Mark Brown on the Bourbon Shortage

Here is more detail about the bourbon shortage discussed here on Wednesday, courtesy of Sazerac President Mark Brown. (Sazerac owns the Buffalo Trace and Barton 1792 distilleries.)

On pricing: "Costs have been increasing for energy and raw materials like corn," says Brown. "Any price increases we are implementing, or contemplating, are primarily tied to recovering those cost increases, as opposed to changing any brand’s position."

On brands: "Each and every brand has a specific sales forecast out through its product age plus several years and therefore has its own allocation of whiskey," says Brown. That means for, let's say Eagle Rare Single Barrel, a 10-year-old, that they have allocated existing whiskey stocks based on meeting sales forecasts for 10+ years. If actual sales exceed the forecast in any of those years, shortages could occur, but since forecasts and inventory allocations are periodically adjusted based on actual sales, adjustments to production are made the only place they can be, in the current year.

On staffing: "We are actually ahead of the curve since we anticipate the need to manage sales, allocations and stocks increasing more so in a year’s time from now," said Brown in response to comments here and elsewhere that Buffalo Trace should have hired its new inventory manager sooner.

On the press release itself: "We felt it was time to explain why folks are already seeing gaps on the shelves (i.e. Weller 12) and from our vantage point why those gaps will be occurring on various brands for some time to come," says Brown. "We have had extensive debates about what to do about the supply / demand imbalance and our conclusion is that the best thing to do is stay the course with each brand’s position in the market and spread the available supplies out as evenly as we can."

It should be noted that this is an issue throughout the entire whiskey industry. Sazerac is now on-the-record as to how it intends to deal with the matter. If any other producers decide to weigh in on the subject, you'll read about it here.

More About Sazerac

The chief architect of present day Sazerac Company is President and CEO Mark Brown. He had some follow-ups to Thursday's post.

Although Sazerac doesn't belong to DISCUS or KDA, it is a member of The Presidents’ Forum of the Beverage Alcohol Industry, a trade association made up of U.S. beverage alcohol company CEOs. Brown estimates that Presidents' Forum members account for 35 to 40 percent of U.S. distilled spirits volume. Vicky McDowell, former Deputy Administrator of the TTB, is Executive Director.

The Forum doesn't have a web site but it appears to represent its member companies primarily on regulatory issues, which is part of what DISCUS does as well.

Regarding the absence of Ten High and others from the Great Bourbon list, Brown pointed out that Great Bourbon was not meant to be all inclusive. The full list of Sazerac products is on the Sazerac site.

They're still trying to figure out whether or not to put their ryes on the Great Bourbon site.

Brown has been a fun presence on the bourbon scene. He's the kind of guy who will drive from Frankfort to Cincinnati to show up at a small, private gathering of bourbon enthusiasts, just to see what we think of something they're working on at the distillery. He's very accessible and open, to a point, but when he doesn't want to tell you something he doesn't dissemble, he just says "I'm not going to tell you that."

Buffalo Trace Takes Experimentation to New Level with Warehouse X

Buffalo Trace Distillery broke ground Friday on an experimental barrel warehouse that will allow the distillery to take its quest for the “perfect bourbon” even further.

Named Warehouse X, this warehouse is the first new building Buffalo Trace has added to its 130 acre complex in more than 60 years.  Comprised of brick, concrete block, and skylights, it is no ordinary barrel warehouse. With a small footprint of only 30 feet by 50 feet, Warehouse X will have a capacity of around 150 barrels.

Its most compelling feature, however, is four independently operating chambers that will allow specific variables to be tested, in order to determine their effect on aging barrels. There will also be a barrel breezeway with an open air rick, underneath a roof, that will allow a small number of barrels to age while being exposed to the natural elements.

The first four variables Buffalo Trace plans to experiment with are natural light, temperature, airflow, and humidity. Warehouse X will test one variable at a time. For example, the first experiment will focus on the effect of natural light for at least two years. Each chamber will have varying degrees of light, ranging from 100% natural light to complete darkness.

After the natural light experiment is concluded, a new experiment will start on temperature, and then studies will start on the effects of humidity, and so on.

Warehouse X is projected to be finished by August 2013, but everyone can track the progress and view pictures of the construction through a blog updated frequently: www.experimentalwarehouse.com.

Upon completion, visitors to Buffalo Trace Distillery will be able to walk around Warehouse X and learn about the current experiment occurring inside. “It’s no secret that we’re on the hunt to find the Holy Grail of bourbon,” said Harlen Wheatley, master distiller. “By building this experimental warehouse, we’ll be able to keep a tight control on the variables that affect the barrel aging process and can make changes along the way to the aging environment that will hopefully allow us to one day come up with the perfect bourbon.”

