Podcast appearances and mentions of Bill Samuels

For the first 65 years of its existence, Maker's Mark had no innovation department. The legacy whiskey brand, known for its red wax coated bottle necks and premium, yet approachable, bourbon, had long focused on quality and consistency in favor of new product development. The spirits industry, however, is evolving. Consumers are placing greater value on innovative concepts and embracing creative offerings. Meanwhile, Gen Z drinkers are consuming less alcohol than previous generations, but also emphasizing premium experiences when they imbibe. To meet the demands of equally important consumer groups – loyal Maker's Mark customers and modern drinkers new to the brand – the company tasked Beth Buckner, the brand's senior manager of innovation and blending, and Blake Layfield, its senior director and head of innovation, blending and quality, with the stewardship of the bourbon's coveted taste profile and creation of products that will attract novel interest. We sat down with Beth and Blake for an interview that explores their roles and responsibilities and how the standards set by Maker's Mark founder Bill Samuels, Sr. are integral to new product development. As part of our conversation, they discuss a common misconception about science and spirits, how a “taste vision” is the foundation for everything they do at Maker's Mark and why they eschew trendy concepts in favor of nuanced expressions of the bourbon. Show notes: 0:35: Beth Buckner and Blake Layfield, Maker's Mark – Beth and Blake talk about their respective educations and work at Maker's Mark and how they align the chemistry of distillation and aging with the subjective and sensorial aspects of producing bourbon. They also discuss how the distillery's “taste vision” influences their work as product developers and quality control professionals and how much  latitude they give themselves if and when they want to veer slightly away from that vision. Beth and Blake also explain where they draw inspiration from; how they are empowered to innovate while incorporating the perspective of the distilling, marketing and sales teams; how trends and consumer behavior factor into their purview and how they are making their own mark at Maker's Mark. Brands in this episode: Maker's Mark, Jack Daniel's, Coca-Cola

Der bekannteste Wheated Bourbon ist ohne Zweifel Maker's Mark. Tatsächlich ist die Präferenz von Weizen über Roggen diesem Whisky mit der markanten roten Wachsversiegelung bereits durch ihren Gründer Bill Samuels in die Wiege gelegt.Wir sprechen über die Umstände der Markengründung, die beeindruckende Entwicklung der Marke seitdem, die Besonderheiten der Produktion, und das aktuelle Portfolio an Abfüllungen.Da die Marke so eng verwoben mit der Geschichte der Familie Samuels ist, setzen wir dabei deutlich früher an als bei der eigentlichen Markengründung in den 1950ern, und beginnen die Erzählung mit einem schottischen Pfarrer namens John Samuels, der im frühen 18. Jahrhundert nach Amerika übersiedelte.Und wie immer sprechen wir über interessante Bourbon-Neuerscheinungen und News in Deutschland und den USA.

Send us a Text Message.What if whiskey shaped the course of American history? Join us on this thrilling episode of the Scotchy Bourbon Boys podcast as we unravel the intricate tapestry of whiskey's role from the Revolutionary War to Prohibition and beyond. We kick things off with the buzz surrounding the upcoming Kentucky Bourbon Festival and our eagerly awaited fourth annual bus tour. Listen to the captivating stories of Freddie Johnson's Ohio tour, where he's bringing bourbon magic to communities and offering exclusive bottles for raffle.Journey with us as we explore the pivotal moments that whiskey influenced in American history. From the Whiskey Rebellion, where George Washington himself had to enforce the whiskey tax, to the Bottled and Bond Act that revolutionized the industry, we trace the significant milestones that have shaped whiskey's legacy. We also delve into the dark days of Prohibition, highlighting its unintended consequences like the rise of organized crime and agricultural disasters that led to the Dust Bowl.In the latter part of our episode, we pay homage to iconic bourbon brands like Jim Beam, Booker's, Knob Creek, and Basil Hayden, and celebrate the innovative introduction of Blanton's single barrel bourbon. We share personal anecdotes, including a nostalgic glance at a Wisconsin bottle stamp and an unforgettable visit with Bill Samuels of Maker's Mark. As we wrap up, we spotlight our exclusive Scotchy Bourbon Boys merchandise and revel in the camaraderie that makes our community extraordinary. Tune in for an episode brimming with historical insights, personal stories, and our unending love for bourbon.Add for SOFL ad for Rosewood bourbon If You Have GohstsSupport the Show.https://www.scotchybourbonboys.com

Exciting times are coming for Washington County Kentucky.  Denny Potter and Jane Bowie are heavy weights in the bourbon industry and they are building their dream distillery in Washington County!  The Bo Brothers sat down with Denny and Jane in an entertaining episode of 2 Shots on a Barrel!  We guarantee this is a version of Potter & Jane Distilling Company you will not find on any other podcast!  Take a listen to a fun filled episode of 2 Shots!https://www.facebook.com/groups/288170582570690 Bourbon Podcast Bo Brothers

The story of how Dr William Key and his super smart horse “Beautiful” Jim Key became one of the biggest acts in America, only to disappear into historical obscurity. But not before they made a profound impact on millions of American children, who pledged to always be kind to animals, as a result of witnessing their extraordinary partnership. Dr William Key was a former enslaved man who became a wealthy entrepreneur before turning his hand to patiently training a sickly foal to do maths and spell. They took their act on the road to the delight of millions of Americans and the attention of the American humane movement. Matthew Syed invites us to dive into this extraordinary story of America in a moment of new understanding, and asks us to consider the possibilities offered by our relationship to animals. With Mim Eichler Rivas, Eric Collins, Dr Bill Samuels, Dr Elizabeth Ormerod Presenter: Matthew Syed Producer and Series Editor: Katherine Godfrey Sound Design and Mix: Rob Speight Theme tune by Ioana Selaru A Novel production for BBC Radio 4

Episode 104 features Maker's Mark Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whisky. Bottled in 750ml at 45% ABV, or 90 proof. It retails for about $28. Enjoy this episode with a Maker's Mark Old Fashioned! The official website for Maker's Mark: https://www.makersmark.com/ (https://www.makersmark.com/) Brief Historical Timeline: 1840 - T.W. Samuels erects the family's first commercial distillery in Kentucky 1943 - Bill Samuels gets out of his family business, for awhile 1953 - Bill Samuels founds Maker's Mark 1958 - The first bottles of Maker's Mark are hand dipped in red sealing wax 1973 - Maker's Mark hires Kentucky ad agency Doe Anderson 1975 - Bill Samuels, Jr. becomes President and CEO of Maker's Mark 1980 - Maker's Mark is featured on the front page of The Wall Street Journal 1981 - Hiram Walker buys Maker's Mark 2004 - A second still is added to increase production 2005 - Pernod Ricard (who ended up with Maker's Mark through acquisitions) sells the brand to Fortune Brands, which would become part of Beam Suntory 2011 - Maker's Mark sells 1 million 9-liter case equivalents for the first time 2011 - Rob Samuels, grandson of the founder, takes over when his father Bill Samuels, Jr. retires 2013 - Proof is reduced 3%, but only for a moment 2015 - A $67 million investment includes a third still and new warehouses 2019 - Maker's Mark sells 2.4 mill cases Key Cocktails: Use as you would any quality bourbon. I'm drinking it neat, but try it in an Old Fashioned or Manhattan. References: Book: Maker's Mark - My Autobiography by Bill Samuels, Jr. published in 2000 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maker%27s_Mark (Wikipedia Article on Maker's Mark) https://www.thespiritsbusiness.com/2019/03/makers-mark-a-brand-history/ (Brand History Article on The Spirits Business) https://www.drinkspirits.com/bourbon/story-makers-mark-whiskey/ (Drink Spirits Story on Maker's Mark Whisky) https://www.thespiritseducator.com/makers-mark (Maker's Mark on The Spirits Educator) https://vinepair.com/articles/makers-mark-bourbon-secret-hops/ (Vinepair.com Article on Hops Used in Production) https://vinepair.com/articles/makers-mark-spelling-bourbon-cost/ (Vinepair.com Article on Maker' Mark) https://www.doeanderson.com/ (Doe Anderson Ad Agency for Maker's Mark) https://web.archive.org/web/20110726195638/http://www.manufacturing.net/News/2011/01/People-In-The-News-Samuels-To-Step-Down-As-Maker-s-Mark-President/?menuid=718 (Press Release on Bill Samuels, Jr. Retiring via the Wayback Machine) Contact Information: Official show website is: https://www.liquorandliqueurconnoisseur.com/ (www.liquorandliqueurconnoisseur.com) Join my mailing list: http://eepurl.com/hfyhHf (http://eepurl.com/hfyhHf) Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/liquorandliqueurconnoisseur (https://www.facebook.com/liquorandliqueurconnoisseur) Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/LiquorandLiqueurConnoisseur/ (https://www.instagram.com/LiquorandLiqueurConnoisseur/) Twitter: @LLConnoisseur

It's been more than a decade since Bill Samuels, Jr. "retired" as chairman of Maker's Mark and turned the reins over to his son Rob, but the 82-year-old Bourbon legend seems just as busy today as ever. He joined us from his office at Maker's Mark headquarters for the #HappyHourLive webcast the other night for a wide-ranging discussion of everything from his early days to being a mentor for today's generation of emerging distillers. Join us each Friday night at 5:00pm New York time for our live webcasts on the WhiskyCast YouTube channel, our Facebook page, Twitter, and Twitch.

Rob Samuels is our guest this week and we are honored to have this 8th generation of whisky-maker on our podcast.  The Samuels family has long been known for founding Maker's Mark Distillery in Loretto Kentucky. Rob is the Managing Director of Maker's Mark and is a passionate story-teller ensuring his family's history is told to the masses.  Rob knows that Maker's Mark is the result of a “purposefully inefficient handmade process” but recognizes the importance of it to his family, their legacy, and to the quality of their bourbon. After this episode, hopefully you will recognize that Maker's Mark is about so much more than the whisky. We are thankful for everyone who has supported us. A huge shoutout to our growing Patreon Community as well! We'd appreciate it if you can take the time to give us feedback on our podcast. If you enjoy our content, consider giving us a 5 star rating on your favorite podcast app, leave us a review, and tell a fellow bourbon lover about our show. Follow  us @BourbonLens on Instagram, Facebook, & Twitter.  And please check out our Patreon to learn how you can support our endeavors, earn Bourbon Lens swag, be part of future barrel picks, and more. If you have any comments, questions, or suggestions, please email us at TheBourbonLens@Gmail.com. Visit our website BourbonLens.com to check out our blog posts, or even purchase your own Bourbon Lens tasting glass or t-shirt. Cheers,Scott, Jake, & MichaelBourbon Lens * Dripping Wax Logo and Branding Courtesy of Maker's Mark About Maker's Mark® Bourbon In 1953, in Loretto, Ky., Bill Samuels, Sr., fulfilled his dream to create a handmade and delicious bourbon. He decided to make his whisky in small batches, using soft red winter wheat to enhance the softness and sweetness. He then rotated each barrel by hand for consistency and, finally, aged each barrel to taste. Bill Samuels, Sr., transformed bourbon from a “commodity” into a premium handmade spirit, and today Maker's Mark® continues to make its bourbon the same way. In recent years, Maker's Mark has introduced thoughtful, super-premium innovations to its portfolio, including Maker's Mark 46®, Maker's Mark® Cask Strength and Maker's Mark® Private Selection, the brand's first-ever custom barrel program. For more information, visit www.makersmark.com. Show Links: An Oral History of Bourbon Part II: Maker's Mark's Bill Samuels Jr. and Rob Samuels Maker's Mark | Handmade Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whisky Samuels Family | Our Story  Maker's Mark: a brand history The LEE Initiative The LEE Initiative Partners with Maker's Mark® to Release "CommUNITY Batch" Bourbon with 100% of Proceeds Supporting the Hospitality Industry How Maker's Mark Bourbon Is Made — From Barrel to Iconic Red Wax Seal Unique Kentucky Getaway - Vacation Rental by Makers Mark  The Family Behind Maker's Mark Has Opened Their House for Overnight Stays The 25 Most Important Bourbons Ever Made | Food & Wine You Can Now Stay in the Original Kentucky Home of the Maker's Mark Family NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES INVENTORY -- NOMINATION FORM LOCATION OF LEGAL DESCRIPTION The Core Bottles Of Maker's Mark Bourbon Whisky, Ranked Column: Maker's Mark Barrel Entry Proof Experiment Proves Its Tradition Is Solid LEADERS Interview with Rob Samuels, Global General Manager and Chief Distillery Officer, Maker's Mark  Earth Day Champions: UK Introduces World's Largest American White Oak Repository and Genome Mapping Study With Maker's Mark UK, Maker's Mark partnership leads to American white oak research | Lexington Herald Leader UK, Makers Mark collaborate to sustain American white oak with repository and genome mapping study  Independent Stave Company

Bill Samuels discusses his thoughts on the race for Attorney General in NYS

Bill Samuels talks about the NYC Mayor's race

Bill Samuels talks about Andrew Cuomo

Bill Samuels talks about Andrew Cuomo and the nursing home debacle

Gregg Walker joins the show to share some inside stories about the history at Maker's Mark. Gregg was the second salesperson hired by Maker’s Mark and took part in 3X growth. Hear some of his stories about the struggle of growth, but also how him and Bill Samuels Jr. had a lot of fun as well. Show Partners: The University of Louisville has an online Distilled Spirits Business Certificate that focuses on the business side of the spirits industry. Learn more at uofl.me/bourbonpursuit. Minimize drink dilution without sacrificing chill power with Meltdown, the ultimate ice ball press. Learn more at MeltdownIce.com. Upgrade your sleep today with a Bear Mattress. Visit BearMattress.com/bourbon. You can now buy Barrell Craft Spirits products online and have them shipped right to your door. Visit BarrellBourbon.com and click Buy Now. Stop putting stickers on picks and take total control of your own private label with Krogman's. Learn more at Krogmans.com. Spirits of French Lick is delivering the finest hand crafted Bottled in Bond bourbons. Check out SpiritsofFrenchLick.com. Show Notes: This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about raffles. What song would you pick for karaoke? When did you get into the liquor business? Did you have to take the personality test before working at Maker's Mark? Were you part of any of the Maker's taste offs? Tell us about traveling for Makers. How do you plan for aggressive growth? What was the tipping point? How many cases were they selling? Talk about Maker's marketing. Were you there when the did the special edition UK bottle in 1996? Any memories with Bill Samuels that you'll never forget? What was your sales force like in the later years? What do you do today? Support this Podcast on Patreon

Jane Bowie carved her path into whiskey with a famous cover letter received by Bill Samuels which led her to be the first global ambassador at Maker's Mark. Over her 14 year career, she has helped propel the brand into new areas and new limited edition releases. We talk to her about this and all the good things going on at Maker's. Cheers!  Thanks to our sponsors:  www.caskcartel.com www.premiumbarproducts.com 

North Idaho Whitetails Forever is an organization founded by seven original hunters frustrated with declining whitetail populations. This group exemplifies what conservation efforts made by determined sportsman can achieve through action, instead of just complaining. They have successfully worked with Idaho Fish & Game to achieve changes that benefit Idaho's Whitetail deer. In this episode, the President of NIWF and Dirk Durham (The Bugler) join me to discuss the whys, the hows, and the whitetails! Also, listen to the intro to hear a special tribute to something close to my heart, The United States Marines! If you love whitetail, here is the link to join! https://www.niwf.org/ SPONSOR PROMO CODES! SKRE, Extreme Mountain Gear: thewesternhuntsman Hoffman Boots: HUNTSMAN15 Phelps Game Calls: Huntsman10 Support the show and look good doing it! Go here for our swag store.  Follow us on Instagram! Stay western, and I'll see you on the mountain! jim@thewesternhuntsman.com

Join us as we talk to Bill Samuels, Jr.--a legend in the whiskey industry and a Bourbon Hall of Fame member. Bill helped build and expand the Maker's Mark brand after his mom and dad created a delicious whiskey with a beautiful design. This is one of the most entertaining, informative, and incredible interviews to date.

