - all that liquid could be sitting pretty in Smooth Ambler's warehouses right now becoming something awesome, instead of Dickel and other things I don't like as much that SA resorted to when MGP doubled or tripled the cost of their distillate.

Hmm, I've seen this theory before but I'm not sure I understand or agree with it. There have been a number of upstart distilleries that have released well-aged (10-14 year) MGP stock that has been great, Blaum Bros, Boone County, and OKI come to mind. These places are too new to have done any significant portion of the aging themselves. Then we have the somewhat more well known brands like Belle Mead, Redemption, etc that probably didn't do much aging with the MGP sourced releases they've put out, some of which have been fantastic. I also question just how long those MGP barrels aged at Smooth Ambler. In any case, I doubt they have a magic warehouse that turns garbage whiskey into gold.

 

I would guess that it is more about barrel picking and bottling method than who aged it where, with Smooth Ambler et al being better dialed in to what customers want than MGP (age stated, single barrel, barrel proof). 

 

I also don't understand why MGP has a reputation for "mediocre blending whiskey" when their high and low rye mash bourbons are exceptionally similar to some of Four Roses recipes. Unless we're going to call Four Roses mediocre blending whiskey as well. Sure, MGP has provided a lot of young whiskey for new / low end brands, but when we're talking ~10 year barrel proof, there are few distilleries that make better bourbon than MGP. Lots of other distilleries provide young whiskey for NDPs too, Heaven Hill for instance.

 

Really, MGP gets a bad rap because they had so much stock at the right time, and provided so much of it to crappy new brands that bottled it too young, watered it down too much, or did dubious stuff with it like claiming to have distilled it and adding flavoring (I'm looking at you, Templeton). How accountable should MGP really be held for this tomfoolery?

 

PS: It's good to hear that their house bottled rye seems to be decent, that's been on my try list for a while. I'm a fan of Remus Reserve II as well, though for the price I would have loved higher proof/barrel proof. In any case, I'll take a Remus Reserve over anything Buffalo Trace is putting out these days, short of BTAC.

Edited August 26, 2019 by EarthQuake

[kcgumbohead]

15 hours ago, Hawk13 said:

Long time lurker, first time poster so yeah I know my words don't carry weight. However, what got me to post was the post about the store pick Blanton's for $69.99 and someone else commented how they would sell quickly in their area at that price.  Blanton's has disappeared from my area a while ago. A local store has brought in about a dozen store picks of things over the summer.  One was Blanton's.  $100 bought you a ticket for the night it was handed out, food and samples, and gave you one bottle of Blanton's.  If you bought a ticket you got the option to buy another bottle at $69.99, and any left from that night went on sale to the public. I think there was 70 tickets available (there was like a 40 ticket more expensive private tasting party on top of the 70), sold out in less than 4 days.  As for the remaining bottles from the barrel left from the night before, well the store opens at 9 am and it was gone by 9:10 I believe.  This same store is now advertising Weller Special Reserve is coming, not a store pick, and that has never been available in our area as far as I know.  Who knows what it will price at.

Welcome to the board!! Given the current market conditions and particularly if someone is new to bourbon ( not saying you are, this is a general response). Firstly are you partial to wheated bourbon? If notand it is a matter of never having tasted the vaunted Weller label perhaps patience is the best approach. Other wheated recipes sit readily available on shelves. I certainly understand the desire to sample many things and establish a reference for ones tastes and preferences, and it was incredibly easy and affordable just a mere 6-7 yrs ago. These days I would say rather than hunt and pay for these harder to find releases look at what is available. Have you ( again the general population) tasted through and identified preferences among the readily available releases that have not  been subject to the price escalation some other brands have?

Heaven Hill, Wild Turkey, Four Roses, Beam, Brown Forman, Dickle,   newcomers New Riff and Wilderness Trail, Dads Hat and many others. It isn’t all about Sazaerac. 

Easy for me to say as they are far from my favorite distillery. Well made and excellent quality yes but their flavor profiles are not my personal favorites. I know this because I have had them and the others I listed so I was able to form those opinions. In time the Saz labels will return to shelves en masse and you too will be able to sample through their wares at your leisure. In the mean time the shelves are full of outstanding pours waiting to be sampled and explored without standing in line, camping out or buying lottery tickets.

Enjoy the journey and take your time, Slainte. 

[Hawk13]

Slainte....I like a little Gaelic.  This forum by the way is great craic!  I enjoyed tasting my way through Ireland and am a big fan of Redbreast....but now I'm off topic.  I've actually got a couple bottles of Weller Special Reserve that I bought this summer on a trip to Ohio since it does not exist back home.  Like most people here it seems, I agree it's so so, but it was great fun while traveling to see the different selections and prices compared to my area.  I don't have much else to offer on the bourbon boom thoughts though.

[Vosgar]

1 hour ago, Hawk13 said:

I don't have much else to offer on the bourbon boom thoughts though.

Don't worry, you've got plenty of time. This thread started 4-1/2 yrs ago and shows no sign of letting up   

[The Black Tot]

On 8/26/2019 at 4:18 PM, EarthQuake said:

I also question just how long those MGP barrels aged at Smooth Ambler. In any case, I doubt they have a magic warehouse that turns garbage whiskey into gold.

 

I would guess that it is more about barrel picking and bottling method than who aged it where, with Smooth Ambler et al being better dialed in to what customers want than MGP (age stated, single barrel, barrel proof). 