The whiskeys aged inside Warehouse X will be bottled under the Experimental Collection line. It will be a minimum of eight years after the warehouse is completed before any whiskey will be bottled from Warehouse X.

Sazerac Company Is A World Unto Itself

Sazerac Company, often synonymous with its main distillery, Buffalo Trace, is one of the largest bourbon and rye producers in the country. Due to its size and independence, it is almost like an entirely separate Kentucky whiskey industry.

This is because Sazerac is not a member of the Kentucky Distillers' Association (KDA). Consequently, its two Kentucky distilleries and other facilities are not part of the Kentucky Bourbon Trail Tour, which is a KDA enterprise and registered trademark.

Nor is Sazerac a member of the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States (DISCUS), the national trade association for the American distilled spirits industry. Asked why, Sazerac says it feels it can spend that money better on itself by itself. Sazerac is privately owned, by the Goldring family, and has additional facilities in New Orleans (where it began) and other U.S. cities.

Sazerac is not completely anti-social. It participated side-by-side with many of its KDA counterparts at the Bourbon Classic in Louisville on March 22nd and 23rd. It typically participates in events such as WhiskyFest and WhiskyLive. The company, its distilleries, and its products have won countless awards. The Buffalo Trace Distillery especially is beloved by serious bourbon enthusiasts for its in-depth tours and products such as the Antique Collection, Experimental Collection, Single Oak Project, and White Dog series.

In addition to Buffalo Trace in Frankfort, Sazerac has the Barton 1792 Distillery in Bardstown. Both distilleries welcome visitors. In addition, Buffalo Trace frequently holds concerts and other events. In Owensboro, the company has whiskey maturation warehouses and a bottling house at the site of the old Glenmore Distillery. Although Glenmore does not now offer tours, the company has said it may in the future. Bottling is also done at Frankfort and Bardstown. Sazerac also operates A. Smith Bowman, a micro-distillery in Virginia, that welcomes visitors.

Buffalo Trace is a bourbon as well as a distillery, a very good bourbon. The name Barton 1792 incorporates the names of two of the best known bourbons from the Bardstown distillery, Very Old Barton and Ridgemont Reserve 1972, which are also terrific bourbons.

At Buffalo Trace, Sazerac produces several rye-recipe bourbons, using a separate recipe, for Age International, which owns several brands and shares U.S. sales and marketing responsibilities with Sazerac. The Age brands include Blanton's, Elmer T. Lee, Rock Hill Farms, Hancock Reserve, and Ancient Age.

Sazerac also produces the iconic Van Winkle line in conjunction with Julian P. Van Winkle III and his son, Preston Van Winkle.

Other major brands, if any Sazerac brand can be called major, include W. L. Weller, Old Charter, E. H. Taylor, Eagle Rare, George T. Stagg, and Kentucky Tavern.

And all that is just the beginning. Sazerac makes a staggering number of different whiskey brands, plus vodka, gin, liqueurs, and bitters. It imports and sells Canadian whisky, scotch, and other spirits and wines. Most of its brands are not household names, but cumulatively it's a lot of business. As a private company, they don't release sales statistics, so it's hard to tell how successful they are, but they keep expanding so they must be doing something right.

One of the ways Buffalo Trace is unusual is their marketing. They don't do very much of it, at least in terms of traditional media advertising. They have several web sites, Facebook pages, and other online activities. Most notable is Great Bourbons, a catch-all site that at least covers most of the company's bourbons. The website was recently updated and upgraded. If you're not quite sure who actually makes your favorite American whiskey, check it out.

As long a list as that is, it's not everything. Ten High is missing, so are all of the blends and (surprisingly) all of the ryes. Perhaps there is a 'Great Ryes' site in the works.

The Case of Fleischmann's Rye

Fleischmann's Rye is an enthusiast's favorite because it is decent and cheap, and a charming novelty due to its extremely limited distribution. Available only in northern Wisconsin, where they drink all sorts of beverages nobody else does, like Korbel Brandy and peppermint schnapps, it's the only rye made at the Barton 1792 Distillery in Bardstown.

Fleischmann's Rye is cheap, sold only in 1.75 liter plastic bottles at 80° proof (40% ABV). There's a raw pleasure in a well-made young rye but that's all it ever was. The whiskey's appeal is mostly in its rarity.

Recently, some posters on straightbourbon.com revealed that Fleischmann's Rye has changed its label. Instead of saying 'Straight Rye Whiskey,' it now says 'Mash Rye Whiskey.' This led to some tea leaf reading and inquiries to the brand's owner, Sazerac, to figure out exactly what it all meant.

To be labeled as 'straight rye whiskey,' a whiskey must be at least 51 percent rye, distilled at less than 160° proof (80% ABV), entered into new, charred oak barrels at 125° proof (62.5% ABV), and aged for at least two years. If aged for less than four years, the label must carry an age statement.

