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Springbank 1999 16 Year Old Local Barley


jvd99
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29 minutes ago, garbanzobean said:

Word on the street is that it will be a significant price increase "because of the use of a more expensive barley variety." If someone tells me that to my face, I plan on interrupting with farting noises and double thumbs down.

LOL!  Scratch inappropriately and spit, too! 

 

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Ah well, hopefully they continue to make hay (barley bushels?) while the sun shines in this whisky bubble.

 

They're opening a whole new malting floor at the neighboring Kilkerran distillery soon (if it's not running already), so as far as I see it the money's going to a good place. Will be nice to see them double their malting capacity so that in 10yrs+ we might finally see a break in Springbank prices with increased supply.

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2 hours ago, The Black Tot said:

Ah well, hopefully they continue to make hay (barley bushels?) while the sun shines in this whisky bubble.

 

They're opening a whole new malting floor at the neighboring Kilkerran distillery soon (if it's not running already), so as far as I see it the money's going to a good place. Will be nice to see them double their malting capacity so that in 10yrs+ we might finally see a break in Springbank prices with increased supply.

Yeah, hopefully.  I don't really take issue with Springbank's standard lineup prices, not even when they start to get ludicrous at 21 years.  The 10, 12, 15, and 18 are all reasonable for the quality.  The older stuff is so in demand that I can't really complain, even if the quality is not there for the price.  It's the teenage single cask and special releases I don't understand the pricing of.  

 

Which brings me to an aside: A big reason I love this forum is that we all have some concept of VFM/QPR.  Lately when anyone brings up those concepts on MM&F, there's a group of idiots who try to shout you down.  Why?  According to them, the whisky is good or it is not.  Price is irrelevant to that judgement.  That is certainly a fine attitude to take when doing formal tasting notes (tasting in a vacuum), but when I am deciding what I want to spend my money on, VFM sure as hell matters to me.

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Eric, I totally agree with your QPR point. Especially in the current market. There are sooooo many NDP and craft bottlings out there commanding outrageous prices for mediocre (at best) product. You know the main offenders-Jeffersons, Michter's-certainly the more recent age stated versions. But the board is a great resource to avoid those pitfalls. A decade ago those weren't in the marketplace and there was a more direct relationship of price to quality. But with plenty of bargains to be had-Ritt rye 354, OGD 114, the Wellers, AAA 10 etc.

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1 hour ago, garbanzobean said:

Which brings me to an aside: A big reason I love this forum is that we all have some concept of VFM/QPR.  Lately when anyone brings up those concepts on MM&F, there's a group of idiots who try to shout you down.  Why?  According to them, the whisky is good or it is not.  Price is irrelevant to that judgement.  That is certainly a fine attitude to take when doing formal tasting notes (tasting in a vacuum), but when I am deciding what I want to spend my money on, VFM sure as hell matters to me.

"Why?"

fanatics (in the positive sense of the word) tend to be much more vocal on any subject than the majority of people. Fanatics (in the pejorative sense of the word) will pay just about any amount to acquire whatever it is in the hobby they are participating in. Therefore, the few that will pay anything (even if they can't really afford it) will tend to be more vocal than the majority that will just pass on anything they deem to be too expensive for them. So, VFM matters to 95% of people, most of which don't talk about it ... 1% shout about it and the rest are too busy accumulating wealth to care about forums.

 

Social media tends to exaggerate the importance of extremes ...

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Social media does indeed do that, and it doesn't help that those of us who are skeptical of some brands and even distilleries are more honest than we used to be (Kilchoman's pricing structure caused the most recent explosion).  It's just funny because it's not like many of us (myself included) aren't willing to drop hundreds or thousands of dollars on our hobbies.  Lately there just seems to be violent differences of opinion on "price of admission" versus what some of us would deem "throwing good money after bad."  Springbank 16 Local Barley is clearly worth asking price to many, and that's great.  To those of us who feel otherwise, also great.  No reason we can't coexist cordially and talk about what we like and don't like in our aged spirits.

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11 hours ago, garbanzobean said:

... skeptical of some brands and even distilleries are more honest than we used to be ... 