The Kentucky Distillers’ Association does more for bourbon in the US than just Kentucky alone. Eric Gregory, the President of the KDA, has been on both sides of the government trying to put the interests of the distillers and consumers first. We talk about his experience with government lobbying and how he revived the organization. What is the future of bourbon? Are distribution laws changing, what will happen with tariffs, and how will the Bourbon Trail maintain growth? Show Partners: You can now buy Barrell Craft Spirits products online and have them shipped right to your door. Visit BarrellBourbon.com and click Buy Now. Receive $25 off your first order at RackHouse Whiskey Club with code "Pursuit". Visit RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Show Notes: This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about up and coming writers. Tell us about your background. What was it like at the KDA when you first got this job? What was your first lobbying experience at the KDA? Any good horse racing tips? How do you see bourbon growing? What do you think of the tariffs? Tell us about the lobbying process. How do you keep it bipartisan? When you hear rumblings of new taxes what do you all do? Tell us about the steps you have taken from the promotional side of the Kentucky Bourbon Trail and the Kentucky Bourbon Affair? How many trail visitors did you have the first year? Talk about partnerships. What are some of the weirdest requests you've gotten from people? Are there other states that look to your organization for guidance? What is your position on the secondary market? Why do so many people oppose shipping alcohol? What do you think about bourbon tourism growth in Bardstown vs. Louisville? 0:00 How many visitors Did you have at that time? 0:01 The first year we did the passport in 2007. We had 189 people complete the Kentucky bourbon trail 0:10 and send them a pin. 0:23 Hey, it's Episode 250. Another big number mark and we're glad you're still here with us. And well, it's not much has really been going on because of COVID-19. It's putting a stop on pretty much everything except delivery services. And that's where we start this week's news alcohol delivery app drizzly says it has seen sales explode in the last week of March climbing 537% above the company's expectations. What's more is that 42% of those orders came in from new accounts. The company says that new buyers on the platform have jumped 900% year over year. Same goes for minibar, sales are up 143% new buyer is up 547% and quarters are up 100% with an average order size up 22%. If you haven't had the chance yet, go listen to our podcast back on episode 248 when we had drizzly CEO and founder Corey rellis on the show to talk about his business. A recent study by economics at john Dunham and Associates estimates that America's wine and spirit wholesalers can expect to lose up to $921.4 million in uncollectible or difficult to collect receivables, due to on premise accounts such as restaurants, bars and clubs that have been impacted by the shelter in place environment, and Massachusetts craft distillers are urging their governor to allow permission to deliver spirits. The Massachusetts distillers Alliance asked Massachusetts officials to take steps similar to those made in a handful of other states, such as California, New York. Washington, Kentucky and Virginia to eight independent distillers that are struggling during the current crisis. In a quote by the Alliance's board, they wrote we pay over two and a half times the rate of excise tax per proof gallon paid by brewers. Yet during these challenging times greater latitude is being extended to restaurants, breweries and wineries. While our businesses remain bound by the rules and laws that put us at great financial risk. We have a significant struggle ahead for some good news, and you all are the first to hear it because we are putting on a free online bourbon conference called whiskey from home happening on May 2 2020. Starting at 12 o'clock pm eastern This event will be streamed live through multiple properties with speakers from the entire castle the roundtable but also Peggy knows Stevens. It's bourbon night, the bourbon review, dad's drinking bourbon and more will have live seminars, panels, virtual tastings. The list goes on or incorrect credibly excited to bring more of this great content to you all. And if you can, please share it. Spread the word. Let your bourbon friends know, let your bourbon societies know let your friends that aren't into bourbon and want to get into bourbon know about it and family as well. This is a full five and a half hour jam packed event that will be streamed live, and you will get the chance to network with other people in real time and ask questions through chat. Go to whiskey from home comm and register today for your free ticket. Now for today's podcast, I was super excited to interview our guests. The Kentucky distillers Association does more for bourbon in the US than just Kentucky alone. Eric Gregory, the president of the KDA has been on both sides of the government trying to put the interest of the distillers and the consumers First, we talked about his experience with government lobbying and how it led him to reviving an organization that was struggling. He's maneuvered the KDA into a model that other states can follow. So we discuss what the future of bourbon looks like. Where the laws changing with the regulation of distribution? What's gonna happen with the tariffs and how will the bourbon trail maintain its current pace of growth? All right now Don't forget it. Whiskey from home.com go register now to get your free ticket. I also talked to Joe from barrel bourbon this week and he has a special message he wants me to share that will lift your spirits. You can now buy barrel craft spirits products and have them shipped right to your door. Just visit barrel bourbon.com from the comfort of your home and click Buy now. Alright, here's Fred MiniK with above the char 4:37 I'm Fred MiniK. And this is above the char. This week's idea comes from Kyle man or at bourbon numbers on Twitter. He writes nothing better than expanding my whiskey perspective. Are there any up and coming writers in bourbon that deserve the above the char spotlight? Or are there any underrated sites we should add to our family favorites. Thanks. Listen, there's nothing I like more than promoting good writing and a perspective that is different than mine. Listen, I am a big, big fan of the cocktail walk. Now I as you know, I am a big rum head. So I would I would get you to start with the cocktail wonk. That's Matt Patrick. He actually writes for me at bourbon plus, he writes the vintage column and that is a writer, you need to check out he wrote the book, The Tiki minimalist. So that is a great book. He's a great guy. And if you're wanting to learn more about another spirit, rum is the one I would recommend going to of course, I wrote a book called rum curious and Matt edited that for me. So I'm a big fan of Matt and everything that he does for the rum community. After that, I would say if you're not already following him, whiskey jug is a young up and coming writer. He's been at the game for Little bit of Joshua Peters is a. He reminds me a lot of myself about 10 years ago when I was out there kind of investigating and trying to break news in the whiskey circuit. he's a he's a very good, he's a he's a very good no bullshit kind of writer. So I'm a big fan of what Joshua Peters is doing. I think he's got he's got a bright future ahead of him. And I also wanted to ask you to go and check out the classics, the writers who are no longer with us. Gary Reagan wrote the book of bourbon, probably one of the one of my heroes in the, in the bourbon world. He because he kind of came at bourbon in a very similar fashion, as I did, but he was a bit before his time, and he broke into like, he broke away from bourbon a little bit and made his own bitters and kind of got a little bit more into the cocktail movement. And then you have the greatest whiskey writer of all time, in my opinion. Michael Jackson. Michael Jackson, the guy with the glove and the jacket and the weird stuff, I'm talking about Michael Jackson, the beer, the beer critic and whiskey writer. His words just flew off the page. And we're just so beautiful. So check those writers out. I'm a big fan of all of them. And I think they can all add to your perspective. But at the end of the day, it's about whiskey is about an experience for you. While the writers, the bloggers, THE podcasts, were all about bringing the information. We're all about trying to explore this community with you. At the end of the day, it's about you, and what's in your glass what you like, and what conversation Do you like to have around whiskey? So thank you for the question, Kyle man or at bourbon numbers on Twitter. Now that came in on April 4, when I asked people to send me their ideas for above the char. I love getting a good idea. So hit me up on Twitter. Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, or go to Fred medic comm and send me your idea. But that's this week's above the char until next week. Cheers. 8:15 Welcome back to an episode of bourbon pursuit the official podcast of bourbon. Kinney and Fred on the road today down in Frankfort. The you know, it's always funny. There's always a good joke that says How do you pronounce the capital of Kentucky? Is it Louisville or Lewisville? And they're like, Nope, it's Frankfort. 8:30 Yeah. You know, hopefully our guest today is part of a campaign to move it to Louisville, you know, 8:35 oh, well, I mean, they just got this new place that we're sitting and that is true. 8:38 That is true. Well, so this is where at the headquarters of the Kentucky distillers Association. And you know, 15 years ago, these guys could not get a meeting with a lot of the legislators. Now one of the first calls a new governor makes is to the KDA because bourbon is political capital and I believe that the Kentucky distillers association is the most powerful lobby in Kentucky. And that was confirmed to me by the Senate Majority Leader, David Thayer. I asked him, I was like, hey, how powerful is the KDA? They're like, and there's really not anyone more powerful right now. I mean, 9:15 is it basically coming from all the taxes from? Well, like it's fun and back in the mistake, let's take a look at what bourbon has 9:21 done for the state. It's really one of the only good conversations that people can have when they're talking about Kentucky you got the derby but the horse industry has been falling for for a while. I mean, it's that's a signature industry and it's it's been hurting. Yeah, getting the gambling, you know, they're trying to bring it in, but Ryan keeps getting denied. And the coal industry is turned to us. Sadly, I mean, it's not. If you look at Eastern Kentucky, it's hurting. And bourbon is the one thing that's kind of carrying the state forward. And one of the reasons why is because of the man we have sitting here and what the KDA has done for the last 10 years. In 2009 you know, when there was a new sales tax Taxes coming in. They protested. And they poured whiskey on the state capitol steps in the way of their protests. And they've been every single year, they have been peeling away ridiculous laws county by county and in the state and in town by town. And that's why we're able to like have a sip of bourbon while you visit a distillery a mean people don't realize that it wasn't that long ago that we didn't have tours, these guys created the Kentucky bourbon trail. So that is why everybody who's listening to this should be thankful that we have someone like this who has their interests at heart fighting for them in the bourbon industry. 10:44 In Frankfort. Yeah, there's a there's a lot to go over today. And with all that, I mean, taxes, tariffs, you name it. So we'll we'll get to a little bit of that. But you know, we'll first introduce our guests. So today on the show, we have Eric Gregory Eric is the president of the Kentucky distillers Association better known as the KDA. So Eric, welcome to the show. 11:00 Well, thank you, you, you guys are making me blush here. So thank you for the kind words. And I've got to say, we obviously couldn't do this without strong support from our membership. So let me lead off with that we appreciate and value all of our members. And they say guess before 11:15 we before we kind of dive into the KDA in the membership and really what the key days mission is like, let's kind of talk about you real quick. Like, where's where's your background? Where'd you come from? Did you I mean, were you part of, you know, moonshine and you said you know what, I'm gonna go ahead and make this legal and get off 11:31 get into business. I this I liked where you were moonshiners? 11:33 No, no, no, no, I grew up in the cornfields of Western Kentucky. My parents ran a grocery store. My dad was a huge Maker's Mark fan and my mom like ofits and in the 1970s I mean, I could still you know, see in my mind's eye my dad coming home every day from work, boring him little makers and in a glass with one cue, my mom Love ofits and some sprite or some ginger ale and then go on the back porch and sit and that was their time and they talk about their day and have a drink. And so it was just always surveillant in and in our household. So no, really just, I'm the luckiest sob in the world. I started my career many people know as a reporter, with the Lexington Herald Leader newspaper, spent eight or nine years there, immigrated to Hawaii for a couple of years and worked at the Honolulu advertiser. Oh my God, why would you come back here that everybody asked me, you know, how crazy are you? So have you ever lived in Hawaii? It's a great place to visit but it's really really expensive. And it's pretty far away from family. And, you know, once you get over there and you realize that everything that you love deer in the world, to me was in Kentucky and not only my family, my wife's family, but I'm a huge Cincinnati Reds fan. I love Keeneland I love the horses. I love Berman. I love UK basketball and they just want a championship without me and Kentucky and things and the tug of home really starts kind of, you know, getting pretty strong. So since those 13:14 those you'd be late night tip offs, right, I mean, if you're sitting now I 13:18 will do a six hour time difference. I'm sitting there having lunch, you know, at the local bar. And in watching the games that was kind of kind of crazy. But move back to Kentucky work for the paper again for a couple of years, went into political consulting. After that one of my jobs in the newspaper was covering the state legislature and back then the limit every two years. For 60 days. A happy channel used to say that he wished the legislature met every 60 years for two days instead of every two to two years for 60 days. So I covered them and I kind of had the political bug a little bit so when political consulting and public relations running campaigns in Kentucky, Indiana and Tennessee That led to one of my clients was the electric power cooperatives and doing lobbying and things for them and they ended up hiring me as their GM lovers manager. So I spent almost eight years working here in Frankfurt is their contract lobbyist, and, and September of 2007, I got a call from one of my best friends. He said, your dream job just opened up. And I said, What's that? He said, the president of the Kentucky distillers Association, he said they want somebody with a media background check. They want somebody with public affairs, government affairs background check. And they want somebody with lobbying experience to check and I love their product. So check that check. But in a resume, three and a half month interview process, Oh, wow. And they they offered me the job on December 7. And it's funny because they asked me in my last interview, how long do you think you'd stay at KDA Acid Are you kidding me This is like the best job in the Commonwealth outside of UK basketball coach you know where President a church on downs or something like that you I said I'm here as long as you'll have me You can drag my cold dead people body out of that chair someday but but we haven't slowed down since it since taking over it is been an amazing run so far 15:18 I kind of want to kind of want to give a little bit of a historical perspective here about the KDA. At this juncture Go for it. It was not really an organization that was known for doing anything or getting anything done. And no offense to interior history, but they didn't do anything. You know, other than like some some efforts in the 1800s and the 1950s. They were mostly just kind of a drinking club of the distillers getting together and they just, they just let things be dictated to them. And I'm curious because everything changed when Eric took office. And you know, Bill Samuels, Jr, who's the longtime Maker's Mark Chairman, has told me many, many, many times is that A lot of the growth of bourbon is because of this man and his leadership for the KDA. So I'm curious, you get the job, what are those first 40 days? Like, what are you assessing? And how are you? What are you looking at? 16:13 Well, it's funny, because the job description in those conversations, they were saying things like, you know, we'd like you to, you know, can you promote this bourbon trail thing we've got going on and, and I went into one of the the meetings and the interviews, and the New York Times had just done a front page travel section feature on the Kentucky bourbon trail, and actually held it up at the at the interview and said, What did y'all do to get this? And they literally said, Well, I don't know a reporter just showed up one day and like, you're getting front page travel sections in the New York Times without drying. You know, you don't know what you've got here. This is amazing. So, yeah, that first 40 days was really transitioning. My predecessor, a great man senator, former state senator Daniel out of Springfield have I don't think is enough credit back in the 70s and 80s when he was a state senator, he really worked hard to keep the ad valorem barrel tax issue from just exploding and driving a lot of distillers and those aging warehouses that Sandy out of Kentucky. And really, you know, he was running the KDA out of his law office in Springfield. And most people don't know that Katie went part time in the 1980s Oh wow. Because bourbon you know, had taken it on the chin and most people had written it off as Matt Shapiro said to the great liquor store in this guy and there was not much you're right for the KDA to do so. He You know, he but Ed for saw the the bourbon revolution coming and the Kentucky bourbon trail picking up speed and said you need a full time staff again. And so that's that's where I came in. So yeah, that first 31st 3040 days was really quite frankly kind of relaunching the association from scratch. We had to find an office in in Frankfort. We moved our operations here from here was running it out to get him his law office in Springfield, Washington County, find an office. After three or four months, I was allowed to hire an executive assistant and just got thrown into a legislative session, you know, with no idea. We need to come up with priorities. And you know, just really, like you said, start to get the KDA build an image bank among the legislators that we're here and we're lobbying and we're not asleep at the wheel anymore, 18:28 quite frankly. Can you remember that that first lobbying experience you did for the KDA? 18:33 Oh, yeah. They started talking about tax raising taxes in 2008. And myself and the wholesalers Association, and the retailers all went in and started talking to, to the legislators because they had just raised our taxes in 2005, wholesale taxes went from 9% to 11%. So we went in and say, Look, as you just, you know, raise our taxes a couple years ago. You're Gonna do it again and we fought it back that year and 2008 but then it came, you know crashing down upon us is very mentioned in 2009. But, again, I was doing all this I'm a bourbon geek. First of all, I'm a longtime bourbon geek. I'm one of the people that stood in line and you know, outside of liquor barn waiting for the different wax colored bottles and whenever bill Samuels I was one I am one of the first before I took this job, I was one of the first bourbon ambassadors at Maker's Mark. I worked my way through college at a liquor store right before Keeneland All right, what bottles were you stashing away back? at you know, we hidden makers gold that was really about the height of bourbon back then, but I remember vividly when we got the first bottles of Blanton's in the liquor store, and they were $35 and we were like Who the hell in their right minds gonna pay $35 for about a bourbon you get makers for 10 over here, right you know and Because we were the last liquor store before Keeneland in the airport, Toyota had just opened up and all the Japanese executives would stop at our liquor store and stock up on bourbon that before they got on the plane to take back home, and they fell in love with blends, and they love the bottle and the horse on top of the bottle. And so every Friday night, when they were making their rounds back to the airport to go home, there was a line of camrys waiting at the draft through and I knew I had to have cases in cases of Blanton's there and I would just go out and load them in the back of the car and they hand me over the cash and go so is more and more of the small batch really the bean products, the small batch selections, the you know the the knobs and things like that as those started rolling out. I had to really become more knowledgeable about what was coming out for our customers at the time. And so my friends all kind of, you know, kidding me about them being the bourbon geek and in teaching about that. So that's awesome. It really 20:58 does run through your veins. 21:00 You know and again and I got a lot of great tips track tips you know from the trackers coming in I think between that and you know that kind of kept me in school paid for for 21:12 me people can say that they made their way through college just like having a good few bets here and there right? 21:18 Especially my bets I guess what's your percentage on on betting? 21:23 I do. I don't do it anymore. You know when you've got young children Fred so once you your children start growing up and I've got you know, I'm putting my first into college later this year and then my son who is getting ready to turn 16 I got to get a car for him and everything else. My sister works at Keeneland and so you know there every now and then I'll get her to place a bet for me, but, boy, my bidding has gone down exponentially is a head start. 21:55 And he said a more attention and he's like winning by that by that. 21:58 Yeah, what's the best bet is Keep your money in your pocket, right? Yeah, 22:00 exactly as I'd say, if you do have a good horse racing tip, what would it be? Oh, wow, you are gonna go bet. 22:08 You know, I'd probably have to have a form with me, you know, to answer that question. Again, I really used to study that form. And there was a group of us former reporters who are now lobbyists and in everything up here who would hit kealan all the time. So I'm big on Kentucky born and bred, you know, I do get a lot of great tips from from my sister who sees them come through as yearlings, you know, in the Keeneland sales and stuff like that. But mainly, I look at bloodlines, you know, a when a family coming down the form the first thing I'll do is start circling but bloodline so that know that that'll be a good, you know, and then you get to look at, you know, how long it is. And if they're closer. I mean, there's just, I don't know, 22:54 that's a that's a good one. It's nice. 22:56 The Kentucky way, right. Yeah. 22:58 My dad's tip, he said Always circle, the ones that were the owner and the trainer are the same person because he was like they put a little bit more effort into that that horse. Right. That's a good point. That's, that's that's his little tip. But yeah, I like to go ahead and try to run with it again, you're still gambling at the end of the day. So let's go ahead and kind of want to shift gears a little bit and kind of talk about the growth of bourbon and kind of really, where have you seen it? And kind of, you know, you've been a pretty instrumental part of this. And so a few months ago, there was a press release that came out about now that there are more barrels of spirits aging Kentucky than there are people, twice as many, twice as many barrels twice as many. You're right, twice as many. Yeah. So kind of talk about like, Where, where do you kind of see the evolution of this going? And like, do we expect three x four x now coming here in the next two, three years? 23:44 A short answer? Yes. I'm typically pretty optimistic about that. I guess the biggest challenge that we faced are the tariffs, the retaliatory tariffs that are put on us. Because you know, everybody asks y'all, you know, what's feeling The bourbon revolutionary thing and we all know, you know, the rise, the cocktail culture, the madman effect. I think bourbon tourism has been has played a big part of that maybe a bigger part and most people understand the fact that we're just putting out some of the best juice that the Commonwealth has ever delivered, again is good. But really the opening of the global markets to me has been one of the if not the driving factor in the growth of Kentucky bourbon, because the I don't think it's any coincidence that back in the mid 1990s, when we had NAFTA and the EU treaties, that's when you start to see the spike in production, and the you know, the growing global thirst, but because we're fine, we were finally on a level playing field with our friends in the scotch industry who've had a 600 year head start on us. So, yes, you know, we have seen bourbon growth exponentially in the past five years. We're currently in the middle of a $2.3 billion capital investment spree. And most of that is Pre production for that, for that global market. We've you know, especially to the EU, you know, in the past three to four years, you're looking at 20 to 30%, even I think two years ago was 43% growth every single year to the EU market. And so that's when we got the call 18 months ago that the tariffs were starting to be used as pawns in a trade war that none of us saw coming. My first reaction was damn we made it we're being used as pawns in a trade war, then that was that was oh my god. Now we're really, you know, what are we going to do now? I really do believe that. You're going to continue to see growth and a lot of people ask us after that press release came out, you know, because not only do we have more than 9 million barrels aging right now in Kentucky. We filled 2 million barrels for the first time in the modern era of Kentucky bourbon in 52 years. And you know, we'll we thought the tariffs are hurting wires. Are you feeling that many barrels and begin the blessing and the curse of Kentucky bourbon is you can't make it overnight. So administration's change, you know, you're looking six, eight years out, hopefully this issue would be settled. But, you know, if the EU market which is almost half of all of Kentucky's whiskey exports, if that continues to escalate, as it has with the new tariffs on scotch whiskey, then you know, to me, that's a game changer. You know, it's, it's something that could really have long term effects if we don't get this resolved pretty soon. 26:35 And you're you're pretty knowledgeable person on this particular subject. And there is people that talk about this all the time. But when it talks about tariffs, they talk about exports, and they have this very narrow minded view and they're like, that's fine. More bourbon here in America. kind of tell people maybe they I don't believe that's right, but kind of give your kind of explanation rationale on that. 26:57 Yeah, well 27:00 Well tariffs or taxes First of all, and in we'd like to say there are no winners in a trade war. You know, there's no really good way out of this because what most people don't understand is when bourbon took a nosedive most of the bigger distilleries diversify their portfolio so they own a scotch whiskey distillery or an Irish Whiskey distillery, a Canadian whiskey distillery. Tequila distillery. And so that's when you saw the tariffs, you know, enacted back, you know, it wasn't just you. It was Canada and Mexico, and other places as well. A company like brown Forman or Jim Beam that owns multiple distilleries across the world. They're not only taking a hit on the retaliatory tariffs on Kentucky bourbon. They're also taking a hit now on scotch whiskey and Canadian whiskey and Irish whiskey and things like that. 27:50 So they're getting both ends of it. Yeah, 27:52 you know, and so they're taking five punches through the gut right away. So you know, that's not good from an industry standpoint because You're, you know, that that for destroy a purely business standpoint, it's hurting business, then we have, as an industry have done so much over the last generation to convert scotch drinkers, you know, mainly from a global community over to bourbon drinkers. And that's a lot of investment in that that most people don't understand. And that market helps us, you know, grow here in Kentucky and produce more alcohol. So if you're a scotch drinker, if you're a newly converted scotch drinker, to bourbon and you go into your favorite watering hole now and you see that bourbon is 25%, higher in price, do you go back to what you were drinking, and now we've lost you, potentially for a generation, that that's not good. Then you've got the situation where, if you're a company, you try to absorb that 25% or as much of it as possible as you can Which means less jobs and investment here in Kentucky, which again, hurts the Commonwealth. or going to your point out, you know, hey, I've just invested $50 million and doubled my production and I've got these stills do I keep them running? Well, okay, you do that. And suddenly, in six years, there's a glut of spirits on the market, that's gonna cause a price war, which probably the first casualty is gonna be the craft spirits market, it's going to put people out of business. And that's not good from a global spirit spirits industry, as well. So we don't like door number one, door number two or door number three on all those and that's why we've been lobbying awful hard to get this resolved as quick as possible. 29:47 So talk to me a little bit through about what your processes when you're lobbying against efforts like this, 29:53 bang the drum as loudly as possible. We've met with pretty much anybody who would listen to us And I've got to give a hand to our partners at the Scotch whisky association that still spirits counts the United States the American craft spirits Association, the American just just distilled spirits Association I mean this affects all of us. So one of the things that we did in Fred was actually there a couple years ago we brought the world whisky community to Lowell and had a W nine some of their Nanos so we called the W nine and talked about this you know, what are we all going to do about this because it affects everybody and we met for two days and eventually put out a resolution calling upon the world's leaders to get together and resolve this quickly before the long term consequences you know, send them became real and even planted an oak tree right in front of the Frazier there and got a lot of press and we got a lot of phone calls about it and and we all kind of went back to our corners and, and did what we we've continued to do is is just talk to us. Every Congress person, you name it. Congressman Andy Barr in Kentucky was having a fundraiser with Vice President Pence flying in. He managed to get our major companies in a meeting with Vice President Pence who from Indiana knows exactly what bourbon means to Kentucky. And he took that message back to President Trump. The governor here in Kentucky had Vice President Pence in last year during the derby did the same thing for us to help us. We've got you know, we're on speed dial with Senator McConnell's office checking in consistently with them on what more they can do. We've had meetings recently with commerce, cabinet, finance, cabinet trade, you know, Senator Grassley, his office, all these people just really explained to them how devastating these consequences could be if this goes on much longer. And the answer to them is all you know, we understand, but these decisions are being made itself high levels. That's where the frustration comes in. And, you know, we know that the US does have trade issues with countries and we get that. And we know that the steel and aluminum thing is a real issue because here in Kentucky, we have great steel and aluminum plants because of our historical low energy rates. So, you know, we're not pointing fingers at anybody, we're just, you know, going up and just trying to tell our story on you know, what this could mean to the industry. You know, because it's like, again, it's like just putting the brakes on a freight train, which is trying to sell bourbon at the end of the day, or at least 32:38 get and I want to remind, I want to remind people to who are listening, and we're never we're never really going to get a lot of backlash on this. People are gonna think all this is political. You know, you're you're you're bashing Trump and what he's trying to do. I want to remind people that this is not political. This is this is an industry who speaks to both sides. Absolutely. And talk bipartisan Talk Talk to us about about that about how you how you have to kind of keep your personal politics out of it and how you have to work with both sides. What's that like? 33:11 Well, you know, let me start from a state point here. You alcohol bills in Kentucky are incredibly hard to pass no matter what the subject is. I mean, we've even had people up here that will vote against our social responsibility efforts. Just because the word alcohol it's in the title of the bill. So we have to have Democrats and Republicans supporting alcohol measures or they just won't pass. So yes, we are constantly we say we support our friends and we have friends on both sides of the aisle. And the great thing about our Kentucky General Assembly is they understand that because they know that some of their members because of their constituencies and coming from drag counties just cannot support alcohol yet but without like how he said yeah, 33:54 yeah, 33:56 yeah, TBD drywall wedge, the you know, the The great thing about one of the smartest things that the KDA did, you know, years ago back in 2010, was invite the craft distilleries are coming into Kentucky into the Association. We change our bylaws, because not only is it good for them and our our legacy distilleries have been tremendous mentors to them, but it also spread our political footprint across the state now in 32 counties. And so we've had legislators now who never voted wet, who vote wet because they understand the the economic impact and the tourism impact, especially of that craft distillery in their district. So that's really helped. But we know you look at you know, we have a political action committee, we raise money for that. You look at our donations, they're almost evenly split between Democrats and Republicans, because we have to have support on both sides of the aisle. So we're very fortunate in Kentucky. Yes, we have Senator McConnell, who can be a lightning rod, obviously, if you're, you know, in politics, but we're lucky that we have his leadership up there because he has the President's ear and he is always, you know, carrying our agenda. That's why we have given him awards in the past. We're very fortunate to have john Yarmuth out of level now chairing Ways and Means and so met with him recently and, and he gets it because congressman Yarmuth is a huge rabid fan, and especially in local bourbon city right now, you know, and all the tremendous growth there he sees the tourism impact in the economic impact on a daily basis. Having him in the house carrying that message for us is equally as important. And, you know, he and Congressman Brett Guthrie started the bourbon caucus in DC which which is growing and as more and more states you know, produce America's only native spirit. So we have to be bipartisan and it's funny because as presently Katie, you know, you have to be kind of like a chameleon on my Republican friends think I'm a democrat and I'm a democratic friends think I'm a Republican. And I say well, I must be doing something right. Y'all don't know what I 35:55 guess. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you also have to be careful to with your membership of when you go to bar what you pick? 36:01 I do. And it's funny, obviously, you know, when people ask me, what's your favorite bourbon Kentucky bourbon is always my answer. But in it, what I usually try to do one of two things I'll usually try to drink from the county I'm in. right then. I also tend to favor our chairman or Chairwoman right now, at the time if you know this year is the heaven Hill, year to chair the KDA. And our great friend Jessica pentagrams. For heaven Hill, general counsel is is the new Chairwoman, so you'll probably tend to see me drink more heaven Hill products this year. But then there are some bars I go to and you know this Eric, what do you want and just surprised me, you know, just just mix me a good old fashioned then and I'll go from there. 36:48 Yeah, the his memberships got spies on him. 36:51 Yeah. 36:54 They have to though. Yeah, that's right. 36:55 And so I guess one of the other things I want to talk about a part of the lobbying effort here is, you know, There has to be it's got to be frustrating because we're This is a syntax basically at the end of the day right like it's alcohol and I would imagine that government just look at it like it's an easy target right an easy target attacks. When you won't like your rumblings of anything like is it like Alright, here we go like put the bat signal in the everybody get together. We're going to fly there. We're going to squash this before it ever blows up. 37:22 Well, first of all, yes. That's when you look at the government affairs strategies for your strategy number one is always hold the line on taxes. Everything else is one a one B. And Fred, highlighted our 2009 bourbon Tea Party in which we poured bourbon on the Capitol steps. And if you go to my office on top of the cabinet, I have the empty bottles in there that serve as a daily reminder for me and never forget that you know, yes, right now they're your friend but in thirst or for revenue. The first place they usually look is cigarettes or alcohol or one of the what they We think of as sin industries. But I think we've done a good job, you know, challenge changing the conversation in the culture in Frankfurt, especially from sin to signature. And that 2009 bill was probably the best wake up call for the industry and the association. That is one of the best things that ever happened to us. I mean, I can tell you the dates It was announced, if it's ingrained in my memory is announced on February 6, they pass it on Friday, February 13. That took effect on April Fool's Day. I mean, you couldn't have written a better script for how all this went down. But you had the bourbon industry and not just bourbon the alcohol industry in general because you had the beer truck circling the Capitol. You know, we galvanized they in you, we fought the governor, the Senate president and the Speaker of the House on an issue and came within one vote of killing that in one week. And it brought us together more, more and quicker than anything could have. So it's actually a blessing in disguise. For us, because we held an emergency meeting after that, February 26. See, these are how important these dates were to me and the history. And one of our board members looked at the rest of the board and said, Are we really a signature industry? Or is that a self portrait? And you could see everybody just kind of living, they physically took a step back from the table and went, you're right. Are we really a sanction? We'd like to think we're a signature in se, but are we? And so they said, what do we need to do? And so we said, All right, we need to have an economic impact study that shows what our impact is to the Commonwealth, we need to start talking about bourbon not just as a drink, but as part of the culture and the economy and tourism and things like that. And so once we started doing that, and we did, we came up with the first ever economic impact study and it is such a tool for the industry, you know, to showcase what we mean to Kentucky that we do it every two years now. And it's a no brainer. We just know we do it every two years. To update and so that gives us also the ability to forecast right what jobs are going to do what we think is going to be coming in there and down the line. But once we started talking about bourbon as economic development and tourism in and investment in jobs, it really changed the focus here in Frankfort, that we weren't a sin industry more as as Fred said earlier, because I remember sitting in a meeting in 2010 with Bill Samuels and and senate president or Senator Robert Stivers, who's now senate president and him looking as the saying you are not a signature industry. You're an image industry, but you are not a signature industry. Coal is a signature industry because he's from the coal fields of Eastern Kentucky. And now to hear him stand up and say you may be the only signature industry left in the state because coal is is dying tobacco is dead. You know, horse racing definitely has its challenges. That's, that's been, you know, a 180 turnaround from where we were 10 years ago. But it's a lot of it's been a lot of hard work, educating legislators. And, you know, in all, like all the other tools that a trade association uses, like political action committees and things like that, to make sure that they know that we appreciate their support and changing these laws. Transcribed by https://otter.ai