On the new label, the word 'mash' was inserted so you won't notice 'straight' is gone, but it has no effect on the product's legal class and type, which is now simply 'rye whiskey.' It still has to be at least 51 percent rye, distilled at less than 160° proof (80% ABV), and entered into new, charred oak barrels at 125° proof (62.5% ABV) or less, but there is no minimum age required and no age needs to be disclosed.

This does not appear to adhere to the rules as written, but it is the way TTB has been interpreting them.

Sazerac was selling Fleischmann's at three years (36 months). They may still do that, but now they don't have to. This part of it is just like the Old Grand-Dad proof cut. With these old, small, and in this case really cheap brands, the producers believe they can cut the proof, cut the age, change the label, but as long as they don't raise the price, the consumer won't notice.

This is all done to extract as much profit as possible from a very marginal product.

As small as Fleischmann's is, Sazerac must sell a lot of it in that one market to justify making it. Unlike a small bourbon brand, which is just a matter of slapping a label on a standard bottle, they have to actually make this stuff.

Before Sazerac bought them, Barton was active in the contract distilling and bulk whiskey markets. Some of the High West ryes are Barton. They may have sold some of it that way, and probably used some of it in the many different blends they make. On the other hand, a 36-month whiskey is practically just-in-time manufacturing for the whiskey business, being able to sell something three years after it's distilled -- and now maybe less than that -- is a nice little business.

When asked about the change, Sazerac revealed that they briefly discontinued the brand, then brought it back. That shows how borderline it is, profit-wise.

About the smallest batch a distillery can make is the contents of one fermenter, but the start-up and shut-down for one fermenter is the same as a whole day's production, so one day tends to be the smallest practical unit of production. Even today, with rye production up, a distillery like Sazerac's Buffalo Trace might do three or four days of rye in the spring and three or four in the fall, but back in the doldrums it was one day in the spring and one day in the fall.

Barton has been doing something like that, or maybe just one day for the whole year, and that has been enough for Fleischmann's, for their blends, and for contract/bulk sales. When Sazerac bought Barton they were shut down for rather a long stretch, about 18 months, because Sazerac felt they had been over-producing. When the rye ran out because of that gap, that may have been when they discontinued it. At some point they decided to make it after all, and probably went right back to what they had been doing, production-wise.

The Best-Kept Secrets in Bourbon Are Hiding in Plain Sight

There are some really terrific bourbons out there that most people overlook. In many cases they are old brands that the manufacturers sell but don't support. Some offer a chance to taste something a little different, others are among the best bourbons you can buy, and all are great values. While a few have limited distribution, many are hiding in plain sight at your neighborhood whiskey monger.

A prime example is Weller 12-Year-Old. This wheated bourbon from Sazerac is right up there with the very best bourbons available today, and it costs less than $30 a bottle in most places. A few years ago it was in very short supply but now seems readily available. If you are pining for Pappy but have never had Weller 12, what's wrong with you?

At the other end of the spectrum is Very Old Barton, another Sazerac product. It is a 6-year-old, rye-recipe bourbon that used to be sold only in Kentucky and a few southern states. In Kentucky, it is very popular and competes head-to-head with Jim Beam and Jack Daniel's. It is now more widely available but not national. Unless you drink 1792 or Ten High, you've probably never tasted a bourbon from this distillery. Very Old Barton is a solid, reliable, standard bourbon that usually sells for less than $20, often a lot less.

Old Forester is the brand that launched Brown-Forman 143 years ago. It was the first bourbon to be sold only in bottles. It has the same recipe as Woodford Reserve. The 86° proof (43% ABV) is usually about $20 and the 100° proof (50% ABV) is usually about $25. Again, it is just a good, solid, dependable rye-recipe bourbon at an excellent price.

Old Grand-Dad, discussed here on Monday, is one of the few high-rye bourbons and definitely the least expensive one. Its bonded expression has long been the best-selling bonded bourbon in the country. The bond usually sells for about $20, the 80° proof (40% ABV) is about $17. It's made by Beam.

Also from Beam is Jim Beam Black Label, which is 8-years-old, 86° proof (43% ABV), and about $22 a bottle. Compare that to Knob Creek, which is the same juice at 9-years-old and 100° proof (50% ABV), and about $30. Even though it carries the Jim Beam name, or perhaps because of it, many bourbon fans overlook this superb value. It's available everywhere.

Evan Williams Black Label is Heaven Hill's flagship brand and the #3 best-selling American whiskey, after Jack and Jim. Again it's a good, solid, standard rye-recipe bourbon, selling in many places for around $10.

No one who really knows bourbon would turn their nose up at any of these.