I wouldn't go so far as saying "magic" - but any old reputable master distiller will tell you that they have some very particular ideas of what makes a good rack house and what doesn't - and they're NOT created equal (even if the ARE created equal, some do better than others for reasons that nobody predicted).

 

And MGP isn't garbage whiskey, so that's not the transformation I'm describing either. 

 

But if it was just barrel picking and bottling method, MGP would have been able to release bottles like SA's and Willett's best MGP monsters - and they just have not.

 

It's great that some small companies have managed to age MGP stuff well, also. Let many flowers bloom. 

[kevinbrink]

I think many things are lost in the conversation about MGP bourbon, one thing worth considering is that not every MGP barrel is purchased from MGP many are bought from brokers who store barrels in other locations, there are many barrels of MGP bourbon aged for at least some portion of time in rick houses in Kentucky.  I'd also add that I'm not really a believer in any magic being done by any one bottler other than cask selection for some of the bottlers that got in early, I've had some stellar bottles of MGP bourbon from SAOS and Boone County but never found them to be really superior to some of the Redemption bottles that never really garnered the same hype, some were better and some single casks were worse. 

Edited August 27, 2019 by kevinbrink

[EarthQuake]

7 hours ago, The Black Tot said:

I wouldn't go so far as saying "magic" - but any old reputable master distiller will tell you that they have some very particular ideas of what makes a good rack house and what doesn't - and they're NOT created equal (even if the ARE created equal, some do better than others for reasons that nobody predicted).

 

And MGP isn't garbage whiskey, so that's not the transformation I'm describing either. 

 

But if it was just barrel picking and bottling method, MGP would have been able to release bottles like SA's and Willett's best MGP monsters - and they just have not.

 

It's great that some small companies have managed to age MGP stuff well, also. Let many flowers bloom. 

I would not suggest that all rack houses are created equality. But I don't think we have nearly enough information to suggest that Smooth Ambler's rack house is any better or worse than MGP's. Unless you've (or someone else has) tasted directly from dozens of barrels that spent their entire life at MGP, and dozens more that spent their life at SA, I don't see how anyone could suggest there is evidence to back up the theory. Now, don't get me wrong, the theory certainly could be correct, but the foundation of the argument is rather tenuous.

 

It's important to keep in mind that MGP's stocks and what products they've released are two different things. For instance, Beam has yet to release a truly great Basil Hayden product. They surely have the stocks to release a 10+ year old age stated, barrel proof, single barrel Basil Hayden, since they're putting some of those barrels in Little Book 3 and have bottled some 10 year at their typical 80pf. But they haven't done it. Does this mean they're incapable of doing such a thing?

 

MGP simply hasn't produced a comparable product to SA's single barrel program, so it is apples to oranges at best. If MGP rolled out a line of single barrel, barrel proof, MGP distilled, MGP aged bourbon, aged 10+ years, it would probably be pretty good. Like Beam, they haven't done this. Probably because they're better at making and selling bourbon in bulk than they are at marketing directly to consumers. With MGP's latest retail endeavors, they seem to be having a little more success, but I don't think they're nearly as good at designing and marketing products as SA or Willett. Whoever is in charge of retail releases at MGP seems to be about 5-10 years behind recent consumer trends.

 

Again, new distilleries have bottled great MGP products that they simply have not had time to age (significantly) themselves. Let's look at the numbers: 

 

Boone County opened in 2015, in 2019 they released a 14 year old MGP sourced bourbon, at the very most it could have aged for 4 years at their facility assuming they purchased it on the day they opened their doors. So those other 10+ years were spent at MGP, or as Kevin points out, some unknown location.

 

Blaum Bros was founded in 2013, and they're putting out (with some regularity) a 12 year MGP sourced product. Though apparently they will soon be out of stock. That means a maximum of half the bourbon's life could have been spent in Galina, IL. If they bought a bunch of barrels on day one.

 

Smooth Ambler was founded in 2009, and stopped putting out MGP sourced bottles in what, late 2017 / early 2018? So they theoretically could have released a 10-ish year that spent most of its life in their rack house, if they bought it shortly after it was barreled and transferred it to their location. So maybe they did get some barrels early on, which aged primarily at SA's facilities. Maybe they bought some and aged it for only a year or two. Maybe they bought some barrels near the end that went straight into production. Perhaps all of these things happened to some degree. If there is a reliable source of information on how long those barrels aged at SA, that would be interesting to see.

Edited August 28, 2019 by EarthQuake

[jwperry]

A local store is releasing multiple barrel picks tomorrow. Normally that would be a great thing in this day and age but..
 
$69.99 for Blantons 
$54.99 for OWA
$59.99 Knob Creek Rye 
$39.99 Eagle Rare
$31.99 Buffalo Trace
 
They also bumped the Bookers up to something like $89.99 a bottle. Everything just keeps going up.
 

In Central Florida these could be 250% those prices and sell out within hours (or never hit the shelf) with a store pick sticker on them.

RE: MGP
So many words! So many posts! Not conducive to drinking & posting.
MGP is a manufacturer/distributor. They attempted to under cut retailers. Business 102 is that distribution does but under cut retail without non-compete concessions. They seem to have skipped that class. And marketing.

[HoustonNit]

SBers bourbon geeks, I mean aficionados can someone tell what the original purpose MGP had in mind when they distilled these barrels 12+ years ago?

When they where originally distilled and put away they didn’t do so with the intention of them being BP single barrel NDP bottlings?

For instance I assume the MGP super high rye was intended to go into some Canadian style blend. Was this also the plan for the bourbon barrels?