We're practicing Social Distancing and trying to do some good in the world at the same time. Johnnie Mundell, formerly Beam Suntory's Japanese Whisky Ambassador, is now here in his new role at Maker's Mark to talk about the brand, the newly initiated Restaurant Worker's Relief Fund and some DAMN good bourbon.--Help us raise money for the recently unemployed bartenders of Seven Grand and Bar Jackalope. If you have the means, please donate to the Seven Grand Bar Jackalope Relief Fund at the link below.https://www.gofundme.com/f/seven-grand-bar-jackalope-relief-fund?utm_source=customer&utm_medium=copy_link-tip&utm_campaign=p_cp+share-sheet--Follow us:spiritguidesocietypodcast.comfacebook.com/spiritguidesoctwitter.com/spiritguidesocinstagram.com/spiritguidesocyoutube.com/c/SpiritGuideSociety/?sub_confirmation=1--ABOUT THE RESTAURANT WORKER'S RELIEF FUND:In response to massive layoffs in the hospitality industry due to the COVID-19 outbreak nationwide, Chef Edward Lee, in partnership with The LEE Initiative and Maker's Mark, launched The Restaurant Workers Relief Program. This program started on Tuesday, March 17 out of the catering kitchen of Lee's restaurant, 610 Magnolia, and was able to serve over 400 individuals in the restaurant industry who had recently become unemployed. The overwhelming response from the community inspired other chefs around the country to create similar programs, working directly with The LEE Initiative and Maker's Mark. Restaurant workers must bring in proof of recent employment (paystubs will suffice) and will receive hot meals, toiletries, cleaning supplies, diapers, formula, personal hygiene items, and more. Times, days and exact details vary between relief centers.Most of these relief centers are funded for the next two weeks but are hoping to be able to stay open longer with donations via www.leeinitiative.org. These relief centers include:Louisville Chef Edward Lee at 610 MagnoliaWashington, DCChef Edward Lee at SuccotashCincinnatiChef Jose Salazar at Mita'sLos AngelesChef Nancy Silverton at Chi SpaccaChicagoChef Paul Kahan at Big StarSeattle Chef Edouardo Jordan at SalareDenverChef Alon Shaya at SaftaBrooklyn Chef Greg Braxtrom at Olmsted and Nate Adler at Gertie'sLexingtonChefs Ouita Michel and Samantha Fore at Great Bagel BakeryNew Orleans Chef Donald Link at CochonAtlantaChef Linton Hopkins at Restaurant EugeneFor more information on the relief efforts, please follow The LEE Initiative on social media https://www.instagram.com/leeinitiative/ . For details on each chef's relief center, including addresses, days and times of operation, and more, please visit their individual social media pages, linked above.About Chef Edward LeeChef Edward Lee is the chef/owner of 610 Magnolia, The Wine Studio, MilkWood, and Whiskey Dry in Louisville, KY and culinary director for Succotash in National Harbor, MD and in DC. He has received multiple finalist nominations for the James Beard Foundation Awards Best Chef: Southeast. He appears frequently in print and television and was recently nominated for a daytime Emmy for his role as host of the Emmy-winning series, Mind of Chef on PBS. Lee won a James Beard Foundation Award for Writing for his book Buttermilk Graffiti: A Chef's Journey to Discover America's New Melting Pot Cuisine (Artisan Books, April 2018). He also authored Smoke & Pickles: Recipes and Stories from a New Southern Kitchen (Artisan Books, May 2013). His documentary film, Fermented, follows him around the world as he explores the rich culinary and cultural traditions of fermented food. For more information on Chef Edward Lee, please follow him on Twitter or Instagram or visit www.chefedwardlee.comAbout Maker's Mark® BourbonIn 1953, in Loretto, Kentucky, Bill Samuels, Sr., fulfilled his dream to create a handmade and delicious bourbon. He decided to make his whisky in small batches, using soft red winter wheat to enhance the softness and sweetness. He then rotated each barrel by hand for consistency, and finally, aged each barrel to taste. Bill Samuels, Sr., transformed bourbon from a "commodity" into a premium handmade spirit, and today Maker's Mark® continues to make its bourbon the same way. In recent years, Maker's Mark has introduced thoughtful, super-premium innovations to its portfolio including Maker's Mark 46™ Maker's Mark® Cask Strength, and Maker's Mark Private Select®, the brand's first-ever custom barrel program. In 1980, the Maker's Mark distillery became the first distillery in America to be designated a National Historic Landmark and has also been decreed as the "world's oldest operating bourbon whiskey distillery" by Guinness World Records. It remains one of the Commonwealth of Kentucky's most popular tourist destinations, attracting hundreds of thousands of visitors annually. For more information, visit makersmark.com. WE MAKE OUR BOURBON CAREFULLY. PLEASE ENJOY IT THAT WAY.Maker's Mark®, Maker's Mark® Cask Strength and Maker's Mark 46™ Bourbon Whisky, 45-57% Alc./Vol.©2020 Maker's Mark Distillery, Inc., Loretto, KY.SOURCE The LEE Initiative and Maker's Mark--Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