Beam Is Selling Bellows and Other Value Brands to Luxco

It takes different kinds of companies to make up the distilled spirits business. One way to divide them is between brand companies and commodity companies.

The brand companies base their business on household-name brands, which become and remain household names because the companies spend a lot of money to support them. They count on consumer demand to pull product off the shelf.

Commodity companies base their business on narrow margins, high volume, and efficiency. They push their products into distribution with price, and count on the distributors and retailers to push them out to value-conscious consumers. Commodity companies spend almost nothing on marketing support. Both types of companies make money, it's just a different approach.

Of course, brand v. commodity is a simple dichotomy and, consequently, not entirely accurate . Most of the brand companies have a few commodity products tucked away, and many commodity companies have a recognizable brand name or two.

Heaven Hill and Sazerac would be classed as commodity companies, for example, but Heaven Hill's Evan Williams is a serious brand, #3 in American straight whiskey. So is their Pama Pomegranate Liqueur, and a few others. Same with Sazerac (Blanton's, Weller, Van Winkle).

The commodity companies, generally, are privately-owned, while the brand companies are public. The announcement of this transaction, for example, came from Beam, not Luxco.

On the other side of the coin you have Beam, Diageo, Pernod, and Brown-Forman. Brown-Forman especially has a very lean portfolio, but it's packed with category leaders like Jack Daniel's and Woodford Reserve. Diageo, Pernod, and Beam--all much bigger than Brown-Forman--emphasize their category leaders, but they all have some 'cats and dogs' in their stables too.

So it is that, periodically, a brand company will off-load some of its commodity brands (also known as 'value' brands) to an established commodity company, as Beam announced it was doing this week. The buyer, Luxco, is a St. Louis-based rectifier and bottler (they don't distill).

For $65 million, Luxco got Bellows and Calvert, both of which Beam acquired in 1987 when it bought National Distillers. Bellows and Calvert are pretty old brands, but they never got off the bottom shelf. Calvert is blended whiskey, both Canadian and American, as well as gin. Bellows is bourbon, American blended whiskey, gin, rum, scotch, and vodka. Luxco also got a couple of vodkas, most notably Wolfschmidt, and a couple of other Canadians.

Wolfschmidt is a good example of a commodity 'brand.' It's a top seller in some markets, but strictly because of its distribution and price. Skol, a similar brand, was once described by its owner as the company's 'aircraft carrier.' Its profit margin was minimal, but its volume was so great that it paid to roll the trucks. The company's smaller but more profitable brands rode for free.

So a move like this is good for both companies. Beam gets $65 million and gets rid of what, for it, were mostly nuisances. Nobody at Beam wanted to manage Bellows. That's not how you advance your career.

Luxco, for its part, got that much more volume. It will keep selling everything Beam sold everywhere Beam sold it. Nobody is going to stop buying Wolfschmidt vodka because it's now sold by Luxco instead of Beam. Luxco will absorb its new acquisitions easily, because that's the business they're in.

The deal should close at the end of this month. Beam will continue to produce and bottle the brands for Luxco until at least January of 2014, according to Beam.

Sazerac Buys 300 Thousand Square Foot Warehouse In Bardstown.

In 2009, Sazerac Company bought Bardstown's Barton 1792 Distillery. Sazerac, which also owns Buffalo Trace in Frankfort, didn't need the additional distilling capacity, and immediately cut Barton's distilling schedule. This led many fans of the distillery's products to worry that Sazerac might not be fully committed to its Bardstown operation.

This may assuage some of those fears.

In a joint statement with the Nelson County Economic Development Agency, Sazerac has announced its purchase of the Warehouse Support Center Building on Withrow Court in the Bardstown Industrial Park. The 300,000 square foot facility, with a capacity of approximately one million cases of spirits, will become the company’s new distribution center for Bardstown. The company is also purchasing eight adjacent acres for trailer staging.

To the Withrow Court facility they are adding cold storage, offices, and IT capabilities. The current finished goods warehouse on the distillery grounds will become part of the expanded bottling operation there. The Barton 1792 Distillery recently increased its processing capacity with additional bottling tanks and bulk storage. It opened a visitors center last year and now offers daily tours.

The Barton 1792 Distillery makes 1792 Ridgement Reserve Bourbon, Very Old Barton Bourbon, and many other whiskey and non-whiskey products.

Jim Beam Is Up 11%, Single Oak Project Has 6th Release, And The KDA Has New Digs.

Here's a little news round-up from Bourbon Country.

Beam Inc. has reported its second quarter results. Sales are up and bourbon is why. In worldwide sales, Jim Beam itself is up 11 percent for the year, Knob Creek is up 9 percent, and Maker's Mark is up 29 percent. That's pretty incredible, but there is another Beam bourbon that is doing even better: Basil Hayden, up 33 percent.