Worthy of note is the strong possibility some (many?) brands employ people (and advertising agencies) to "work" social media. So, I wouldn't put it past them to have employees talk up the brands they work for ...

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I've got a lot of respect for Springbank's in-house operation and I hope they wouldn't stoop to using social media trolls.  However, with rumors the 11 year local barley will be $200+, I worry Springbank is moving toward the premiumization of younger distillate.  Indeed, some of their other LE's are pretty outrageously priced, like a new series of 19 year olds finished in various casks that are going for $300 at Binny's.  That's a steep price given the age and doesn't really jive with the standard line up, which is reasonably priced through 18 years, especially their 18 which I can still find for around $135.  If they go all Bookers Rye on us with the young allocated items, I can see the price creep coming for the standard lineup.  That would be disappointing, but in this frenzied climate, unfrontunately not unexpected.  In reality, I've slowed way down on buying single malts, and have been focusing on shoring up my bourbon bunker with stuff that's still a value.

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38 minutes ago, jvd99 said:

I've got a lot of respect for Springbank's in-house operation and I hope they wouldn't stoop to using social media trolls.  However, with rumors the 11 year local barley will be $200+, I worry Springbank is moving toward the premiumization of younger distillate.  Indeed, some of their other LE's are pretty outrageously priced, like a new series of 19 year olds finished in various casks that are going for $300 at Binny's.  That's a steep price given the age and doesn't really jive with the standard line up, which is reasonably priced through 18 years, especially their 18 which I can still find for around $135.  If they go all Bookers Rye on us with the young allocated items, I can see the price creep coming for the standard lineup.  That would be disappointing, but in this frenzied climate, unfrontunately not unexpected.  In reality, I've slowed way down on buying single malts, and have been focusing on shoring up my bourbon bunker with stuff that's still a value.

I highly doubt Springbank is employing internet trolls.  Outside of Local Barley fanatics, I rarely hear more than grumbling when I say anything about them or Glenfarclas.  Mostly the real trollz come out when I complain about Bruichladdich, Kilchoman, or other young distilleries.  I don't think they are paid social media defensive linemen, but I do think a lot of folk who are big into whisky and social media take criticism of people (or the products those people produce) they consider friends or heroes quite personally.  I want every distillery on earth to succeed, but that doesn't mean I am going to pull my punches when I see a massive quality / price disparity.

 

I should also point out that many of these same people seem to either not know how capitalism works or think discussing the mechanics of a free market is gauche, because I tend to get very testy responses from these same people anytime I bring up stuff like the concept of marginal utility of a luxury good to defend my arguments.  

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3 hours ago, garbanzobean said:

I should also point out that many of these same people seem to either not know how capitalism works or think discussing the mechanics of a free market is gauche, because I tend to get very testy responses from these same people anytime I bring up stuff like the concept of marginal utility of a luxury good to defend my arguments.  

VFM/QPR

Marginal utility

Luxury goods

free markets

...

Brings me back to my late '80's university economics classes, LOL

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  • 2 weeks later...

I find this statement interesting - "we get a lower yield from the local barley (approximately 10% fewer litres of alcohol from each tonne of barley)". Does anybody have an idea why that would be?

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30 minutes ago, maybeling said:

I find this statement interesting - "we get a lower yield from the local barley (approximately 10% fewer litres of alcohol from each tonne of barley)". Does anybody have an idea why that would be?

 

There is a thread on Springbank's official Facebook page about all this. Most of it is people bitching about the price etc... But somebody from Springbank is replying to people there though and I asked about the 10% yield difference. Here is their reply:

 

"Michael, it's the amount of fermentable sugar we can create during germination, which can in turn be influenced by the soil the seed is grown in. Basically, Kintyre doesn't have the best soil or climate for growing barley for malting and we therefore get a lower yield for our (and the farmer's) efforts. Different types of barley also give a different yield and often the barley we get locally isn't as efficient in terms of yield as more modern strains."

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Wouldn't have a problem if they'd just let a few harmless professionals in lab coats tinker around with their genes.    :D

 

You have to think BIG PICTURE!!!!   