If you’re a bourbon die hard, you’ve probably asked yourself this question, “Do bourbon brands care about me?”. You know what I’m talking about because you join in on the conversation when distilleries increase prices or you get angry because your barrel picking group has been snubbed out for allocation reasons. The Bourbon Pursuit team takes a hard look at many of the larger whiskey producers by looking at some of their past actions. But if you’re the whiskey producer, what would you do in the same situation? Show Partners: Hotel Distil on historic Whiskey Row is set to open October 29th in Downtown Louisville. Book now to experience it for yourself at HotelDistil.com. The University of Louisville now has an online Distilled Spirits Business Certificate that focuses on the business side of the spirits industry. Learn more at uofl.me/pursuespirits. Barrell Craft Spirits enjoys finding and identifying barrels that contain distinctive traits and characteristics. They then bottle them at cask strength to retain their authentic qualities for the whiskey enthusiast. Learn more at BarrellBourbon.com. Receive $25 off your first order at RackHouse Whiskey Club with code "Pursuit". Visit RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Distillery 291 is an award winning, small batch whiskey distillery located in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Learn more at Distillery291.com. Show Notes: Wilderness Trail Expansion: https://amnews.com/2019/10/03/wilderness-trail-distillery-expanding-planning-huge-announcement/ Toddy’s: https://www.liquor.com/articles/best-bourbon-store-toddys-liquors/#gs.7u244v Glenlivet Scotch Pods: https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/05/world/glenlivet-scotch-whisky-capsule-glassless-trnd/index.html Scotch Tariffs: https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/03/business/us-tariffs-whisky-wine/index.html This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about line etiquette. What are your thoughts on the Heaven Hill Bottled-in-Bond relaunch? What do you think Heaven Hill did wrong in that situation? Are we moving away from a $15 price point? What about the Booker's price increase? Let's discuss Maker's attempt to lower the proof. What about Sazerac's strategy? What about Brown-Forman? What's happening with the allocation of barrel picks? Are people or groups getting cut off? 0:00 Hey everybody. If you have a bachelor's degree and live anywhere in the United States, there's now a way for you to take your bourbon education to the next level. The distilled spirits business certificate from the University of Louisville is an online program that can be completed in as little as 15 weeks and will prepare you for the business side of the spirits industry. It's offered by the ACS be accredited college of business, and this certificate was developed in partnership with industry experts to be one of a kind and it's going to prepare you for your next adventure. Learn more about this online program at U of l.me slash 0:35 pursue spirits All right, 0:37 let me see if I can't get everybody to just like Quiet on the set here. 0:41 All right, Quiet on the set. 0:56 Hey everybody, what is going on? It is Episode 220. of bourbon pursuit. I'm one of your host Kenny, and we've got a ton of news to run through. Let's not wait let's dive into it. Eagle rare bourbon is announcing the 10th annual Eagle rare life award. Now Eagle rare has partnered with garden and gun to seek nominations for the 10th annual Eagle rare life award. The award celebrates those who lead a rare life as defined by showing courage, leadership survival, devotion, character and heroism. Past recipients have included Brian Anderson representing USA cares in Jake Clark of save a warrior to nominate a remarkable individual for the annual Eagle where life award submit an application by November 3 2019. The finalists and their stories will be featured on garden and gun calm from November 15 to December 6, and they allows you to go and cast your votes. The winner of this award will be announced in early 2020. We talk all the time about how big players in the industry are always expanding but now we get to see one sort of on the mid size wilderness trail. Now you've heard from Pat heist and Shane Baker back on episodes 121 at 130. They are playing to add three new additional buildings to their site, including a 13,000 square foot addition. This is going to be an expansion of their bottling and administration buildings plus two new brick houses each totaling around 16,624 square feet. They will store 20,520 barrels each and they will be next in line for construction. The distilleries bottling operation is undergoing a $1.5 million dollar expansion right now with a new automated bottling line and warehouse space as they are going to be adding also more headcount in operations and administration. The distillery is currently wrapping up around a $6 million in capital projects for 2019 and as $8 million in projects underway for 2020. But now that you're doing close to 215 barrels of whiskey per day, you can read more about this in our show notes with the link to AM news.com. Back on episode 152. We featured Guthrie McKay of Tommy's liquors. Now this topic is polarizing to some folks. Today Guthrie charges more than secondary prices for his advocated bourbon and with this small shop that has a lot of listeners and shoppers going through, it puts them in a mixed and almost kind of gets you're frustrated and mad. But Guthrie has seen the highs and lows and he was a kind of a key and secret ingredient to helping the whiskey boom. And you can hear some of those stories that we were counted back on that episode 152 but you know Guthrie was also this week featured in a liquor.com article titled The best bourbon store on earth. And that might be a little bit of clickbait, but we've provided a few quotes to give context the story, and you can read that article with the link in our show notes as well. Jim beam's knob Creek is announcing a new limited edition bottling called quarter oak. The new release finishes knob Creek bourbon and quarter oak casks for four years. Now quarter casts are as the name suggests, one quarter the size of traditional 53 gallon barrels. And as we've seen this before, this means that there's an increase in the surface area with the charred oak relative the volume of whiskey inside. You can call it accelerated aging but it could just mean different types of taste profiles that are coming out of it. But when this finished product is going to be dumped from the Quarter Cask. It is then blended with knob Creek and bottled at 100 proof to create the knob Creek quarter oak, this is going to have a suggested retail price of $50. And with more release news heaven Hill is announcing that they are doing their first line extension of larceny, Kentucky straight bourbon whiskey larceny barrel proof released on an allocated basis three times per year. The first release of this weekend bourbon will ship in January of 2020. larceny barrel proof offers whiskey fans the opportunity to taste larceny just as heaven hills master distiller does Connor straight from the barrel. Each release will have varying proofs and consists of barrels aged of six to eight years old with releases in January may in September. This is also going to have the same naming convention that we've seen with Elijah Craig barrel proof. So the first release will be a 120 a representing the first batch of the year one representing the month with this January and 20 representing the year 2020. Each release will be bottled at barrel proof non chill filtered and available at a suggested retail price of 4999. we first saw it with black and which is metallic is new whiskey, followed by collaboration Slipknot with an Iowa whiskey company and now few spirits and Warner Music artists services are announcing a new release called all secrets know which is a new limited edition bourbon distilled by few spirits master distiller Paul help go in collaboration with Grammy nominated and multi Platinum selling Seattle grunge pioneers. Allison chains now whose music has also stood the test of time and pollutes a generation as well as a lot of whiskey lovers out there two bottles will feature a custom design label by artists Justin Helton. For this release few bourbon is finished for six months in tequila barrels bottled at 101 proof and will have an MSRP or suggested retail price of $75. This game this is how bourbon pursuit we hardly ever really talked about scotch, but the Glenlivet has the internet up in arms because they have released something that was new. It was a video and the Internet has coined it scotch pots. They are clear seaweed wraps that are completely edible and have a cocktail in a clear capsule, Glenlivet partnered with a sustainable startup on this new idea, and it has everyone talking about it. Some folks thought it was April Fool's in October, but we'll see who has the last laugh on this one. If they catch on, they will be served during London celebration of college tail innovation through October 13. And you can read about that with more in our show notes. We've talked about terrorists on the podcast before and terrorists, the retaliation are coming back harder and harder. The US is now going to be imposing a 25% tariff on scotch whiskey being imported into the US. This is going to increase the price of scotch for Americans. The US is the largest market with over $1 billion of scotch whiskey being exported in 2018. Well, perhaps this might get more people drinking bourbon in the end, but who knows what the outfall of this could be. You can read more about it with the link in our show notes as well. Now speaking of what things that we have going on, our community took one for the team and selected a barrel at Traverse City which ended up being a seven year in GP, or incredibly fortunate that we get to bring these experiences to our Patreon community and happy that all these whiskey geeks get to be a part of them. We have a new barrel pic to announce which is in addition to our last one week that we announced which is our Eagle wearable are also adding in to 2019 k jack daniels barrel proof that will be taking place in December. This is going to bring our 2019 tally to 19 barrels selected. And we've already got our first barrel lineup for 2020 as well. Thanks once again to our retail partner, keg and bottle out of the San Diego area for making this all happen. You can go check out their website and get whiskey shipped straight to your door at keg the letter in bottle.com. today's podcast it's one for the diehards, you know who you are because you join in the conversation when distilleries are increasing their prices are you get angry because your barrel picking group got snubbed because of allocation reasons. Now the trio of bourbon pursuit we're here to talk about some of the actions that we've seen over the past year and contemplate. Do bourbon companies actually care about their consumers? Or is this just a part of a bigger game that we all have to play? We mentioned it towards the end of the show. But if 9:00 You're a producer and you're listening to us. Just know that we love you. And we do our best to play devil's advocate. But there's some things that we saw that we really feel like we should take the bourbon communities view and kind of really talk about it put out there in the open and see what happens. So hope you're going to enjoy this one. Alright, so let's get down to it. Here's Joe from barrell bourbon. And then you've got Fred Minnick. What's up the char? It's Joe from barrell bourbon. We enjoy finding and identifying barrels that contain distinctive traits and characteristics. We then bottle them a cash rank to retain their authentic qualities for the whiskey enthusiast. Keep up to date with our newsletter at barrell bourbon.com. 9:37 I'm Fred Minnick. And this is above the char, I reached out to my followers on Twitter for this idea, and bourbon West came up with a good one. He wanted to know how we could improve the etiquette of standing in lines for bourbon. And he's speaking in particular of the etiquette towards the distillery, the store owner, the proprietary, he's saying that he sees some disgusting behavior out there when it comes to standing in line for these were bottles. So thanks, bourbon west for this idea. And here's the thing, if we want bourbon so badly, that we're willing to camp out overnight stand in a long line, I bring my kids to these things. So I have to it's it's the only way I can get there because my wife will be out of town or she'll be running. And the only way I can go to a lot of these events is if I bring my kids and so right then and there. I'm kind of like an odd man out people look at me funny because I've got my kids. And I'm standing in line for bourbon. So they're like, there's there's your dad of the year. But you do see people like get very angry toward the store owner, if they are the last in line and they don't get a bottle. Or they're at the front and they can't get what they want. Or they see a bottle in the store and the store owner wants sell it to them. I've seen people yell, I've seen people throw tantrums. And then you see people on social media afterwards, just absolutely tearing apart a business for them not selling him a bottle. And is that right? Well, you know, it's free speech. And people have the they can do whatever they want. But when you're inside someone's property, and you are there as a customer, there are some things that you should do first, you should never really raise your voice to the store owner. That could be you know, considered threatening, and, you know, if somebody wanted to, they could kick you out, and you should be just a good decent human being. You got to remember this whole bourbon thing. It's, it's just a hobby. It isn't something it's not life and death. We're not curing cancer. We're trying to get a nice bottle of bourbon. So treat people with respect. And so there are three rules that I recommend that everyone carry when it goes into the stores. dress nice it This may sound very weird, but people do not act like assholes when they dress nice. Now what is nice now you know I wear an ascot I'm not saying you have to do that, for God's sake. I'm the only person left on the planet still wearing the damn things. But you know, maybe like a like a polo shirt and khakis and a pair of nice shoes. And you'll find that you don't want to be a dickhead when your dress pretty nicely. Number to say thank you. Even if you do not get the bottle you want the store manager, the store clerk anybody you interact with the distillery whoever, just say thanks. And number three, the people who you're around with start talking to them. Where are they from? Some of the best friends I've made in bourbon have been from standing in line at these places. You really do meet some cool people. They'll be from all over the state or country and sometimes even out of the country because it's their only opportunity to get a rare bottle. So just practice those three things. And it seems like little but hopefully it will diffuse someone else from being a dickhead when they're shopping bourbon. And that's this week's above the char. Hey, if you have an idea like bourbon West did hit me up on Twitter or Instagram at Fred Minnick. That's at Fred Minnick. Until next week. Cheers. 13:15 welcome back to this episode of bourbon pursuit the official podcast of bourbon, the whole trio here today. Wow, hoping we don't burn some bridges. Right? I mean, we're going to be bringing the heat putting some people under some fire. But also, I think speaking for the broader bourbon community that's out there, because we're going to be talking and the subject is, you know, do distilleries actually care about their customers? And this is we thought about this idea. Because, gosh, what was it probably six months ago, we had this this concept of like, everything The news was changing. There's people that are taking off products, there's allocations of barrels that are just getting axed across the board from Yeah, as Fred always said, people that took you to the dance. So today, we're going to, 13:57 you know, barrel programs not kind of going he usually just made it him. 14:02 And so that's exactly what today we're really gonna be focusing on is, is looking at and hopefully, you know, I think we're going to take some, put some fire, put some heat and do some people, we all got to play a little devils advocate, right? Kind of will, one of us one of us will kind of take the role of, well, if the distillers that if I'm the distiller here, like, what's my response? Male? Fuck 14:21 it, let's just, whatever, whatever I mean, it this is this is a conversation that we need to have. Yeah, they need to know, we need to have this conversation because they're, you know, I feel like sometimes distilleries live in a bubble. They live in a bubble of their bottom line, and, you know, help benefiting their shareholders. And the informations out there. It's not like they can't go to a social media forum and find the data find, find people conveying their feelings about what consumers want and what they need. You know, their two years ago, they'd spent $150,000, to get the kind of feedback that is free now. Yeah, on social media. And what I have found consistently, is that they continue to ignore a lot of what people want, or what at least what they're saying they want on social media. 15:20 Absolutely. Well, they got short memories. They forget that like, just 10 or 15 years ago, nobody gave a shit about them. 15:27 So before we also kick it off and dive even further, you know, if you're watching on video, you might be hearing some background noise and people shuffling through because we are recording an episode of this podcast from the barrel room at Hotel distil, which is going to be on historic whiskey row here in Louisville, and it's set to open on November 1. And hotel distill is a place that is exciting. It's got a rich history that's happening here. It's now being transformed into this great space. It's designed to really, you know, what they say is ignite your passion for discovery and we'll do this 16:00 Social anchor for Louisville's revitalization and refinement of bourbon culture and you can book your experience now and stay at this authentic little destination at Hotel distil com. Yeah, I think this JTS Browns office they said at one point there Yeah, this is the actual building his office I had no idea Fred you got any insight into Yeah, this is this is the this is one of the I actually have an old photo of of like the 16:28 an old photo of like the outside and said JTS Brown, it was actually out there. 16:31 Yeah. facade. 16:33 Yeah. And, you know, a lot of cool things happened in here. 16:37 It just amazes like 1015 years ago, all this was like a dump. And yeah, I mean, it was it was like a Renaissance. I mean, 16:43 it was I saw what whiskey row was. I mean, I remember one of our first podcast we did was actually saving whiskey row and what it was, and all the effort that went in for historical and preservation societies of what it went to actually save a lot of the buildings and the facades that you do see out here, 16:57 guys, I want you to think about this. You know, in the 1800s, early 1900s, there were fellows walking around and their suits, go into meetings, and they were brokering deals about bulk whiskey. And they were talking about, like, you know, exporting it to Japan or Germany or wherever. I mean, this is where all the action happened. for American whiskey, where it's like, we're right here at the wall street of whiskey. I really don't like using that term, but it is it really is. And it just kind of went away. And level. You know, I and I give a lot of this credit to our mayor, Mayor Fischer. Greg Fischer. I really don't think, you know, any of this Renaissance happens without, you know, kind of like his, his vision to like, improve, improve this part of our culture. 17:46 Well, and I know and it might be a slider, Ryan, you know, he always has this famous line that you know Bardstown as the capital of bourbon, but it still is global is the epicenter of bourbon. Well, maybe now. 17:58 10 years ago, not so much. Nobody cared about down there, down here. They saw how cool it was in barge towns, they're like, Oh, we gotta do we gotta go do it now. 18:05 Absolutely. 18:06 So I'll play a Bardstown can put up some hotels like this, I think 18:10 they missing it. They need this, put a distill and bars down the awesome. Here we go. 18:15 So let's go ahead. And let's dive back into the subjects here. And let's go ahead and we'll take we'll take an easy one, right. I mean, this is one that is a recent news because as people in ourselves live in little boy live in Kentucky, we had access to the white label have six year Heaven and Hell bottle and bond. And it was a, you know, it kind of made. It was pretty big news, right? I mean, when they said they were gonna take it off the market. However, there was no announcement to say that there was going to be a relaunch, there's no anything like that. It was just something that I think it usually kind of started through the grapevine where the distributors found out about it distributors told the retailers, the retailers then told the consumers and then from there, everything went kind of Bismarck, and people just started clearing the shelves left and right. And Kentucky is actually finding this, this white label. And fast forward two to three months afterwards, then a press release comes out that says they're gonna be relaunching with an additional year, and, you know, three x the actual price of what it was before, before you can get it around, what 1215 bucks. And then it was coming back with an SRP of $40. But not only this is also be going out a little bit further outside of Kentucky hitting I think, what 678 states something like that during its first launch. So let's kind of talk about that. What do you think heaven hell did wrong in this situation? 19:41 Well, they, we kind of talked about this on the round table, but you know, that they think we're like stupid or something like they just totally like think, as consumers, like, we'll put out this press release. And just believe what we say. And it happened with the logic, Craig 12. You know, for years, we were like, we're like, oh, we're gonna move the 12 from the front to the back. And you're like, is it going away, no, never, never gone away. And then it goes from the back. It's not no longer and a number, they write the letter 12 or the word 12 on the back. And then after that, and it's like, you think we're stupid, then they do the same thing with heaven Hill, like six year they'd say, Oh, it's going away and never coming back. And then, you know, home to hold. Three months later, get a press release. And so it's like, I get what they're doing, they're going to try to make it a more premium product to the mainstream audience. But like 10 to 15 years ago, nobody cared about you. 20:40 I mean, let's let's also, I'll take their side, little bit here, you know, not even told that that was really happening. Not a ton of people really cared about the white label. I mean, it was always available. It's always there. It was something that was kind of our whiskey geek. Like it was like the thing you knew about like, you're like, that's the bottle that you go, that's 99 or 1099, that you could always count on as a 21:04 great poor at a great value. And like you said, it was kind of you had to be in the know to know about it. 21:10 To answer your question, Kenny, I think the one thing that the mistake they made was transparency. And I I'm very, very close with with heaven Hill, I think their whiskies fantastic. Some of the best I mean, I they do a great job. But I think in this growth of American whiskey, there has been a, there still has been a little bit of this kind of like old school protectionism, of holding on to their ideas and what they're going to be doing, you know, to kind of protect it from, you know, their competitors finding out. Well, really what has happened is that consumers, we feel like we have a right to know, of like, what's happening, 22:00 But what are they hiding? Like? It's whiskey. Like they act like they got like 22:06 you would if they said, We are pulling heaven hills, six year old off the market, to rebrand it, and bring it back as a seven year old bottle and bond at an additional price to more consumers? Would you be? See that's just I think most people would be fine with that. And the last thing I would have been fine with, hey, we really want this to stay available on shelves, we don't want to be like, well, they're 12. So that's why we're going to drop the age statement, kind of do a blend of eight to 12 which, by the way, they 12. So I mean, I was to use Preston van winkles term, I was bought hurt for probably about two years. 22:45 You still don't let it go. 22:47 But it was Elijah Craig 12 years is like so 22:50 tricky. Just like, like we're in it, but the age statement, you know, write it on the back and like had it and then eventually just phase it out and then change it. 22:58 I also so so that that's to me is the only thing the business decision to do it. I don't have a problem with and I don't think it's them not caring about their consumers? I think it's I think it's simply a I think they make a decision and they try to think about the best way to release it. And they're not thinking about necessarily the backlash and the whiskey geek state, we are still very much a very small portion. We are the one percenters 23:23 right, that's that's the one one thing I think, if I keep taking the distillery side of this, and I keep thinking, well, if I'm heaven Hill, I, my goal is to look at the broader market, right? My goal is to focus on that. And when I even put out these press releases, who cares? Except, you know, the 10,000 people that are like really hardcore into this, right. And 23:47 I'm still just flabbergasted by like, they think they have this secret stuff. Do you think like Buffalo Trace gives a shit that they're taking heaven Hill six off year and bringing it and relaunching it like, what do they? What do they think they're hiding? Like, I didn't mean from a competitive stamp, right? Like, yeah, I mean, this, whiskey takes years to develop to what it becomes. And so like, when you announce something, you've thought about it for a very long time, like, somebody just can't replicate it, like a month later, you know, 24:14 let's remember to 14 years ago, when there was like, there were like, two or three of us out there, kind of writing about this sort of thing. Now, I mean, you have a sea of social media, people, you know, finding a bottle, you know, analyzing every single thing, and it's very knowledgeable base. And so we can, you know, people can find out things really quickly. And also heaven hills got a you know, they have a few people in their organization that, you know, will get on social media and or under anonymous handles and say things. So there's that some moles they have, 24:52 they have some leaders. And so does that mean, they all do? 24:55 Nailed it? So I'll take the other side of this. And we had Larry cast on the show, right? You know, before he retired, and Larry is still being even in his retirement. He's actually been very outspoken on this even on social media and Hall 25:07 of Famer, by the way, yes, yes. 25:08 Recent inductee to it. Yeah. And, you know, he goes against the saying is insane. Like, the brand has been undervalued for far too long. True. And it's and it's very true. I think, I think bourbon in itself has been undervalued for this is very true. I agree with all that. But I guess, you know, when we look at it from another standpoint of, you know, if we're going to, is there a market to keep bringing $15 bottles of whiskey or where are we past that because it had been that way for so long is it do we just need to move on. And 25:37 so I've done some research and the studies show that when you raise prices, you actually get more customers. And I've witnessed many people go into liquor stores and my various, you know, book signings and stuff and you know, they're new to bourbon, they don't know anything about it. And the the store rap will try to get someone to buy four roses yellow label, and they'll look at the price. And they say, No, it's too cheap. I want that one. And they'll point to like Jefferson's reserve. And I'm picking I'm picking four roses yellow label every day of the week, over Jefferson's reserve. We still love Trey about Yeah, still. Yes, but but that from a value perspective, you know, I'm saying it's like, that's like, it's, you know, I'm saving pennies, or I'm saving, you know, 1015 bucks. Absolutely. But the the everyday consumer looks at this as a luxury good. And $15 isn't luxury. And that's that's kind of where they're, that's where these these distillers you're coming from? 26:38 Yeah, and understand that from like, if you're buying a gift or wanting to try something special, but if you're wanting like, quality everyday drinkers, you know that you gotta have an affordable option like 30 $30 for heaven Hill balled and bond, I think, or whatever, it's gonna be $40. I think it's overpriced for what it is. I'm, it's me, it's good. But I can drink some great, didn't you? 27:04 Me it was that great. He kept he kept 27:05 himself from 27:08 Above Average? 27:11 Well, I mean, from an everyday drinker to like, Am I going to go buy it at 40. Whereas if I would have it, you know, constantly on my bar, but they don't care about me, they care about the mass audience. And so, 27:22 all right, so here's the here's the sad, hard truth of it. The only line against this is the bartender, the bartender, has to have it at a surf a certain price in order for them to make money. And you can't make a $40 cocktail, right? You gotta it's got to be 10 to 15. So that's why that's why like in scotch, you know, they have like monkey shoulder and Glenlivet, 12 year old, you know, it's very affordable, you know, well, scotches, and the bartender community will always make sure that we have a 15 to $25 bird, because they have to make money on it. And you know, Larry rice is not going to be making cocktails with you know, $55 bourbon. 28:09 Absolutely. So I guess that's the kind of like, makes me think of another question. Like, if one of the main strategies behind bullet and how bullet became so big was because they were able to get behind the bar. Yeah. So in bullet is not a 15 $20 bottle, right. I mean, last time I checked, it's still in the 35 to $50 category. I don't 28:29 know I actually I've seen it for I saw like $18 Cosmo, is it? 28:33 Yeah, well, nevermind. Yeah. bullets in the sub $25 range, we found out what Kenny doesn't buy. 28:41 Just don't pay that much attention, apparently. 