Almost everything in Beam's portfolio is up. Effen Vodka is one notable exception. When Beam bought Effen Vodka from Sazerac three years ago, I said it was a mistake. Sure enough, Effen sales are down 14 percent, probably because Beam has lost interest in it since Beam now has Pinnacle Vodka, a much bigger brand and one that is not based on a vulgarity.

This month, Sazerac's Buffalo Trace Distillery will releases the sixth round of Single Oak Project bourbons. Twelve of these experimental bourbons are released each quarter. With release six, therefore, the score is 72 released, 120 to go.

Each release has a theme. This time, all twelve bourbons in the set are from Warehouse L, a masonry warehouse with concrete floors that many Tracians consider their best. The other common feature is low barrel entry proof (52.5% ABV). Since most bourbons go into the barrel at close to the legal maximum of 62.5% ABV, low entry proof is of great interest to distillers and aficionados.

The Kentucky Distiller's Association (KDA), of which Sazerac is not a member, is 132 years old but never has had a physical home. It now occupies a portion of Frankfort Barracks, a 141-year-old building that housed federal troops stationed in Frankfort between 1871 and 1876. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The address is 614 Shelby Street, Frankfort, KY 40601.

In addition to offices for KDA's staff, which has ballooned to three people, it will also serve as information center and gift shop for the Kentucky Bourbon Trail tour.

Barton v Beam: Too Close To Call.

If you saw these two bottles next to each other on a shelf, what would you think?

They're both handsome bottles, but what else? Are they the same product in two different bottles? Two different products from the same maker?

You probably would not think that, although both bottles contain bourbon whiskey, they have no other relationship to each other. The typefaces in which the numbers are set, while not identical, are very similar, as are the numbers themselves. Too similar, perhaps?

On the left is a bottle of Ridgemont Reserve 1792, a Sazerac product, made at the Barton 1792 Distillery in Bardstown, Kentucky. It is widely distributed throughout the U.S. It is an 8-year-old straight bourbon, bottled at 46.85% ABV. It costs about $30 a bottle at retail.

The number 1792 refers to the year Kentucky became a state.

On the right is a bottle of Jim Beam. According to the UNCRATE web site, it is an eight-year-old, 47.5% ABV straight bourbon. Limited to 200 bottles, it is available only in the Heinemann Duty Free store in the T1B Schengen lounge in Frankfurt, Germany. The price is €140 ($178).

A different source says it is also being sold in Australia, for about $190.

1795 is the year, according to Beam family tradition, that family patriarch Jacob Beam sold his first barrel of whiskey in Kentucky.

The similarity is all the more interesting considering Ridgemont Reserve's history. It was originally called Ridgewood Reserve 1792, a fact that rubbed Brown-Forman's Woodford Reserve the wrong way. They sued for trademark infringement and won.

In response to inquiries, Sazerac said it does not comment on matters subject to pending litigation.

Kentucky Tavern Gets A Face Lift.

Kentucky Tavern has gotten a face lift. This is the new label.

Kentucky Tavern was the flagship brand of Glenmore Distillery, which had its offices in Louisville, with the distillery itself in Owensboro.

Glenmore also owned the Yellowstone brand, and its distillery in Shively (a Louisville suburb). Yellowstone was the bigger brand, but it was like Jack Daniel's is to Brown-Forman's founding brand, Old Forester. Kentucky Tavern - known as KT - was Glenmore's flagship.

Glenmore was the Thompson family's distillery. The Thompsons, Browns and Van Winkles were Louisville's leading distilling families of the post-Prohibition era. The Van Winkles sold Stitzel-Weller in 1972. 'Buddy' Thompson sold Glenmore to what became Diageo in 1991.

KT got beat up and bounced around after that, at various points becoming "Kentucky Whiskey," and even a blend.

Now owned by Sazerac and made at the Barton 1792 Distillery in Bardstown, it is Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey once again.

The KT brand was somehow linked to an actual Louisville bar of the same name, frequented by Louisville downtown business types because it was conveniently located between downtown and their northeast side homes. The bar's heyday was the 1950s, so one assumes the bar was named after the whiskey, which began in the early 20th century.

The names may even have been a coincidence, but came to be linked together in the minds of many. Both were called KT.

In the 1980s, when Glenmore was still independent and looked like it might be one of the survivors of bourbon's collapse, a new KT's was erected on or near the original location near Louisville's Cherokee Park. Good bar. Good sandwiches. No connection to the distillery or the original bar, just a tribute, and still in a good location.

Weller Antique Is Not Being Discontinued.

Several whiskey-enthusiast blogs and web sites are reporting that Weller Antique, a wheated bourbon produced by Sazerac at the Buffalo Trace Distillery, is being discontinued. The ostensible source is none other than Harlen Wheatley, Buffalo Trace Master Distiller, speaking at a tasting event in Dallas, Texas.