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I actually don't think the UK prices are all that bad relative to the demand over there.  Heck the last release didn't really bother me in terms of age relative to price, it was the quality relative to price I took issue with.  I am just afraid it will be close to $200 when it lands in the states, unless Springbank and their importer finally deign to account for the U.S.'s screwed up liquor laws.  The lower yield explanation is interesting, but my tolerance for craft pricing does not extend to 10% lower yield - 5 years of age = 30% higher price.

 

 Yep, this is definitely going to be an interesting release to see the pricing on.  Kilchoman has no problem charging $130+ for cask strength single casks 4-6 years old, why shouldn't Springbank charge $200 for something 11 years old?

Edited by garbanzobean
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I'm not saying this $200 rumor is wrong, but last year the 16 year local barley was slated for £95.00 and came in at U.S. retail for ~$170 (in Atlanta at least...)? So maybe the 11 year local barley will be a hair under that? I get that there is an argument to be made that an 11 year old CS isn't worth that much, but it doesn't seem too far out of the realm of reason to me. How much does Diageo want for Lag 12? AND how much does Springbank want for their batches of 12 year CS? Also, based on the Springbank news comments, it sounds like some/part of the problem is the demand in the UK market for these limited Springbank bottlings is far exceeding the supply. This makes me think that we in the U.S. may actually be in a better position to obtain these bottlings and at prices that folks in the UK are not.

 

"We are aware of the likely high demand for this product, driven by what we hope is the quality and desirability of the whisky itself. However, we are aware of the secondary demand for these bottles amongst whisky collectors and the manner in which that can drive prices up very quickly."


"We express no judgement on the practice of “flipping” (buying bottles and immediately making them available on the secondary market) other than to re-iterate that this whisky will be distributed around the world over the coming weeks, albeit in relatively low numbers in comparison to the expected demand, and at prices much closer to what we would consider reasonable than those we have already seen on some websites."

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In my corner of the states, Lagavulin 12 and Springbank 12 CS have cost about $90 until Diageo's last price bump, which puts Lag 12 at about $130, which I am not personally willing to pay.  Springbank 12 is still about $90.  That is a lot of money already for a 12 year old, but to me the quality is there.  It is stretching the upper limits of acceptable QPR for me, though.

 

Ultimately we all have to decide what we are willing to pay for something.  I'll never tell another how to spend his or her money, but I'm not going to pretend I'm not disgusted with Springank's pricing of the new Local Barley series stateside, or that I'm not amazed to see so many (particularly in Europe) caught up in the hype.  I've tried it a few times now, and I just don't get it.  And I love "naked" Springbank.  I was happy to leave it sitting on shelves when it was still available.

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I'm not chasing this one like I did the 16 yr, which can still be found on a few shelves around here. Maybe if it's sitting around in late spring and I have some extra cash.

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I digress, Master of Malt had the 11 year pop up today at $87 USD, so the hype about it being more than the 16 seems misplaced.  Sold out on their site.  I think this will will be easily available here, and I'm not rushing out either, gotta save up for the 25 year Pappiez B)

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If it's a comparable price here, I'll certainly give it a go.  Unfortunately my past experience with Springbank's US prices has me prepared to be disappointed.

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FWIW, I did (and continue to) pass on the Local Barley 16. I haven't tasted it yet, but general comments I had heard where that it wasn't worth the $. Doubt I'll pull the trigger on the 11 year as well, but depends on the price as always. I did splurge yesterday for a 19 year single cask re-charred sherry @ 57% ABV. It could be because that's right around the most I've ever paid for a bottle ($199 + tax) but my initial impression was very positive. AND it seemed like a not insane price compared to what I'm seeing online...

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5 hours ago, maybeling said:

FWIW, I did (and continue to) pass on the Local Barley 16. I haven't tasted it yet, but general comments I had heard where that it wasn't worth the $. Doubt I'll pull the trigger on the 11 year as well, but depends on the price as always. I did splurge yesterday for a 19 year single cask re-charred sherry @ 57% ABV. It could be because that's right around the most I've ever paid for a bottle ($199 + tax) but my initial impression was very positive. AND it seemed like a not insane price compared to what I'm seeing online...

If that's the latest release, it is selling in Maryland for $300.

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