28:45 So I think we beat up on heaven Hill a little bit. So I think, 28:48 well not beat up on them. It's just they know, the criticism. And they, they they see it. And it's also stuff that I wouldn't tell them to their face. You know, like, I guess we'll do it on the podcast. back. No one's gonna hear the end day always push back of like, we are. We're a business and we're trying to make money. What I really the thing about it is I also feel bad for heaven Hill, because they get they do get a lot of blowback, and poor Bernie lovers. That guy's doing his job. 29:21 Yeah, but they do it themselves. They do it 29:22 themselves. But Bernie's like, sometimes just kind of left on an island. He's got to be the punching bag, you know? And it's like, I hope they're paying him well, and if not, they need to give him a raise, because that he takes a lot of a 29:34 lot of abuse. And it feels he gotta have a little bit of empathy for him too, because he ends up being like the spokesperson for the brand. I mean, yeah, right. Ryan, do you remember when we interviewed him? We had a two part interview. And we actually asked him, we asked him about Elijah Craig, and the 12 year age statement. And he looked, I mean, he came and he said, and he has no, it's not going away. You know, we're just moved to the back and little blah. And then, like, two months later, 29:57 again, whoops. Yeah, you know, we had to do this because make it available. And it's like, well, two minutes later, it was available and what changed it to 30:05 remember to like, automation, he had, oh, it's not his fault. It's and that's the and that's also the information that the someone gave him had, you know, so, you know, the decision was made that I have no doubt that, you know, they're looking at stocks and they're looking at where the future is and everything, and they make they make decisions in a moment and, and then everyone else is is forced to, like kind of 30:31 catch up to it. I guess. I just don't understand. I understand. Yes, Bourbons undervalued. I totally agree with that. But that's what your logic Craig's your inner McKenna's your Evan Williams single barrels your William heaven hills that's what they're those are brands are for heaven Hill has been a everyday affordable drinker. I don't understand why pivot takeaway from those brands to position this one when it's been like a bomb on the shelf all for all i also 30:58 think so you're thinking one particular thing get to realize when you go to Heaven Heaven hell we've all been in the label room there's hundreds of thousands of labels that they have maybe not hundreds but the definitely thousands Yeah, and I'm pretty sure like a bought every abandoned trademark of Oh, I just don't know that. So let me keep going here because I know when you think about the heaven hell bottom Yvonne that's one thing but you still got Evan lanes bottle and bond. You've got virgin you've got all these things but don't get me wrong I know people are starting to hate on the virgin thing now because they're dropping the age statement off that one as well. So you know it's just a continual progression of what are they going to be able to do 31:32 be honest that was the best marketing that virgin ever had no one knew about that fucking perfect. I mean, we can hear me there's like we knew about it sounded but like i was i was cracking up with like all these people like, like you didn't know about that bourbon. It was a very like I mean, heaven Hill bottle the mom people knew about it, but it's like out of the woodwork they're all a virgin fan. Like Come on. 31:54 Yeah, that was where it was mostly in like North Carolina Yeah. 31:58 There was like a Washington's like, I can't get any worse. Like you couldn't get it anyway. 32:02 Yeah, you know, so not even be tried. But 32:04 it's like I don't know what you're saying they 32:06 still came out. I mean, they rebranded it and came out of quality house right. So it's still still the same box he you know, 32:14 let's mean heaven hills seven years old and bond thousand barrel dump is not a $40 bottle like it 32:24 I get it, it's a rebranding. It's a way to do this. I mean, you can also see this as a way that you know, they they wanted to remove the name heaven Hill, from lower in tears, like, okay, green labels not 32:35 gone away the 90 proof one, you know why? Because someone in the Shapiro family, that's what they buy. Oh, well, so it's on their it's on their bar inside. And so it'll it'll always be there because they that's what they drink. You know, I think it's probably important that we also look at some of the some of the brands that have reacted to consumers pushing back pricing. Like when Booker's announced that they were going to be $100 bottle, you know, they went, they they reverted pretty quickly, because they were like, they were getting a murder. Remember that? 33:13 Oh, yeah, just it was 33:14 11 years ago, they changed it, but yeah, 33:16 they changed it back. And, you know, they didn't have to change any branding or anything. But, you know, they still have a little bit of residual 33:25 in I mean, to be fair Booker's, probably, I mean, it's a barrel proof six year like, really good bourbon. I mean, 33:32 I used to get it for 55 bucks. Yeah. And it was it was 33:37 the most incredible values out there. 33:38 That is a that is to me, that was a more palatable, you know, price increase. You know, they decided change, I think it's 75 or something like that. CSRP now it's about it's probably right where it needs to be and I think people are happy with 33:54 that you were still happy with that. And I mean, I still recommend it to people who haven't tried something and you want to you know, start elevating and trying to go barrel proof and you know, to kind of just take a note off your above the char from weeks ago, you know, being able to experience the different flavors you can get with barrel proof by starting at barrel proof, adding some water adding some ice letting the ice melt, you know, you get you get to experience bourbon five different ways. In a in a barrel proof whiskey like that. So 34:20 some you can always find to, but you know, 34:22 Becker, Booker's isn't the only one remember makers, even what had been five years ago about the 2013? The proof? 34:29 Yeah, the proof debacle, they still won't, they still won't talk about it. So for our listeners out there, this is what happened in 2013, Maker's Mark decided to lower their proof from 90 proof to 84. And they announced it to their brand ambassadors, which is their program that they have for their sir customer loyalty program. So they sent an email to it and people in batch it crazy. It was it was it ended up being front page news, Jay Leno, or one of the you know, the talk shows were talking about it. He was on CNN, it was everywhere. And I got like this. I was I was covering it very, very intensely. And I got these interviews with Bill Samuels and Rob Samuels. And I remember bill saying like, oh, son of a bitch, I guess people really care about our wisdom, you know. And it's like, they say, Bill always has this way of like, making everything sound funny and putting things in perspective. But they changed it back. But to this day, people think people think it's a, it was a marketing ploy, because it was only eight days that they had it out there. But think about it, they had to change their labels, you know, they had to pull. Well, they had they already had products out there had 35:42 a product out there. I mean, and that's kind of I think, I wouldn't say it's a unicorn by any means. But it's definitely a unique bottle that people could have how many 84 proof? maker's marks do you have? I don't 35:52 even think I've ever had it or tried it. 35:55 Not to have you had it, lady? I know. I bet it I they actually I tasted it on the air for a TV station. I was like, yeah, this is it's more watered down. It was like very light. There you go. I mean, really, it's makers is not the I mean, it's nice, but it's not the most complex whiskey. You know, it's it's fine for what it is. But I really did think it was a bad move from a whiskey perspective, because you could taste the difference. You really could. 36:18 Yeah, but I think they've they've been able to rebound and with flying colors. So I haven't really had a problem. 36:26 These companies need like somebody on their team, like they have like bean counters, like making these decisions. You 36:31 know, like, I mean, let's not like in the in the government, they just don't have, like, the government has like someone from like, so the VA has like veterans on committees, to, like have like a veteran oversight committee to make sure that the veterans are getting treated like they should be instead of like the, you know, the doctors want, maybe you want to treat them. And I think you're right, I think that might not be a bad idea. But you know what, they're never going to go for it. And you know, and here's an example I can think of like Sazerac in a lot of people's eyes. They're their public enemy number one. And that's that's because their stuff is highly allocated hard to get. But it's so damn good. Yeah, so I mean, it's same with heaven Hill, their whiskey so damn good. It's kind of like you know, it's kind of like the it's a love hate relationship. Exactly. It's like the the girlfriend you had in high school who couldn't stand but she was so hot, ready? 37:26 Like, I can't help myself, like crap, but yeah, I can't stop 37:31 it. So I guess, you know, will kind of shift the gears a little let's talk about Sazerac. 37:38 As the saying goes, Portland is weird. Perhaps it's something in the water. It turns out that there might be some truth to that. The Oregon capitals primary water source is supplied by the bowl run watershed. It's also the key ingredient and one of the city's most popular watering holes, Bull Run distillery, the boulder and watershed is a very unique water source. It's protected by an act of Congress back in the 1870s. And the city's 38:00 Others got their hands on a beautiful lake up in the Cascade Mountains. And it's been that way since the 1870s. It used to flow through wooden pipes by gravity to Portland. 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Use code pursuit for $25 off your first box. distillery 291 Colorado whiskey aims to create a one of a kind bold and beautiful Colorado whiskey, rugged, refined, rebellious owner and founding distiller Michael Myers built the original still from copper photocopier plates, which he used to create in during photographic scenes from Western landscapes to the Chrysler Building. 39:00 on sep tember 11th 2011 10 years after 911 changed his life and the lives of so many others. He pulled the first whiskey off that's still building a future in whiskey office passion for photography. What defines to 91 Colorado whiskey is it spirit passion permeates every sip, find a bottle near you at 291 Colorado whiskey calm, right like you stole it, drink it like you own it, live fast and drink responsibly. Let's will kind of shift the gears a little let's talk about Sazerac. You know, I I will say that the one thing I will I will stand behind size rock. And what they do very well is that they are not pulling the strings of saying like okay, well, we're going to pull something off the market or we're going to just say like, Hey, we see what this stuff trades for we're not dumb, we're going to go ahead and we're going to MSRP our products at x, y, z value, right? They I believe that they are in it for the long game. Like Yeah, I'm they see this is not this is just a quick market blip, where it's going to be something that you know, if you chase after the short money in the short dollar, then that's all you're going to wait, that's that's all it's going to happen. Like you're not going to be able to sustain this for the next 1015 years. So you brought up a good point, because a lot of people distilleries do look at the secondary market, even though say they don't but to especially for limited releases, they really have kind of fell on the secondary market to price things. For me, it's gone up up up and up every single year. And where it says right, it's kind of kind of stay true to like, I mean, I don't me wrong, there's been there's been gradual increases. I mean, if you take it back to 2010 days, you know, antique collection was probably $65, whatever, but going up to 100. Like that's not a that's not a good, that's not a huge ship. 40:48 Parker's was 5575 bucks. And now it's like 400, depending on you know, that 24 years, like 400 bucks or 300 bucks 40:57 retail, and then you take a birthday bourbon, for example, back in 2003, that was a $45 bottle. Now, it's 161 60 out the door at the distillery. So I mean, it's, it's, that's definitely 41:11 something way that the way that says rack operates is basically through the brain of Mark Brown. And Mark is a very conservative, you know, thinker when it comes to business and how they do things. But he's also a long term planner, they have planned out their whiskey projections through 2043. So they are they are that planned out. And they have made the appropriate, you know, business decisions that, you know, to get them where they need to be, I think that the biggest concern that consumers have with the way that company operates is through distribution. Now a lot of it is not anything that they can control. You go into a retailer or an on premise facility. And they will tell you, the only way that they can get Pappy or Buffalo Trace antique collection is if they carry Wheatley, vodka or some of the others as rack brands in large quantities now, that is that is a decision that is made at the distributor level is not. 42:18 That's because I always I always kind of thought like, somehow there's something working in the back the back room over here. And there's greasy palms to be able to say like, you 42:26 know, I'm saying like, if you want this, you gotta that is a very good conspiracy theory to have. But as of right now, it is illegal, you know, to have those conversations for it is illegal for a, a supplier to dictate who gets what, that is an actual law. That is under the federal alcohol administration act. Now, what is happening? I don't know. But I do know that everybody wants that whiskey. And, you know, how does how does the distributor make the decision of who to give it to? Now I've had conversations with people like Joe Beatrice, who's like, the only way you can do this is, you know, top, top level now, you know, customer loyalty. And so it's like, you know, how do they How does the distributor make the decision of who gets the five bottles of Pappy? Is it a? Is it a favoritism thing? Because if that's the case, that's also you know, is that is that fair? Is it you give it to the one who's like doing you're doing your bulk purchases, I've also heard of them like, like the distributors making decisions of like giving using Pappy to get rid of non Sazerac product. So like being would be in their portfolio or, you know, another big brand like that and say like, take up, take all this off of her hand, and you get you get a case of happy. So that stuff happens. And that is not, you know, to my knowledge, you know, I don't know how that you know how those conversations are going. Well, you don't know that's 43:59 the necessarily sighs rags. Yeah. Problem. It's, it comes back to them. But do you think they falsely manipulate their supply? Like to create this allocation? Like myth or because every time I go to Buffalo Trace, there's, they're always bottling blends, and it's always piled up cases? Because it's like what they have done. They got as many warehouses as all these 44:25 other big boys. Yeah, but you gotta realize they're also filling in the hand doing every single one with six people on the line. That's not that's not heaven. Hill level automation. 44:33 Yeah. What a lot of warehouses a lot age juice in there. I mean, this is true. 44:38 What what they do, they do put out, they used to put out an annual press release, about that, and it got picked up everywhere. You know, a smart marketing will say that. But what what Buffalo Trace has done is that they have spread the markets out so much like so let's say, you know, they're trying to penetrate every market in the country. My best friend lives in northern Wisconsin. He's building a Buffalo Trace, really now he can only have one bottle a month, because, you know, because now that northern allocations is moving on over to North Dakota. And so what they have done is they have they're trying to saturate the domestic markets so much that they've spread themselves out of being able to get into the hands of a lot of people so so that allocation that supply is because they're trying to open up bars in Montana, and places like Montana and Wyoming North Dakota. You know, I dare say you walk into a random liquor store there and you might you might find like a gold mine of like Sazerac products. 45:42 Well, where are they? Who are they using their, you know, everyday products like Buffalo Trace or Willer will or 12? To kind of fuel the more premium products like v tak and Pappy, do you think that you know, I mean, most of the most of what they do is they come out with a a lower version of everything that you get stack Junior, you gotta go rare, and then you get the big boys on top. But I know it seems like there's more like 12 year, it's I think it's sometimes easier to get a van Winkle 12 than it is a well or 12 zalando 46:12 you know, well, I think that's this is also just the the rise and the rise of bourbon and the amount of people that are looking forward to I mean, that's we say it's it's hard. It's it's not because yes, I still think there's I would honestly, probably guess that there's probably they're pushing out more product now than they ever have. But it seems still scares to us, because there's still more people now that are looking for it. 46:36 It's I'll put on their hat for a second. They have everybody in the world wants them. How do you how do you decide? What market gets what? 46:47 Yeah, I mean, that's that's it's definitely a tough call. Because you've gotta you gotta take one out of your your your playbook here is is who's been with us for the longest time who are the most loyal customers? Who are the ones with the biggest pockets right now that are really want us? I mean, Money Talks, like let's not be Bernie lovers always said it the best. This is not the bourbon charities the bourbon business. Yeah. And so who's got who's got money? money's gonna talk. And if, if by some chance and Ryan, we know, we've looked at this when we were opening up distribution for pursuit series, and we're like, oh, what state should we go for? And he did a trip down to Texas. And really, I 47:23 always forget that you to like on a brand. Like we're having this conversation. I'm like, wait, you guys hate your customers. 47:30 We listened to our customer feedback. We listened and we go, we go to a snail's pace. But I mean, but but the part was, you know, he said, like, let's look at Texas. And you look at Texas, and he came back from a trip. He was like, Kenny, this is this is so smart. Like why not? There's like, there are more people in the city of Dallas than there are in the state of Kentucky three times as many people in the city of Dallas as there is in the whole state of Kentucky. And then you got states or cities like Houston, San Antonio Austin, and you're like, why would you know, any liquor company would be smart to in they're thirsty. They're thirsty for it, right? And it's like, Okay, well, that's that's an easy target. So you go after the larger markets. 48:12 Dallas bourbon club, shout out to you boys. Yeah. 48:15 Peach MIT. Mm hmm. And so I mean, like, those are the those are the kind of three ways that I look at it. If I'm a if I'm a, you know, brand owner, and I want to figure out if I've got an allocated whiskey, how do I get into the hands of the people? That's the that's the way I'm going to go. Right. Do you have any kind of other thoughts on 48:32 I mean, just going back to what Fred said, like they're trying to get into these new markets, and I think they're trying to position themselves because they're, they're all pumping out a ton of juice. So when the product finally becomes of age, they don't they have us as customers already. So it's like, we need to go promoted other places. So when we do have this stock available, we can spread it out everywhere, not in whereas if they just focused on us bourbon, consumers are going to have a whiskey glut. 48:59 Well, they want to find new consumers too. Yeah. I mean, that's what I mean. Yeah, absolutely. We can't keep selling it to the same three guys here that have more bottles, and they can drink for the rest of their life. Right? They want to find new customers. And that's Yeah, that's really helpful. 49:11 Guys, that's what it comes down to. And you know, what, I saw that in the magazine business, you know, like, one of the big reasons why I decided to go out on my own for with the magazine is because the magazines I was writing for, were pursuing new audiences that would require me to be writing about cocktails, and you know, and not the stories that I wanted to tell. And so anytime you anytime you, ESPN did this to ESPN is inserted VH one and MTV. Anytime you water down, like what was the essence of what you were trying to do. And you're trying to reach a new audience, you're always going to like, appear, like you don't care about your original customer. It's just how it is you can grow 50:00 well, you cannot lose it. Well, to make it appeal to the mass market, you always have to like dumb it down to where like, because you have to make it appeal to everyone versus like a very small niche. And so that small niche that you appeal to at first, you kind of have to break away from them. Because the everyday consumer is not gonna be as passionate as that very small niches. Yeah, we're fairly early adopters. 50:24 Yeah. But you know, people they got a pivot to right now just think of MTV, like, I remember the last time I watched a music video on TV, but if I watch a music video, it's usually on YouTube, right? There's a new platform that takes over and takes care of that. But YouTube's a multi dimensional platform for all that kind of stuff. But you know, I kind of want to 50:40 talk about bourbon pursuit. Absolutely. 50:42 Absolutely. We will never done down 50:46 in Minnick media while we keep doing the shout outs here. Yeah. So let's, let's talk about two more brands. While we kind of wrap this up a little bit. You know, there's there's one brand that comes to mind. You know, we talked about old forester birthday bourbon, but brown Forman, I think they do an aggressive audible job of really not pissing off the consumer base, you know, they've got products that are continually coming out at aggressive price points. And, and really, they've only got it. Should I say, besides all four, it's a birthday bourbon, and they get king in Kentucky, they don't have a whole lot of stuff. That is the super premium, highly allocated stuff. And so they are continually trying to just make everyday solid products. 51:23 Yeah, I mean, the the old forester extensions, like great, everyday like, drinker. I mean, the bottom bond, the 86. I mean, those are like, I could drink the right, yes, they just came out well, but I mean, like these prohibition series, I mean, like the 1910, like, in 1920, just always, consistently blow my socks off. Every time I drink. I'm like, this is really good at 50 to 60. Buck. And one thing, one thing that 51:50 Chris Morris did with the prohibition series, is when they when they are know, when they did the wheat whiskey release with Woodford, you know, they it wasn't prohibition series was with Woodford, they sent the release out and said, We have now released every single type of whiskey that was allotted in the 1935 federal alcohol administration act, and I was just like, oh my god. And I'm like, there's probably not another person in the world who gave that we should talk about that. But I was like, I was like, the fact that you know, and they're released, they're dropping, like, one of the greatest, like legal documents I've ever read. And I was like, I was like, I can't kid in the candy store with that press release. I didn't publish it, but I was, you know, it was very well done. And that the thing about brown Forman is that they overly think, you know, so while they while they are doing a lot of this stuff, I also think they've been kind of left behind in a lot of these conversations of like, you know, you just mentioned you don't have a lot of allocated stuff. You know, so in like, if you are if you're if you're thinking about it, like is that not a good thing? I mean, because now you know, heaven hills got a lot of highly allocated stuff for roses highly Alec a lot of highly allocated stuff, and so does Buffalo Trace. And I don't see why, you know, brown Forman doesn't because their whiskey out of the barrel is incredible. 53:18 And we think it's because they promoted like Woodford so hard out the gate versus and kind of left old fo just a winner and then now it's kind of regain popularity. I think old foresters coming back hard. 53:30 Yeah, I birthday bourbon is highly allocated, by the way. It's very, very much is it but I look at 53:35 at what the resurgence of old forester as the same resurgence we see with 1792, right? Like, how many people were really like gung ho talk about 1792. and still they started coming off with all these extensions of their bottle and bond. Yeah, foolproof. Sweet. Hi, Robert. It's a 53:52 very interesting comparison because they have they both have a very unique note in there that I detect in both of them. No, bananas. Yeah, banana. No. You have to also remember that the beast of brown Forman is the world's number one whiskey and jack daniels. And I tell you what, some of the barrel proof stuff coming out of jack daniels right now. It's fantastic. It's some of the best whiskey you can find. And so, you know, I think what they what brown Forman does really, really well, is that 30 to $50 product, they do a great job with that. And I know a lot of people don't are not Woodford fans. But that's a lot of people's favorite bourbon. Oh, yeah. I mean, I've been I've been on airplanes where I've seen ladies yell at someone sitting next to them for pouring coke with Woodford like How dare you pour Coke? bourbon 54:46 airport. A lot of bourbon consumers that aren't whiskey geeks like Woodford is their premium go to you know, it's like I'm always amazed, not amazed because it is great juice. But it's like you forget that that it is like yeah, the common marketplace that sir like premium go to. 55:00 Alright, so one last gripe before we kind of close this out. And that's one thing that I've talked about at the top of the show. And that's the allocations of barrel pics that used to go to bourbon societies and used to go to people, charities, charities, bodies, everybody that was doing them early on. And now it's like that, sorry, you're not selling enough. And this is we're seeing this at four roses. We're seeing this at wild turkey. And so kind of talk about really, what is the effect of, kind of, from a if you're the manufacturer? Or if you're the the end consumer? Like, do you hate the brand more now? Like do you start to look at other places? I mean, because we're good friends with read an emerald from 1789 be, you know, they they said that their allocations are gone from wild turkey and other places like that, where they used to go and just go in and do barrel pics all the time. And now they're looking at other places. They're looking at wilderness trail they're looking at 55:52 Yeah, just it's opened up an opportunity for these like new players in the game to like, kind of like we've gone barrel pics so many places, but like you're not, you're treated more like royalty, when you go to like new roof or wilderness trails, or Willits, or somewhere, whereas the other ones are like, how can we get them in and out of here as fast as possible? It's clockwork to them. Yeah, it's like, we're going to roll out three barrels, and you have 15 minutes to taste each and then we're gonna go through this and this and get out now. So 56:22 Well, I mean, I still enjoy roses experience and stuff like that I still enjoy the experiences. I mean, when you go to wild turkey, you're there with Eddie and and, you know, you know, it's not Eddie making these decisions, right. You know, this this is definitely higher 56:35 up and then I also I also think that Eddie would make those decisions if he had to, you know, that's something we have to always remember that they're kind of protected like that we always want to give like the distillers a break, but they are you know, they have people there kind of around them to protect them and make them continue to look like the good guy, but don't think for a second that they're not in those rooms having conversations and saying like given their input. Yeah, well, we're about to lose our stock, you know, for 2025 if we keep doing these barrel pics, so they're looking out for the long term and healthiness of their brands and that and that's what I'm like a cop when they're around us, 57:11 then that's exactly 57:12 right. I do not be fooled by that. The niceties from the distillers leave me like someone like Bo Backman. It's as direct. Everybody hates that guy because he's the keeper of the barrels. But he's he's going off of what someone else tells him, you know, and he's got the allocation. 57:30 Yeah. And I'm sure if they if they had unlimited barrel supply, they'd love to keep doing it. Right. I mean, I think I think that's one thing that people don't understand. I don't know if they would they probably 57:40 it's like thing is is a inefficient process. And it's a low margin. Feeling personally, 57:43 are you feeling cut off? 57:45 No, I don't think I'm feeling personally cut off. I think it's Oh, let's let's try harder than us. 57:50 It's harder for us to go to So you mentioned 1789 be Let's mention I I'm a part of a charity that got cut off. what's what's another group that you know of that got cut off? I know about two retailers that got cut out of Wild Turkey? Well, yeah, 58:08 there's there's it's all around, right. I mean, it's there's definitely 58:12 we don't cross the board. We don't see a 58:16 you know, a commonality other than that. They're small. This place isn't getting cut off. MGM and Las Vegas isn't getting cut off. And total wine, liquor barn, they're not getting cut off. So it goes back to this this conversation of like, Who's spending the most money? And, you know, I think it's short sighted to cut out 1789 and you know, people like that, that have incredible connections within the bourbon world. 58:46 And we're the one of the pioneers of actually doing some of this 58:49 stuff. I don't I don't think they cut out some of 58:51 these gaps in a lot of money to charities, like a lot of good comes out of these. 58:55 But there's also been some charities that have been debunked. Right, you know, so you got to remember that to to just like we've seen with the counterfeit, they're always fuck wads that are going to take advantage of the the scenario the situation sounds like that. 59:07 Yes, absolutely. So I think we're going to go ahead and wrap that one up. Because you know, we've, we put some people under fire here, we make sure everybody knows that. If you're brand new, listen to this. We still love every single one of you. We still love the product you're putting out 59:20 we went talk about you if we didn't care. Exactly. I'm 59:23 on the show and join us. 59:24 Yeah, we're looking out for you. We want 59:26 what's best for you actually, they're not looking out for you. And not 59:29 well, we're looking at right 59:32 now they got a brand they're trying to knock you down. So their brand goes up. You don't have 59:35 to worry about 59:37 our toy 24 barrels a year, I think is like we don't we're 59:40 not gonna we're not gonna be stepping on any toes anytime soon. That's for sure. 59:44 Well, you know what I would, you know, I'll talk to you about this off the air. I'll bring this up. Sorry. 59:47 It's okay. So, you know, it was like I said, just make sure that you do have a pretty thick skin if you're listening this from brand, because we do We love you. We love having all the personalities and people behind the brands on the show. You know, we do 1:00:00 kind of look at this from, you know, we see what happens in the Facebook groups and Reddit and everything like that when people are writing blog posts of saying like, oh, like we don't like you anymore. So we're just trying to look at this from the consumer perspective. Don't shoot the messenger. Yeah, exactly. So I will. I will say, though, that I've said this for more than a decade. Don't forget the customers who brought you to the dance. That's it. Absolutely. So thank you everybody, for listening. We hope you enjoyed this episode we recorded at Hotel distil hotel is still is located in downtown Louisville here on whiskey row. And for those of thirst new experiences, you should come check it out. It's a home for the connoisseurs of the finest comforts and gracious service. It's a space where you're going to pass through historic risk row facade and joy, a true and authentic global destination. You can book your experience for it yourself at Hoteldistil.com and it's set to open here on November 1 of 2019. So fellows, thank you once again for joining us. 1:01:00 show. Yeah, and we'll have e