Two different individuals who attended the event have written that he cited limited amounts of wheated bourbon barrel stock as the reason. As reported, his exact words were, "Weller Antique is going away."

So your humble correspondent asked the Buffalo Trace PR department about the reported incident. Through them, Mr. Wheatley denied making the statement. Both he and the PR department assert that, in fact, Weller Antique is not going away and there are no changes to the Weller line underway.

The two witnesses are knowledgeable, veteran whiskey enthusiasts. There appears to be no reason to doubt them, nor to doubt the denials by Mr. Wheatley and the official spokespeople at Buffalo Trace. How to explain the discrepancy? Many possibilities suggest themselves. Most fall well short of the conspiracy and duplicity suggested by some members of the commentariat.

One would think that the denial is enough, everyone assumes there was some kind of misunderstanding, now cleared up, end of story. But that's not how it works among people afflicted with whiskirexia nervosa, a condition whose principal symptom is an unreasonable belief that no matter how many bottles of whiskey you already have, there is one more you desperately need. Paranoia is a typical reaction to conflicting stimuli.

One problem with the notion of Weller Antique being discontinued is that there is no reason to do it, nothing to be gained by it. Buffalo Trace only has two lines of wheated bourbon, Weller and Van Winkle. Van Winkle is extremely popular and profitable, but it's also tiny and intends to stay that way. They can make appropriate increases to Van Winkle production without robbing Weller. So why would they discontinue Antique?

One theory is that they are going to push all wheated bourbon production into Weller Special Reserve, which conveniently lost its 7-year-old age statement not long ago. By using younger whiskey and diverting whiskey from Antique, they can produce a lot more Weller Special Reserve, cheaper and thus more profitably. Antique was always just the high-proof version of Special Reserve, after all, 53.5% ABV instead of 45% ABV.

It's not a good theory, necessarily, just one that rationalizes the conclusion.

The Weller line, which also includes Weller Special Reserve and Weller 12, may not be big where you are but it's huge in Texas and everyone knows you don't get between a Texan and his or her bourbon. It's not healthy.

The Rye Renaissance Is Finally Real.

The 'rye renaissance' has been a popular topic in the media for several years, but even though it was getting a lot of ink, producers weren't inking a lot of additional sales. (See, "The Rye Revival Is A Mirage," here.)

That's starting to change. Many brands, such as Sazerac Rye (i.e., 'Baby Saz') and Rittenhouse Rye Bottled in Bond are on allocation and shoppers sometimes find empty shelves. Templeton Rye has struggled to get enough whiskey from its distiller in Indiana to meet demand. Now add Wild Turkey to the list.

As Wild Turkey introduces a new Wild Turkey Rye at 40.5% ABV (81° proof), it is letting people know that the 50.5% ABV (101° proof) version will be in short supply for the forseeable future. Wild Turkey also makes Russell's Reserve Rye.

Jim Beam, which produces more rye than anyone else, doesn't seem too stressed. It's even bringing out a new one, under the Knob Creek name.

Another brand that seems to have plenty is Bulleit Rye, which just launched a few months ago. It's the same Lawrenceburg, Indiana-made rye as Templeton and several other brands. You have to believe drinks giant Diageo, which owns Bulleit, has a priority claim on any whiskey Lawrenceburg has ready, but even mighty Diageo can't make fully-aged rye whiskey out of thin air.

You can bet the new owner of Lawrenceburg Distillers Indiana, MGPI, is turning the dial on the rye machine there up to 10. This is why the aging cyle makes whiskey production planners prematurely gray. A few years ago, producers were wondering if the rye boom was real. Now they're wondering if it's here to stay.

Barton 1792 Distillery Opens New Visitor Center.

Earlier today, Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear (center) and officials from the Barton 1792 Distillery cut the ribbon to open the Barton 1792 Distillery Visitor Center in Bardstown, Kentucky.

Pictured from left to right are Chuck Braugh, former Barton Plant Manager and present for the original Visitor Center opening in 1967; Mark Brown, President and CEO, Sazerac Co.; Governor Beshear; Johnnie Colwell, Vice President of Operations, and Ken Pierce, Chief Chemist.

Though not billed as such, this also marks the official return of the Barton Brands name, by which the distillery was known from 1944 until 2008. It is now the Barton 1792 Distillery, incorporating the name of the bourbon -- Ridgemont Reserve 1792 -- for which the distillery would like to be known. Very Old Barton and several other whiskeys are made there too.

Barton Brands was established in Chicago at the end of Prohibition by Oscar Getz and Lester Abelson. They bought the former Tom Moore Distillery in 1944 and named it Barton. Constellation Brands, which owned the distillery from 1993 to 2009, changed the name back to Tom Moore in 2008, shortly before selling to Sazerac.