When our friends at the Los Angeles Chapter of Women Who Whiskey invited us to come play with them at Whisky Extravaganza, how could we say no? Chapter President Kim Ohanneson joined our friend Megan Brier for a no holds bard conversation about all things Maker's Mark!--What we drank:Maker's MarkMaker's Mark 46Maker's Mark Cask StrengthMaker's Mark Private Select--Follow us:spiritguidesocietypodcast.comfacebook.com/spiritguidesoctwitter.com/spiritguidesocinstagram.com/spiritguidesochttps://www.youtube.com/c/SpiritGuideSociety--From the Maker's Mark Website:There's an old joke at the distillery that goes, "If we could make it any faster, we wouldn't." Because at Maker's Mark, it's one bottle at a time. Every time. That's as true today as it was when our founders filled our first bottle. And since then, it's been a widely held belief around here that character isn't made by machine.Soft red winter wheat is the Maker's Mark® flavoring grain and star of its mash bill. In a day when distiller's rye – which can have an unwanted bite – was the go-to grain for whisky makers, Bill Samuels, Sr., set out for a flavor that would let his new bourbon stand out in the crowd. After some trial and error, he discovered exactly what he was thirsting for.The limestone shelf where the distillery is located is key to crafting the unique taste of Maker's Mark – the only distillery with its own water source and watershed. Kentucky limestone filters out iron from water, which is unpleasant in bourbon. The pure calcium- and magnesium-rich water surrounding the distillery makes better drinking water and a better sour mash in which yeast can flourish.Sometimes the best, freshest ingredient available is an heirloom yeast strain that's more than 150 years old. In fact, this highly guarded microorganism has been passed down to every bottle of Maker's Mark ever produced. Would it have been easier to switch to cheaper stock yeast when everyone else was? Sure. But, it wouldn't be better. And, it wouldn't be Maker's Mark.The yeast ferments in tanks that are original to the old Burks Distillery that predates Maker's Mark. They're made from cypress planks more than 100 years old. Hard to source these days, cypress is ideal because it has no effect on the flavor of Maker's Mark.Our double-barrel distillation stills:In addition to being stunning to look at, these gleaming copper stills are key to our double-distillation process, which removes impurities for a more refined sipping whisky. As demand grew, our friends at Vendome Copper & Brass Works fabricated and helped us install an exact replica of our original still, creating this cool mirror illusion in our stillhouse and ensuring every drop of Maker's is still made the same way as Bill intended.The perfect degree of char:It takes just 40 seconds of fire to achieve Maker's Mark customary number-three char. The process of firing barrels opens pores in the staves and caramelizes the natural wood sugars. This helps give Maker's Mark those pleasant vanilla notes. But before the firing can happen, the cooperage (or barrel-building company) must "season" the new American white oak used for our barrels outdoors for nine months, including summer. This helps remove the bitter tannins in the wood that would otherwise go into the bourbon.Barrel rotation by hand:We rotate our 525-pound barrels by hand to ensure proper exposure to the different temperatures around the rackhouse. This adds consistency from barrel to barrel while setting us apart from distillers who abandoned the practice long ago. Barrels spend a minimum of three hot Kentucky summers in the top of the rackhouse where the whisky expands through the wood, gaining color and flavor. Our tasting panel determines when the whisky is ready to move to a cooler section, keeping it from maturing too quickly.makersmark.com--Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

Welcome to Bourbon Heritage Month where it’s full of awesome festivals like Bourbon and Beyond. We dive into the show talking about Pernod's intent to acquire Castle Brands which Jefferson’s is a major portfolio player and if $223 million was a good deal. We comment on PBR's newest whiskey which is aged for a grand total of 5 seconds. Next is looking at the artificial tongue and what this could mean to the future of the industry. We wrap it up examining EU tariffs and it’s impact 1 year later on the whiskey market. Show Partners: The University of Louisville now has an online Distilled Spirits Business Certificate that focuses on the business side of the spirits industry. Learn more at uofl.me/pursuespirits. Barrell Craft Spirits has a national single barrel program. Ask your local retailer or bourbon club about selecting your own private barrel. Find out more at BarrellBourbon.com. The 2019 Kentucky’s Edge Bourbon Conference & Festival pairs all things Kentucky with bourbon. It takes place October 4th & 5th at venues throughout Covington and Newport, Kentucky. Find out more at KentuckysEdge.com. Central Kentucky Tours offers public and private bourbon tours for groups from 2 to 55. Learn more at CentralKentuckyTours.com. Receive $25 off your first order at RackHouse Whiskey Club with code "Pursuit". Visit RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Show Notes: This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick takes a look back at the Legend Series. Let's discuss Bourbon and Beyond. Pernod buys Castle Brands for $223 million. https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20190828005771/en/Pernod-Ricard-Acquire-Castle-Brands-223-Million Do you think more smaller brands are going to get bought out? Is Pernod trying to get back to bourbon? Was this a good buy for Pernod? What do you think about PBR making whiskey? https://www.jsonline.com/story/entertainment/beer/2019/08/22/pabst-blue-ribbon-now-making-whiskey-collaboration-new-holland/2086883001/ Have you all seen Screwball Peanut Butter Whiskey? What are your thoughts on the artificial tongue? https://www.geek.com/tech/artificial-tongue-can-taste-subtle-differences-in-whiskey-1798999/ More secondary markets are gone. What are your thoughts? Who do you think is behind the shut downs? Tariffs continue to hammer down on bourbon. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trade-whiskey/us-whiskey-exporters-struggle-after-year-of-eu-tariffs-idUSKCN1V80DN What do you think is next for tariffs? What impact do tariffs have on the bourbon industry? Thanks to Nick from breakingbourbon.com, Brian from sippncorn.com, and Blake from bourbonr.com for joining. 0:00 I love bourbon, but I'm not ready to restart my career in be a distiller. I have a bachelor's degree and I want to continue to use those skills in the whiskey industry. So check this out. The University of Louisville now has an online distilled spirits business certificate that focuses on the business side of the spirits industry like finance, marketing and operations. This is perfect for anyone looking for more professional development. And if you ever want to get your MBA, their certificate credits transfer into Ul's new online MBA program. Learn more about this online program at business.louisville.ecu slash online spirits 0:38 so I'm just waiting for the movie where artificial tongues go rogue and one of them decides is going to go and replace everybody's whiskey with like rapid each whiskey because it's got the perfect profile and there's just insanity and chaos. You know 1:08 This is Episode 217 of bourbon pursuit. I'm one of your host Kenny. And as usual, a little bit of news to go through. So larceny from heaven Hill has launched a new app. It's an augmented reality app called unlock the Rick house. The app was inspired by the history of john II Fitzgerald. He was a treasury agent back in the late 1800s and early 1900s, and was one of the only people that was legally allowed to carry the keys to the barrel storage Rick houses with a discerning palate for fine bourbon john Fitzgerald often uses Rick house keys to gain access to some of the finest bourbon barrels for himself. And those barrels from which he chose to help himself were often referred to as the Fitzgerald barrels around the distillery. The infamous active larceny led to the larceny brand and has now inspired the newest augmented reality app. So Once downloaded, you can explore the Rick houses by tapping on each one to search for the prize winning 2:00 Fitzgerald barrel, and from September 1 through December 31. Each tap of the Rick house gains one entry into the grand prize of $10,000. Daily prizes will also be awarded and include everything from a mini barrel shot glass and larceny magnets all the way up until a larceny guitar or an LED sign. So you can get unlock the Rick house available now on the Apple Store and Google Play. On Tuesday this week, I had the pleasure of joining four roses master distiller Brett Elliot, to a special media preview of the 2019 limited edition small batch, were able to ask him anything in taste through all the individual lots that comprised of this batch. And here's some of the details. The 2019 limited edition small batch will have a breakdown of four different bourbon runs. There is an 11 year old ESV that accounts for 26 27% of the blend. A 15 year old GSB at 40% of them blend a 15 year old ESK with 25% and a 2:59 21 year old BSB at 8% on the blind, and we got to go through each one of these and kind of rate them all and kind of figure out how they all lead into creating their own blend and the 21 year OBSV had the best knows it was super okie but the finish lacks some depth. And there was I know there's a lot of OESK lovers out there, but this one had a pretty strong bite to it honestly wasn't my favorite. However, the 15 year OESV was the real star of the show. This had depth and complexity and just kept going at all the right components into it. But come to find out. This is the same version of OESV that was sold at the gift shop this past year for Father's Day. So there's a few lucky people out there sitting on some really good bourbon right now. And the final proof of this will be 112.6 with around 13,440 bottles to be released in the US in around 3002 the rest of the world with an MSRP of $139 and 99 cents. 4:00 During this time with Brent, we also discussed the barrels and if we would ever see a single barrel limited edition ever again. Well, the unfortunate news is that he said it's likely to never happen again. With the explosive growth of bourbon, it's almost impossible to find a run of barrels that were all distilled at one time that would be able to satisfy this type of demand. Instead, these runs will be saved for future small batches for years to come. He said they have plenty of high AH stock. So this is great to hear for enthusiasts like us. And hope you're out there enjoying these whiskey quickies that we're releasing. As we get into the fall we're going to be bringing new reviews of all the newest releases including next week's as we review the new four roses small batch Limited Edition. All right now on to the podcast. On this Roundtable. We talk about bourbon festival season as we just wrapped up one, but we're heading into bourbon and beyond right around the corner. And if you haven't yet, go get your tickets. We'd love to see you there. Drink some good bourbon and listen to some good tunes. But after that, we dive into 5:00 To the acquisition business was the 230 $3 million deal for Pernod Ricard to acquire castle brands which Jeffers is a part of. Was that a good deal? Well, we had a lot of folks that were commenting in our chat section and talking about the EPA or the earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization. It's a measure of a company's operating performance. One comment we received was from Craig Kessler, he's a Chief Investment Officer as well as an executive bourbon Stewart. So he talked about per node selling wild turkey at 12 times its EPA, while brown Forman was selling at 10 x. So per node got an above market value during the time of the value of other competitors out there in the market. As for promotes re entry to the market, castle was trading at a price sales ratio of one x and per node paid about to exit the company. So brown Forman is currently trading at eight x. So per node is paying 75% less than brown Forman on a price per sales basis. So from this production 6:00 It looks like four nodes sold above market for wild turkey and bought castle below. So we'll see about more of that into the podcast that after that we also dive into PBR is new whiskey, the artificial tongue and if you tariff data that's now been published is still going to continue to wreak havoc on new exports. All right, now let's get on to it. Let's hear a word from Joe over a barrel bourbon, and then you've got Fred Minnick with above the char. I'm Joe Beatrice, founder of barrell craft spirits. I know I talk a lot about blending here. But we also have a national single barrel program asked you a local retailer or bourbon club about selecting your own private barrel. 6:41 I'm Fred Minnick, and this is above the char. In 2013. I started a series at the Kentucky Derby Museum called the legend series. It was a great opportunity for me to sit down with the legends of the industry and ask them questions about their careers and taste their whiskeys. I've talked to great people. 7:00 Julian Van Winkle, Edwin Foote, Harlan Wheatley, Chris Morris, Bill Samuels, Jimmy Russell, Jimmy Rutledge, and many, many, many more. It's been one of the most important events of my career. And now as I go into building the eighth season of The Legend series for the Kentucky Derby Museum, I just look back on it, and all. It's also where I made my first connection with the fellas here at bourbon pursuit. You may have heard this story where Ryan showed up and forgot to turn on the microphone. We still razz him about that. But it really was a great, great moment. I think, not just for me or the Kentucky Derby Museum. But for all of bourbon. The Legends Series was really one of the first high level high education events that allowed people to get really connected to a master distiller or a CEO and learn about what makes them 8:00 Tick. And I'm very glad to see that today we know everybody's mash bill. We know people's business procedures. And you have companies like heaven Hill who are creating diagrams for social media about airflow in a warehouse. So much has changed in eight years and the people who are most to be credited with this, are you, you the consumer have more power today than ever before. And let me tell you, the whiskey distillers pay attention a lot more to what you think, than they do. The USA Today or the New York Times, you are the most powerful person in the all the equation of American whiskey. They follow what you say on social media. They follow what you listen to what you read, and they want to know your opinion, constantly. So join me in the further pursuit of knowledge and let's 9:00 asked people to open up and tell us more about their distilleries. Some people may think it's unfathomable to know what's going behind the scenes when they're making a price increase, or what they're thinking when they're changing their barrel entry proof. But eight years ago, heaven Hill didn't disclose their mash bills. Now, they freely tell you every single grain that goes into their whiskies, so things can change. And that's this week's above the char. Hey, make sure you're following me on Twitter and Instagram. So you can come to next year's Kentucky Derby Legends Series. You can find me at Fred Minnick again at Fred Minnick. Cheers. 9:45 Welcome, everybody. This is the 36 recording of the bourbon Community Roundtable. This is where we talk about what's happening in bourbon bourbon culture bourbon news. We've got a lot of topics to cover, but you know, this is also the beginning and how we're kicking off 10:00 bourbon heritage month so everybody welcome to bourbon heritage month it's kind of like our Super Bowl if we will right we're finally here doing that. But you know not only this bourbon Heritage Month starting to kick off but one of the biggest things is this is also turning into festival season. You know we just wrapped up bourbon on the banks. There's one called Kentucky's edge that'll be coming up and first week October however, Fred Super Bowl here is here and in two weeks so Fred you getting getting mighty pumped for bourbon and beyond? Yeah, bourbon and beyond is right around the corner. I've got two other festivals right before that one but bourbon and beyond is my baby. I work on a year round. We've been working so hard on it, obviously we got the Foo Fighters ZZ Top. 10:41 Alison Krauss, Robert Plant, Zac Brown band we got all these incredible bands but we also have 10:47 you know, grand Melia from top chef and we have a lot of lot of cool panels here. So you all are on the panels. Nick Jordan's there on behalf of breaking bourbon. But I'm very proud of 11:00 The curation of the panels this year, and it's just an incredible, incredible lineup of of education and cocktail. Yeah, I mean, do you want to kind of give people a little bit of a teaser on what some of these panels are so they can go out and yeah, so well one year of moderating Kenny is like what is a master distiller and that's something that we in our community we talked about all the time like what is a master distiller? I mean right now technically Brian who's just a lawyer could be a master distiller without even going any kind of like training for it. We're I'm moderating a panel about the history of slavery and American whiskey. This is the very first time that anybody in our industry has approached this and I want people to realize that you know, this is something that 11:50 you know, it we, we kind of like avoided a lot but you have people like fun Weaver 11:58 and you know, who's bringing 12:00 to the forefront and making sure people want to talk you know, make sure people talk about it because it is something important that is a part of the American whiskey heritage. And I don't think we should just like gloss over it with and so that that's, that's a big seminar we've also got one called bourbon disruptors. I'm excited about Brian's panel that he's doing. It's called whiskey dark past, you know, there's been a lot of murders, there's been a lot of bootlegging. All kinds of shenanigans have been associated with with American whiskey. And, and so you have some some deep ones. And then we have some like real basic like high about how to make a high ball and how to make a man hat and an old fashion. We have a lot of stuff like that as well. So licenses, as well as the hardcore ones. Yeah, and I think at least all of us, we're super excited to actually be there be a part of it beyond the panels. And, you know, while we're doing that, let's go ahead and introduce all of our guests that are here or sorry, our typical roundtable member 13:00 Is that are here today. So let's start off with somebody who might not be able to be here for that much longer because he's getting ready to start batten down the hatches as as the hurricane starts making his way so Blake from Florida checking in How are you, buddy? Doing well, How are y'all? 13:18 We're trying to sneak sneak in a little bit. Yeah, it's been quite the week we you know, I'm kind of a little bit of a procrastinator on the on the storm side, but this one looks like we could get a little bit so yeah, no school for the next two days at least. 13:36 Well, good deal. Well, make sure you you stay safe out there. You know, we're all we're all making sure that you know, everything is everything's good for you, as well as all the other flirty and bourbon residents that are down there. So hopefully everybody is staying safe and heat and all the warnings of evacuating if you actually need to evacuate. That is true. Yeah, you know, but the streak continues. I just kind of throw that out there. The streak continues. 14:00 Introduction. 14:01 Absolutely this qualifies. It sure does. Yep. Yep. So Blake, if you could go back 10 to family please do please go for it, man. Thanks for thanks for chiming in here. 14:12 Yeah, I'm good for a few minutes. arena question Where were we? Not yet we're just still we just started going through the the table just going around the horn so well. 14:23 Yeah. Well, let's take a break. So Brian, you go ahead and take next. Yeah, thanks, Fred. And again, this is Brian with sip and corn. You can find me on Twitter and Facebook sipping corn Instagram to sip and corn and online at bourbon justice calm and sip and corn calm and just to echo Fred's comments. 14:44 Probably no one is is is as excited as he is. But I'm I might be second place got rained out last year for my bourbon workshop. So I'm really excited about doing it this this year. And Fred Thanks for including me. Yeah. 14:58 And Nick, let's go ahead break 15:00 bourbon. Let's hear it. All right, thanks, Kenny. I've Nick from breaking bourbon breaking bourbon com. Check us out on social media at breaking bourbon. And yeah, unfortunately, I will not be able to make bourbon and beyond this year, but Jordan will be there. I will say I am pretty disappointed. It was a pretty fantastic festival last year even with the day the rain out the second day. And you know, I think anybody who's gonna be making it out there probably won't be disappointed. So I'm sure Fred you're probably going nuts now still getting ready for this thing but yeah, it's a pretty fantastic bourbon festival seems to seems like it's only getting better year after year. Wow. Thanks, guys. I gotta tell you, you know, it means a lot to me hearing you all say that because, you know, getting rained out. It was like it was like a gut punch. And it was just so it was really devastating because we had to cancel the other festival which is the Hard Rock Festival louder than life the next weekend. So all three days were canceled. 16:00 So we're really hoping and praying that we don't we have great weather and we're at a weird a better location that can handle the rain so like it's at the fairgrounds it's like right across from the actual Expo Center building and it's like that flat plane and it's a much more it's not as beautiful as champions park with all the trees but it's something that you know is if if this thing floods the whole city's underwater 16:32 there's gonna be a new meters thick that's going to be on the side of the bridges the show the the great flooded 20 2019 if that's what it is. Knock on wood. Yeah, let's we're not gonna have that it's gonna be remember the first year it was hotter than hell out. The second year was just torrential downpour. Third year it's got to be just clear skies. It's what it has to get it perfect. Yep. Alright, so let's jump into it. So the first topic of conversation is kind of a big one. You know, we've had days all our 17:00 on the show before good friend of the show from Jeffersons, and it was announced last week that Pernod Ricard is going to acquire castle brands which Jefferson's a part of that portfolio for 223 million. So it's good to see that porno is still still on the hot streak of buying a lot of stuff. You know, I was just looking at Castle brands. His website, of course, like Jefferson's is the one that kind of screams out to a lot of us. But they've got they've got an Irish cream and an Irish vodka. They've got Gosling's rum, they've got Aaron whiskey, which I had never really come around before. But again, it's a it's a bigger portfolio but it's it's pretty good to see this sort of thing you know, we've been not really not accustomed to seeing a lot of these. These brands start getting acquired. Now porno is actually kind of on a buying streak. It seems a lot recently. 17:51 You all kind of see. This is a trend that's going to continue to happen like do you think these more smaller brands are going to continue to keep getting 18:00 swallowed up by a lot of these big ones. 18:03 One thing that I noticed about this and I know, I know what they're paying for, obviously 223 million sounds like a lot of money. But for these larger companies, it's really, to me that's a that's a low amount for a brand like Jefferson's, which really is a workhorse. I mean, that that's a good selling brand that, you know, that alone could have probably sold, you know, you know, five years ago when you had high West sell for 170 $5 million. You know, Jefferson's was 10 times the brand of high YS at that point. So I think and I know what I know what rabbit holes sold, but I can't really say and I felt like that was a low amount as well. And so I feel like they're getting these these these brands that might be in debt and they may not have as much like 18:56 you know, may not they I don't know what 19:00 How porno is doing this, but that's not a lot of money for for castle brands. I just don't I just don't think there was anyone else looking to buy them. And so, right now you have the big companies and I don't know if they're out there looking to buy up, you know, brands unless it's like white cloth at the moment. You know, the like laws the hot one. So I guess that you know I come from the I always say that where I come from the tech side and so seeing things in the, you know, a couple hundred million dollars of acquisitions aren't, you know, it doesn't really I don't really bat an eye at it anymore. So you said that 223 millions just really not a lot. 19:37 And you think that it also could be 19:41 are there really only like a just a tiny handful of big players in this game that actually have the capital to acquire and if they already have something that's in their portfolio, do they need to continue to keep acquiring? Yeah, let's look at the brands that the big. The big portfolio is proud for 20:00 pronounce Ricard Diaz. Do you throw Proxima in there? BM Suntory obviously 20:07 Karen which has four roses would you know throw them in there and you know there might be a couple others that could really move the needle but you have to look at like what are the who has what it says rack Africa says RX a big player obviously. 20:27 And in 2009 porno basically got out of the American whiskey game when they when they spun off 20:35 you know Barton and you know, wild turkey and so you had like this incredible you know, they got rid of these these great brands and 20:47 and, and now they're trying to get back into the game after it was too late and pornos got a great Irish Whiskey portfolio. So Irish Whiskey is the only you know, whiskey that's really hotter than bourbon and 21:01 It makes sense for them to to try and get some jargon juggernauts but you know they've got smooth Ambler rabbit hole now and Jefferson I think they got rabbit hole really because of the facilities and rabbit holes facilities have incredible potential for expansion they fit right into the like the tourism model and Jefferson's is a hot hot brand smooth Ambler two is got you know they're they've penetrated a lot of really good markets so they made some interesting moves and I think they did them at you know whoever negotiated their deals I think probably did a very good job for them. Yeah, you know Nick or Brian Do you kind of see this as is Fred said it is this PR know kind of like crawling back into the market a little bit. You know if you know if you got rid of wild turkey at the wrong time because you thought it was a you know, basically a bad stock and you sold when the you sold out when is low and you know you bought it when is high like it they tried to like flip the script for themselves here. Well 22:00 I think they they definitely trying to do that. But they're they're filling their roster with D league players instead of what they lost. And I think their problem is going to be capacity. I mean, how can they increase production of any of those without huge distilleries to be able to turn this out? I see that is their issue. I mean, they they can get some from rabbit hole and they can get some from smooth Ambler. But that's a ways off. 22:28 Jefferson's is still just bottling in Crestwood. Right? I mean, they don't have a whole lot of capacity of their own. They're still sourcing. So where's it going to come from? So I see it is problematic there, they're buying the league players, and they can't, they're not going to be able to increase production. And I think that to kind of piggyback on the sourcing, and that's, you know, probably the comments that were, at least that I saw, you know, here in there, with, of course, the focus then Jefferson's in the in the bourbon world. 23:00 With respect to this acquisition, you know that's the question thing about high West with Ambler there, they've got distilleries, they've got the that kind of capability, you know with Jefferson's for example, it really is the brand that's bought the distribution you know, the labels that that kind of thing. So kind of to Brian's point it's that you know, it's that want to get back in the game want to get in in the game. I think there's still a lot of growth potential in general, but it's what is that you know, what are you going to do with that so now they've got two brands now they've got a pull out from you know, pull out from behind them probably invest quite a bit more Jefferson's to like they go from a company that didn't necessarily didn't necessarily have the ability to walk into a company like brown Forman and and strike a deal for 5000 barrels of stock. I'm not saying that's going to happen now if you're in our carbon now printer card. I mean, trees owners got muscle like NASA castle brand was is like 24:00 You know, that was like, 24:02 you know, a triple A baseball team, you know, in comparison to our car, who would be the Boston Red Sox or the Yankees, you know? So the buying power that they have to be on the source market. I mean, it just went up. And because they can, they can strike deals that he could never dream of before when they start sourcing from wild turkey that or MGP, which, you know, they they own the facilities after, after Seager. I'm sad to shutter all their stuff. 24:35 They got the facility in Lawrenceburg, Indiana, and DIZO. got, you know, Crown Royal and they're like, you know, who got the better end of the deal on that because they can never make Pernod Ricard can never make that Lawrenceburg, Indiana distillery work, and they sold it to LDI. And that, you know, I became kind of like the source capital but so that would be ironic if they end up sourcing from wild turkey. 25:00 GP. 25:02 And I guess another question that kind of throw at you all about this is do we see, this is going to be a lot tougher game going into this, you know, we had Trey on the on the podcast before I last year and we talked to him he said like, Is it getting harder now with sourcing, like our people kind of trend in your territory or you are in had all these relationships for and now you've got people that are on your turf barrel prices are going up. How can you maintain, you know, with not actually having a distillery that can pump significant volume? You know, is this was this a good buy for per node like it? It's That's a tough question. I think. I think Brian kind of alluded to that and I wouldn't say that they're, you know, deep play or anything like that. I I still am a fan of Jeffersons. I still like the whiskey they put out. However, in regards of an operation, it might have been a kind of a weird acquisition in my opinion. Anybody have any thoughts of like, is 26:00 Is ditches they don't actually do a lot of distilling or heavy distilling, like Was it a good acquisition? Or is it just something that you know as Nick said to it, just maybe a brand recognition thing that you have to understand like this business is driven by brands like we look at things from where the liquid liquid comes from, but this business is really driven by like a name and they're like it or not, whether you if you if you follow it or not, the Jeffersons ocean is one of the one of the best like marketing ploys of of the last 1015 years and American whiskey. Now I remember asking, I remember asking Trey for to see a man manifest that was barrels at that it was going to punch me but you know, you've got you have some people who disbelieve in that it's the ocean barrel concept, but he does put them out there and it's been one of the best like my 27:00 And the conversations that are marketing boys, I've turned into conversations. 27:05 At least in my world, everyone's like is a real? Is it real? Is it you know, so it's it's one of those things that it's probably just just on that alone. And the fact that Jeffersons is, is everywhere. 27:19 I think it was a great, great acquisition for PR now. So there's another comment here from Dan wall ski, you know, he sees Jefferson's brand is probably worth the investment. However, he wouldn't be surprised to see it now eventually start getting separated from Kentucky artisan and then becoming like a visitor destination of its own now, it's a pretty good theory, I think for for what this could potentially be and where could go to think about the Kentucky owl situation, for example, you know, immediately it's the plans for a gigantic, gigantic park in distillery, you know, so are we going to see something like that? Is that going to be the growth plan for her, not in this 28:00 Or are they just going to keep you know, continuing with the brand as it is and sourcing and kind of doing business as usual? Be curious to see how that changes over time. 28:10 For sure, and I think you know, there's there's also something that kind of it kind of jogged my memory when I think about this when we look at you know, we had Corky was last week's podcast, we've had coffee from rabbit hole on and there's always like this. A lot of these CEOs they say a lot of the same things of like, we're never going to sell this is going to remain in the family forever. And then it's like, is it though like is it like is it puts a fat check in front of your face? Like it's got to be pretty hard to turn down. There's always a number. I agree. I think you have to look at you know, let's take a look at at those two particular brands. Kobe had a lot of investors. 