The new Visitor Center is a 1,000 square foot facility with a tasting bar and gift shop. It is also where all distillery tours begin and end.

Inside the Barton 1792 Distillery Visitor Center guests can purchase branded merchandise, including hats, shirts, glassware, and jams and jellies. In a nod to its roots, the Visitor Center is in the same building as the original Oscar Getz Museum, which moved to downtown Bardstown after Oscar Getz retired in 1982. Pictures of the original Getz Museum’s grand opening as well as many other distillery historical milestones decorate the walls inside the Visitor Center.

“We’re proud to say that we have, despite the challenging economic environment, significantly increased our investment in the Distillery, hired additional staffing and committed to keeping this vital industry alive in this part of the state,” said Mark Brown, president and chief executive officer for Sazerac. The Bardstown facility employs nearly 200 people and is responsible for an economic impact of $7.2 million to Nelson County. The new Visitor Center is projected to bring 10,000 tourists to the region its first year.

“I congratulate Mark Brown and the others at Sazerac for their success in the midst of a difficult economy, and I want to thank them for their confidence in the Bluegrass State,” said Governor Beshear.

The Barton Brands of Kentucky 1792 Distillery Visitor Center is open Monday-Friday 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and Saturday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tours start every hour on the hour. The last tour begins at 3:00 Monday through Friday and 2:00 on Saturday. Enter at 501 Cathedral Manor (31 E-New Haven Road). The phone number is 866-239-4690.

Virginia Gentleman Is Still Made and Sold.

Ah, the bar bets.

The know-it-all tells you bourbon can only be made in Kentucky so you book the bet and ask the barkeep to hand you a bottle of Virginia Gentleman Bourbon, made in Virginia. Easy.

A. Smith Bowman, in Fredericksburg, Virginia, is now owned by Sazerac/Buffalo Trace. About a year ago they launched a line of Abraham Bowman small batch bourbons and ryes. They also killed, I thought, the more pedestrian Virginia Gentleman brand.

Joe Dangler, the long-time Master Distiller at Bowman, will retire soon (exactly when is up to him). His replacement will be Truman Cox, Chief Chemist at Buffalo Trace in Frankfort, who moves to Virginia this week.

I was talking to Cox recently and learned that while they did discontinue the 90 proof Virginia Gentleman expression, known as 'the fox' for its fox-hunting scene label, the venerable old 80 proof VG continues to be made. It's nothing special, just a good, standard bourbon, mostly distributed in Virginia.

But if you see it on a back bar somewhere else, there is money to be made.

Find It If You Can.

It's Fleischmann's Rye, a straight rye whiskey made at Tom Moore (Sazerac's distillery in Bardstown). It's the only straight rye they sell, only sold in northern Wisconsin, only in handles (1.75 L plastic bottles). It's not great (too young), but not bad. It's cheap.

Fleischmann's is an old brand that has passed through many owners. There is a Fleischmann's Preferred American Blended Whiskey that is more widely distributed but apparently the rye sells well enough in this one part of Wisconsin to justify its continued production. 

I wonder if by "premium taste through the years" they mean "but not right now."

Sazerac Explains, Sort Of.

When I heard that Sazerac had withdrawn from the KDA, I sent a note to Sazerac spokesperson Angela Traver asking why. Here is her reply:

"After being a member of the KDA for a long period of time, we elected to evaluate that membership and decided that it is in the best interests of all our distilleries to chart a course independently of the KDA. Tours at Buffalo Trace and Tom Moore will continue. We have even added some new and fun stuff to our Trace Tour—a Cooperage Display provided by Independent Stave and a trip into Warehouse D, which has a few surprises. We also will be opening some riverfront hiking trail and the Firehouse Café this spring. Lots of good stuff!"

That may be all the explanation we are going to get for now. I won't speculate, but it's worth noting that the primary work of the KDA isn't tourism promotion, it's lobbying the Kentucky legislature and other parts of state government. Buffalo Trace is the only distillery in Frankfort, the state capital. There clearly is some kind of disagreement at work here, although no one so far is saying what it is.

Sazerac Quits KDA, Bourbon Trail.

On New Year's Eve, the Kentucky Distillers' Association (KDA) received a letter from Sazerac, Inc., notifying it that Sazerac was withdrawing from the KDA effective immediately. No reason was given.

Since it is no longer a member of KDA, Sazerac's two Kentucky distilleries--Buffalo Trace and Tom Moore--are no longer part of the Kentucky Bourbon Trail.

The people at KDA have not subsequently received an explanation, and have not announced the resignation as such, but today they put out a routine press release about the election of officers and directors (Chris Morris is the new Chairman), and Sazerac's name was notably absent. Upon being asked, they confirmed the facts above.

No explanation has been given by Sazerac.

The KDA, organized in 1880, now includes Beam Global Spirits & Wine (Jim Beam and Maker’s Mark); Brown-Forman; Diageo North America; Four Roses; Heaven Hill and Wild Turkey.

We'll know eventually what this is all about. For now, don't read too much into it. It certainly does not mean Sazerac is planning to stop offering tours at either of its distilleries. What is does mean remains to be seen.

Sazerac Brings Back Original 1934 Herbsaint Recipe.

Herbsaint has long been a critical ingredient in the world famous Sazerac Cocktail. Both have enjoyed a revival of late as part of the passion for classic cocktails.

So it is with perfect timing that the Sazerac Company of New Orleans has dug deep into its archives to launch a new product called Herbsaint Original. The new product is made according to the same recipe first used by J. Marion Legendre for Herbsaint in 1934.

Shortly after Prohibition ended in late 1933, Legendre - a New Orleans apothecary-turned-entrepreneur - introduced a product he called Legendre Absinthe. Legendre had learned about pastis and absinthe while stationed in France during WWI. Upon his return to New Orleans after the war and with the onset of Prohibition, he secretly made absinthe in his uptown home. His launch of Legendre Absinthe was a dream come true.

Sadly for Legendre, just months after launching his product and in spite of the fact that it did not contain wormwood, the U.S. Government forced him to remove the word 'absinthe' from his brand name amid concerns that absinthe consumption was harmful. Legendre quickly re-named his product Herbsaint and launched an aggressive marketing campaign that called on people to “Drink Herbsaint Wherever Absinthe Is Called For.”

In 1949, after spending 15 years promoting Herbsaint around the United States, Legendre sold it to the Sazerac Company. Legendre died in New Orleans in 1986 at the age of 90.

The recipe for Herbsaint changed a bit over the years and while Herbsaint has been a staple on sophisticated bars for decades, Sazerac hopes the release of the original recipe will rekindle consumer interest in the product as it tasted 75 years ago.

“It has been a lot of fun to work on bringing back the original Herbsaint formula. We’re grateful to have discovered the recipe in our archives and to have had such a wonderful reaction from consumers and bartenders about bringing it back to life. It really is The Spirit of New Orleans,” said Kevin Richards, Sazerac’s Herbsaint brand manager in New Orleans.

Herbsaint Original is 100° proof and is available in 750ml bottles. Sazerac will continue to sell Herbsaint 90° proof, also in 750ml bottles.

Is Ten High No Longer A Bourbon?

First Blagojevich, now this. How much humiliation can Illinois take?

Ten High Straight Bourbon Whiskey has been demoted to a blend, at least in some markets.

Hiram Walker’s Ten High Bourbon was, in its heyday, a proud product of Peoria, Illinois. It was made there at the largest whiskey distillery in the world. Peoria, Pekin and other Illinois towns had significant whiskey industries on both sides of Prohibition.

Ten High was popular as one of the better cheap bourbons. The name refers to a barrel storage location at least ten ricks high, as barrels in the upper part of the aging warehouse mature faster. It was always just a name, never an actual barrel location promise, but it was meant to communicate quality.

Hiram Walker was the Detroit grocer who created Canadian Club whiskey in the 19th century, at his distillery across the border in Canada. When Prohibition ended in 1933, Hiram Walker and Sons, Inc., then owned by a guy named Harry Hatch, decided to reenter the newly-legal U.S. market in a big way. Their Peoria distillery made Walker’s DeLuxe and Ten High, both straight bourbons; Imperial Whiskey, a popular blend; and other Hiram Walker products.

Peoria paid off for about 35 years, until the American whiskey market suddenly tanked in the late 60s. The distillery closed in 1981. (Today it makes ethanol for ADM.)

They had actually stopped distilling there several years before and then slowly emptied the warehouses as the whiskey in them matured. Ten High production then shifted to Kentucky. Eventually, Hiram Walker was sold for parts and Ten High was acquired by Chicago’s Barton Brands, whose obituary I wrote a few weeks ago.

Recently a friend of mine in upstate New York bought a bottle of Ten High and, when he got it home, discovered that instead of "Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey," the label said, "Bourbon Whiskey - a Blend."

Straight bourbon is all whiskey. A bourbon blend is about half whiskey, half vodka.

Some people like that sort of thing, but since vodka isn’t aged, blends are much cheaper to make.

My friend was told by his whiskey monger that the straight has been discontinued. He wondered if this was some depredation by the brand's new owner, but I assured him it can't be Sazerac's fault, as that deal won't even close for another month or so.

The Constellation Spirits web site still shows the only available expression of Ten High as being the 80-proof straight bourbon. So does the Binny’s web site.

The bourbon is still one of your better cheap whiskeys. I can’t speak for the new blend.