28:56 Corky did all this with his own money and he's got 29:00 Trust lined up and everything, it always comes down to the money. And look man, I'm in business. I don't come from money. I've had to work for everything I've gotten. And when you sit down in a room with with money people, you know, they always want something. So, you know, you give up something to give up shares of your company or something to get what you want out of them. But this, you know, there comes a point where they're like, okay, we've had a good time on this fried where's our payout? We went out and that we want to cash out and so everything depends upon how your business structure is when you have these small distillers 29:41 you know one other one other in games is that like, this is Yeah, no, I agree. And I think for anybody that is ever getting into business like you always want to think like yes I do for the passion. I do it for the for the joy of what it is, but at the end of the day, if somebody puts a big fat check in front, your face 30:00 That's, that's part of the American dream too. So you can't you can't discount that. So, you know, as we kind of almost kind of switch gears a little bit. And this is one that I actually kind of like this one because Fred sent this a little bit before we started here. And this was the fact that 30:18 PBR is getting ready to start making their very own whiskey. So I will drop the link here into the chat. I'm also going to drop it into 30:28 the YouTube chat as well so you can kind of see it, but really what it is, is PBR is now making a whiskey that's been aged for a complete total of five seconds. So that should probably already kind of get your blood flowing a little bit. So they have recently talked about their have a new, hard sell to it's coming out with a percent. But now they're actually going to be doing a 40% whiskey. It's already 40% ABV that has been aged for five seconds. So Fred kind of talked about this one Fred does this. Make your blood boil a little bit 31:00 Yeah, I have two words for PBR. Fuck you. 31:07 Yeah, I think it's I think it's a, you know, PBR is trying to be trendy and they got some headlines with this. But you know, 31:20 given that we're, we have a brand that's raised, basically repackaged Zi Ma, taking over the space of 31:30 millennial consumption. And actually really, Why call penetrates the entire world right now. 31:37 Anything is possible with what will be the next big thing and PBR has got a big brand behind it and I just, I just wish they would, you know, 31:47 this is this is a mockery of whiskey so i just i hate everything about it. 31:55 Nick, do you share any the same the same feelings, you know, I 32:00 Always look, I do think it's interesting, it really created a buzz I think people who may not normally think about whiskey or bourbon or what they really are, you know, I think that just that buzz about that it's going to go into a container into an oak container, it's going to be aged for five seconds or, you know, whatever they end up doing with it, if anything, that's an awareness, you know, piece of will have number one, how good is it going to be, you know, so for somebody that is just doing shots at a bar, they never think about anything, you know, as far as you know, whether they like things that are you know, higher quality, you know, longer aged, etc. What am I really drinking? Where does it get its color from things of that nature? It may cause some people to kind of get curious about what's really there. And I think once people start getting educated reach the point of, you know, anybody who's listening to this or watching this right now, you know, you're obviously this is much farther behind, you know, where your journey started, or, you know, much farther behind where you are now where your journey started, but I think that's the interesting 33:00 part about it is kind of just that awareness. And what's probably a younger crowd that's going to be more, you know, 33:07 in tune with this or tasting this or whatever the case might be, you know, where it might make some people curious about exploring a little further and eventually getting to the point where they respect what's going on with the actual, you know, creation and aging and things of that nature. So I think it's interesting I don't hate it in the same way that I guess that Fred does. You know, Willie succeed. I don't know. You know, it's it's different than the beer in that sense of, you know, the beer. I see the market for this. I'm not so sure. I guess we'll see. Yeah, I think you look at it, like everybody wants to try to create something. And you know, what's PBR? PBR is not supposed to be some glorious luxury brand, right? Like this is supposed to be like bottom shelf like how like, How fast can we get this out the door and you know, really just churn product. And this might be following that same exact suit. I'm not too sure if this is supposed to be a a premium product by name. 34:00 Yeah, they're not trying to be premium and I guess from my standpoint it PBR five second whiskey has no impact on me whatsoever and I don't care about it. But I see where it's it's going like like Nick said it's going to be at the is going to be at the bar for a shot and hopefully it overtakes 34:22 you know, some of these other flavored whiskeys which I don't care about either as the you know, the new hot shot for college age through mid 20s. And then there's going to be a market for that and there always will be in my day it was Yeager Meister and you know, that's awful. 34:42 So, you know, knock knock your socks off, go ahead and do a five second whiskey. Try to sell it by by the shot to 24 year olds and I'll keep drinking what I've been drinking. 34:55 So you know, you talked about flavored whiskey there. Have you all seen the the new phenomenon of 35:00 screwball the peanut butter flavored whiskey. Okay, I think I had it first at your house to tell you the truth. But it started it's starting to catch on now like it's out here. Now I see it here. It's I mean, it's in all the forums, people are talking about it. It's like It's like the white glove whiskey right now. That was the first time I had it was bourbon and beyond last year. So I don't want to call myself a trendsetter. But you know, we did a 35:28 shout out to Tony from keg and bottle who actually gave me that probably about a year and a half ago. And he said, Kenny, I kid you not, this is going to be the next fireball. And so I mean, I guess a year and a half ago, he gave it to me and now all of a sudden, like people are buying and it's taken off a little bit, but you gotta like peanut butter, that's for sure. Because Yeah, definitely definitely has that. That flavor to it. Okay, then liked it or hate it. 35:55 All right, right position. Yeah. So So back to back to work. 36:00 whiskey. You know, there was something else that came out a few weeks ago on on geek calm, talking about the artificial tongue. Do y'all remember this? So I'll talk about it. So the artificial tongue can taste the light. Subtle, subtle, subtle differences. Wait, hold on. Wait, hold on. Okay, I got it. You don't have the art. I wonder what the artificial Tom thinks about the five second whiskey? I don't know. That's a good question. 36:26 I don't know if that's what it's really made for, though. Who knows? Right? I guess we'll find out one of these days. But this was built by Scottish engineers and it's ultimately made to sit there and try to find counterfeit frauds or anything like that. That's on the on the open market. And of course, you know, we talked about it with bourbon, you know, having counterfeit Pappy all the time and stuff like that. However, you're going to see this even larger scale in the scotch world as well. So Fred, what are your kind of thoughts on this artificial tongue? Well, I've actually talked to 37:00 Quite a few people about this who are like in a tasers role and I think most everyone knows I do a lot of tasting. And I think it's, I think it's great if it's not like, you know, stealing 37:16 that I'm curious to see like the data that like goes into it like how they how they create it, because I know of one like, you know algorithm that's out there that's been taking people's tasting notes and applying them to basically putting a collective 37:37 algorithm together of like white to say, from people various like if you're, if you're writing tasting notes on Reddit, or if you have tasting notes on a blog or anything that's scalable, there is now a there's some spiders out there that's out there taking him and they're applying them elsewhere. So, robot tasting, so if it's something like that, I'm not a fan of it, but if it's something that really 38:00 actually adds to the, you know, our world. I'm all for it. But, you know, the thing is, is like Canada, it's the right now their marketing is like spotting fakes. And that's great. But I wonder what their next iteration will be. Because, you know, 38:23 eventually it's going to be about like, you know, this is how you taste. So this is what you're going to like. And, you know, I think that's cool. Yeah, I think this could definitely lead to a lot of different things. I think. I think finding the counterfeits is a, it's kind of like a it's I don't it's like a gateway. Like, it's, I don't think it's going to have a large purpose at first. Like, I think you need to cover a little bit more blanket area here when you're trying to figure out exactly what can you do with this technology? It's got to be a little bit more uniform, a little more universal of actually how to catch on into the point where, you know, you know, Fred, you taste a lot, however, like, is this something where it's like, okay, 39:00 We've got six panelists that are humans and then our seventh is this AI machine, right? To make sure like, everything works like this out of this distillery, like, you know, we've been going for utilizing people for the longest time to you know, knows and tastes and actually understand what this what this is supposed to taste like and what typical batch it goes in, but we're human like what is human it's, it's you have error error is built in versus a computer. Whereas if you're feeding a data, like it's just computations, so you know, knicker or Brian, like, do you kind of see this like, much more spreading its way out into? Maybe distilleries should start looking into this time of technology as well. So I'm just waiting for the movie where artificial tongues go rogue, and one of them decides is going to go and replace everybody's whiskey with like rapid each whiskey because it's got the perfect profile and there's just insanity and chaos. You know. 39:59 I'm visually just look 40:00 is like little tongues across the street like just around like overtaken a rogue tongues. Yeah, rogue tongue, I think there could be great applications for it. You know, they just the question is, is it going to replace, not necessarily master distillers but you know, people that you know blend in in, you know, testing that takes place, you know, within distilleries, and producers, you think about kind of that non scientific nature of so much of this and even just tasting notes, like you're talking about, I mean, the very non scientific process in the sense and that's one of the kind of magical things about whiskey, you know, would we, you know, if there was inside each label or on each bottle, kind of like a very specific profile of a particular whiskey or almost a map that was scientifically put together, you know, would that be something that, you know, would enhance the experience to people want that, you know, is that the end result of what we're even, you know, kind of dealing with here? I think it's interesting from that aspect at the same time, I do think one of the 41:00 great things about whiskey is kind of the human and the art of whiskey. So it's almost a kind of a weird dichotomy of technology and, and kind of that, you know, our full human interaction that, you know, you don't want to see that necessarily overtaken but you do want to, you know, you do want to add you value when you can, you know, there's so many whiskies are so expensive, that I could definitely see a, you know, a value proposition for somebody to say, Hey, is this something I might like, you know, for example, or how do we design a better, you know, a better whiskey. I'm just really I'm really excited that there's been tech applied in 41:38 a valuable way usually, tech people apply it in the most into rapid aging or something that everyone's trying to fix that when there's really not a problem other than waiting. 41:51 But I'm just I'm just glad that somebody in the tech world is applying, applying their know how and skills to a very 42:00 particular area that we do probably could use some consistency. And I agree with Nick and I'll take it a step further though i mean i think while it's it's beneficial in some respects, to have this AI tasting because the AI is not can be thrown off with what you had for lunch or what you had for dinner. It's but it's on the other hand, it's going to be much more sterile of, 42:28 of an experience of a description of what you're supposed to be tasting. And so much as Nick said, is so much of drinking whiskey is the experience and it can change if you've got a steak versus something else. And it can change in the mood and I've been doing it presentation Fred did. Music can affect what you're what you're experiencing, and AI is never going to get to well Famous last words as never going to 42:58 have the experience 43:00 That you can have with whiskey and if I've got a piece of Gouda that I'm eating with it, AI is not going to be able to tell me again Famous last words how that's going to affect what what I'm experiencing at that moment. So it's it's nice but it's to me it's sort of like a party trick and we all know that Jim Beam or somebody would hack it to give like something like a legion like a 95 43:28 so now Brian, I'm picturing like, VR goggles, some scent thing going on here. 43:34 headphones with your favorite music, you know, you can certainly get right there. tastes and smells right at your at your disposal. Yeah, you see, a few Metallica, Metallica does that they have one of their tasters played various have everybody put on, you know, special headphones. And they have to taste like five different whiskeys. It's all their whiskey but they 44:00 People say like the whiskeys taste different based on the music they're listening to, and that there's news, new evidence that suggests that what you listen to has a much deeper effect on on how you taste. So I am definitely on board with what Brian just said there that the AI will never be able to pick out a more of a human element at least and probably in our lifetime. I think. I mean, I don't know, I think I think you're right, I don't think it's gonna have that human element to it. However, I think there's there's a lot of potential of what this could do in regards of thinking that you want to create more, say a brand that has a very, very specific kind of character. And so you take, you take one outside of a particular barrel, then you get a chemical breakdown of like the 30 different things that are in it. And it's like, you know, x percentage of something versus white percentage or another, and then you kind of figure out exactly Okay, I need this kind of percentages, and they all start equal now. 45:00 Alright, dump these barrels together. And now we eat. Now we kind of see this, this sort of specific profile that could be coming. So could be completely different in a way of building new brands versus just sitting there and saying like, okay, we'll just go and make sure this is this is this is not Pappy. This is just regular WO Weller. And you know, the thing about checking if something's fake or not, most the time when it matters, it's sealed, and you want to keep it that way. So that application is a bit of a struggle, you know, because you're probably rarely going to find a purchase contingent on you know, opening, pouring, tasting or testing or whatever the case might be. Yeah, how would you like to be the guy who just dropped $1.5 million on a bottle of McKenna gets a test and like, Oh, yeah, now. This is actually Glenfiddich, 12 year old, you almost don't want to know. 45:55 Like, no, just keep those things away. 45:59 Yeah, there's this 46:00 Definitely a bad side to that to it you know it as we start coming going down this path you know there's something news that happened last week. You know, there has been a tear on the secondary market lately like there's just groups are disappearing left and right. 46:17 The 2019 Kentucky's edge bourbon conference and festival pairs all things Kentucky with bourbon. It takes place October 4 and fifth at venues throughout Covington in Newport Kentucky. Kentucky's edge features of bourbon conference music tastings pairings tourists and and artists and market Kentucky's edge. 2019 is where bourbon begins. Tickets and information can be found online at Kentucky's edge.com. 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Their Dragon's milk beer is America's number one selling bourbon barrel aged out in 2005. They apply their expertise from brewing and began distilling beer barrel finished whiskey began production 2012 and rock house was the club is featuring it in their next box. The barrels come from Tennessee get filled with Dragon's milk we are twice the mature bourbon is finished and those very same barrels. Rocco's whiskey club is a whiskey the Month Club on a mission to uncover the best flavors and stories from craft distillers across the US. 48:00 Along with two bottles of hard to find whiskey rackhouses boxes are full of cool merchandise that they ship out every two months to members in over 40 states. Go to rackhouse whiskey club com to check it out and try a bottle of beer barrel bourbon and beer barrel rye. Use code pursuit for $25 off your first box. 48:20 There has been a tear on the secondary market lately like there's just groups are disappearing left and right. And even the secondary backup BSM group that was over on me we may way whatever it is, is that's now gone as well. So it's not like it's just Facebook, it looks like this is like a virus that's continually trying to spread and it's just getting knocked out sort of wherever it goes. Now don't get me wrong, there's still a few groups that are remaining You know, they're probably around like the two to 3000 member Mark but there's nowhere near even on the bsm on me was like almost 10,000 or above. So it seems that we're everybody flocks to 49:00 These are just getting can left and right. 49:03 Now I've tried to reach out haven't really heard anything of in regards of why it happened or anything like that. However, it just seems there's there's no safe haven right now. Do you all kind of see this as is this can be the new norm? Or is it just like, it's just hot for the moment? We'll have to wait ride this wave, and then maybe here in another three months, will we back up to where it was, is going to happen. It's just a matter of what in when. And it might change over time. You know, as we're seeing right now, it's certainly changing how the communication is done. Probably the bigger question is if we have these call it a period of a drought, for example, which is interesting, because this is happening, you know, before we start seeing some of the big fall releases and things of that nature, you've got to ask yourself is is that going to change the the primary market, you know, because how much of the primary market is driven by what ends up happening on the secondary market? You know, so a lot of people buying you know, basically 50:00 The idea that they're going to be able to turn around and sell for a profit, if that is no longer in place or that you know, you knock out 50% or some in reasonable percentage of the, you know, people that are able to do that or see their ability to do that. Does that start driving prices down on the primary? I think it'll be interesting to see how that you know, kind of goes over the the upcoming months here. Yeah, I think we're going to see this in Natalie. That is, I think Brad Atlas had a post that was on Blake's group, this past week of, you know, the the new each Taylor amaranth has been album release. However, nobody can figure out what a price should be on it because there's no room there is no place to auction off and figure out what's going to be even today. There were I think, like 72 birthday Bourbons that were sold at old forester distillery downtown to kind of commemorate the old forester birthday bourbon and George bourbon Browns birthday. However, I haven't seen a whole heck of a lot of them show up on anywhere. So you know, this 51:00 Is this could be a sign of the times that, you know, hopefully you're buying it to hold on to it because finding the outlets to sell it is getting a lot harder now. It's definitely interesting. 51:12 I, you know, I, I'm beta testing an app right now and I've been asked if, like, people can do that and I'm like, Well, you know, I have that I have to, like, seriously look at that now. And I'm thinking of like the potential liability associated with it. I'm like, 51:29 you know, maybe you don't know maybe in your chat your own little private chat group, which I can't see but 51:37 it's, it's fascinating to me. How this this domino effect and I would love I would love to sit down with Mark Zuckerberg interview request I put out many times by the way, never that I have a probably, but I would love to find out if like he's had a hand in or some on Facebook, haven't you know, I would love to hear the rationale behind it. But I know they 52:00 said some things but there's more to it, there's gotta be more to it. It just doesn't. just doesn't make sense to me, especially with this new, this, this new social media site dumping it so quickly. It just, it's odd. Just, it's gonna be coming down from somewhere else. I mean, fame makes you wonder if brands are involved. Sorry, brands, you know, if we've got brands or somebody specific, you know, with intent, you know, and is watching this more closely, and specifically, I think that's a great question. And they have been watching these markets for for some time because they would even like, you know, price their whiskey to, to combat it, but I would, I would argue that it may not be a brand behind it, but a very powerful retailer. You know, who wants that money 52:58 and knows that that money 53:00 He's out there they want they want your dollar. They don't want you to buy it, you know, SRP and then flip it. I mean, there's any number of areas this could go, there's any number of people who would like to see it stop. 53:13 But I do know this. I, I know that most of the like the state authorities don't really care. You know, I mean, I've talked to him about it, and they're really care, you know, but like Texas does, Texas cares, Pennsylvania. All the control states actually. But 53:33 you know, this is doesn't seem to be like, any kind of state leading it. 53:39 Yeah, I mean, I don't know. The control states, they don't want competition. And Sylvania doesn't want to know, what cracks me up about Pennsylvanians. Every year they send out a press release, and oh, we lost like three or four of them this year, or one was broken in and transport. And I'm like, wow, I bet it suddenly got lost on the 54:00 The state majority leaders front still front step and you know the bottle accidentally broke after it was consumed by the directors house in our at the directors house and me is just it's all kinds of silly with with Pennsylvania 54:15 well let's control states in general but you know I think when we when we look at just the secondary market you know we've talked about it in regards of like how this built a culture This is probably how bourbon has a mass to how big it is because most people wouldn't even know about a lot of brands if they didn't see them on the secondary markets begin with I mean it's we all have our stories so I think it'd be it'd be interesting to kind of see where this is going to go you know me when I look at it I think this was this is a critical and crucial part of really what made bourbon what it is today. And you know, there's going to have to be somewhere where people can basically value this as sort of currency maybe it's trading You know, I'm, I don't like to sit there and say like, yeah, go get a birthday bar, birthday bourbon, 450 bucks and go try to sell for 300 like 55:00 I'm not all about that However, it's like, if you get a birthday bourbon 450 yet, you can't get a George t stag this year. And that's just part of the trade. And that's great, right? That's, that's something that you are able to get your hands on, you can kind of trade your way there, you know, and start with a paperclip unit with a plane. But that's that's essentially like where I like to be able to see this because it's all about getting the, you know, the bourbon that you want in your hands and kind of how to get it. But yeah, I mean, I think you're right, but for to the point of like this, this help kind of like spread the enthusiasm. 55:33 I know like the people in the groups, if you if you put it on scale, you're looking at maybe at most like 2 million or something, at least the various groups that I knew of, and that's not a lot in the grand scheme of things. Those people who are like everybody's influencer in their families in their workplace, and they would be the people out there talking about bourbon so and it was the these groups kind of became community 56:00 Bs and I was, you know, I, I love them. You know, I love them because we're actually I love them five years ago, you know, they they changed quite a bit in the last couple years, but they were very, very engaging. You can talk history, you can talk about who distilled water like, I mean, I remember having a conversation with someone educating them about Woodrow Wilson, which if you don't know, he was a master distiller, it's it's a well or for a very short period. But you know, he made some good whiskey. And so I guess a, you know, as we start thinking of other ways of how is the bourbon market being hindered, you know, there's been finally some data that's now coming out about the US whiskey exports and the tariffs that are now happening over in the EU. So when we start looking at this, you know, I look at some of the data here and I'll again, I'll drop the link in the chat for folks that want to be able to see this. You can see all these links in our show notes as well. 57:00 But the distilled spirits council came and said that there was a 21% decrease from June 2018 to June to 2019. That was all lost sales after shipments to Europe plummeted. So we've got the data coming in. 57:19 You know, I know Fred, you're you're kind of close to this. Is there a way that things could eventually bounce back to help bourbon brains grow? And I will always say it again that if somebody says, Oh, yeah, this is great, because it means more bourbon on the shelves for me. You're in the wrong here. Okay. Think bigger. Well, there have been some really nice trade related things that have happened like in a couple weeks, I was invited to to meet the European Union ambassador to the United States. And they're celebrating scotch Irish and bourbon whiskey, the you know, the unique designations of them and like all the all the country 58:00 kind of coming together in Washington DC to celebrate this. And so, from an industry perspective, you know, they have the ears of their legislators, their ambassadors, their Parliament or whatever. 58:14 You know, Brexit also, you know, through a wrinkle into it. So in an odd way Brexit could be 58:23 you know, it could be good for for the tariffs, 58:27 you know, for that particular portion. But, yeah, so those are a couple of the good things but in in all seriousness, you know, they're not letting up you know, Europe is still very hell bent on applying pressure. And you know, there's been reports that they want to apply more pressure you know, in in in mitch mcconnell areas so I just, I just don't see this you know, being good and it's in it's shut out small brands like the topping Creek completely. And Kenny, I know you're a brand owner. 59:01 You know, you want to, let's say you want to open them. You have a small shop in Poland, who absolutely loves to show loves you wants to make you his number one whiskey in his store, you won't find a distributor in that entire country that'll take your call. You know, it's just because of tariffs, they don't want to pass that on it. They're just not taking calls from small American lyst companies. So 59:25 yeah, and I think this is this is, as I mentioned before, I mean, this is so much bigger than just what you can get here in the shelves like this is this is trying to grow the category as a whole to start taking on scotch as as, you know, the whiskey in the market. And we can't get to that level scotch unless you have a fair playing field, you know, across the board to be able to say like, okay, like, let's get this in the hands of people in Australia and Zimbabwe and China and, you know, in the EU as well, like, how can we grow this as a whole. And this is really where the tariffs are going to start really being that that first sort of 1:00:00 Hand slap, I guess you could say is, if you're trying to reach a new market, you know, all of a sudden, if you have a, if you got a 30 or $40 bottle here in the States, I mean, you're, you're looking at doubling that, if not coming close to triple as you start getting, you know, already just distribution overseas, but now the tariffs are adding a lot more to it. And if you can't compete with a, you know, 50 $60 bottle of scotch, then you're, you know, you're already setting yourself up for failure. And so, you know, as we start kind of rounding this out, you know, Nick and, Brian, I kind of want to get your sort of thoughts on this, if you have any sort of inkling of what do you kind of see next? Maybe, if it's an election year, is there anything that could change? You know, after that as well, Nick, you go ahead and go first. I was gonna I was gonna say the same. 1:00:53 You know, I, it's, I think it's tough to say what's going to happen going forward. I'd be really curious. 1:01:00 To see, you know, what small brands are seeing the impact of this right now? 1:01:06 Immediately, 1:01:09 you know, like anything, I think there's the initial shock of it, but then, you know, demand is demand. So if that means to 20% increase in price or whatever the case might be, if the demand is there 1:01:21 over time might cause that to, you know, to become a non issue. But, but it's a barrier of entry as a starting point. So when you think about bourbon growing on a global scale, and the potential it has on a global scale, you know, certainly that's a pretty 1:01:40 pretty immediate, you know, block of have taken that first step for a lot of you know, a lot of these brands on that larger scale. You know, what if you see this go on for a period of time, then suddenly it goes away, you know, do you have the opposite impact you have suddenly a flood of, you know, a flood of opportunity, a flood 1:02:00 brands that are saying, Okay, now this opportunity just opened up, we're going to put pressure on actually doing this. Because if you think about all the brands that are out there, especially the small ones, how many of them are actually taking those steps right now to get overseas? I'd be curious out of this 1000 or 1200 distilleries. You know, in the US, for example, how many you're saying, Let's get on the shelves in Europe, or let's get on the shelves in Australia or Japan or whatever the case might be? China, what's the market like over there? But it will be interesting to see how it plays out, you know, like anything, it's it's a global economy, we're going to see the push and pull. And I think ultimately, the long term play for bourbon for us whiskey is to be probably bigger than scotch, quite frankly, I personally think is better, you know, so there's no really no reason why it can't be bigger or at least just as big it's just a matter of time and what you know, things are going to have to move and shift around and what dominoes are going to have to fall in when 1:03:00 can't allow that to, you know, to really gain some momentum and happen. Bourbons got a long way before it catches scotch. And I'll tell you like, this is why this is why the tariffs are so frustrating to me is that, you know, bourbon became a unique product to the United States largely in part because they were trying to get special designation so they would not get tariffs after world to the country, the rest of the world basically tariff bourbon and open the open the markets for scotch to help the United Kingdom recover from World War Two because, you know, they were bombed and everything, they took a much greater hit on the physical real estate of their country. And, and so they were places like Argentina, you know, was terrifying us like 200% United Kingdom actually had like limits of bourbon that they would allow in the country for a given year. And when they would actually when the bourbon distillers would push to like, you know, have exports. You know, the French basically came back and said, 1:04:00 Why would we give you any kind of anything carefree when bourbon doesn't mean anything to us? Like you have no special designation, of course the French, you know being the home of cognac and Champagne has a very unique understanding of like designation for alcohol. And and so in 1958, they started the bourbon industry started banding together and working to make bourbon, a unique product in the United States. And after that in 1964, they then had the ability to negotiate and free trade agreements to peel away tar

Peggy Noe Stevens is an encyclopedia of great information about many bourbon brands. You may not know it, but she's one of the biggest influencers behind many of the great distillery experiences while on the bourbon trail and outside of the state too. Peggy is a pioneer in driving diversity with her leadership behind the Bourbon Women organization and involvement with women-led panels. Peggy is an incredibly talented person that has shaped the industry from being in front of people leading them at bourbon tastings and crafting one of kind experiences behind the scenes. Show Partners: At Barrell Craft Spirits, every release is intentionally unique, and can’t be duplicated. Once it’s gone, it’s gone. Find out more at BarrellBourbon.com. Receive $25 off your first order with code "Pursuit" at RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Use code "BOB2019" for discounted tickets to Bourbon on the Banks in Frankfort, KY on August 24th. Visit BourbonontheBanks.org. (Offer good through 6/30.) Show Notes: This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about Wikipedia. What is an experiential expert? Who have you consulted for these experiences? What value do you bring to these experiences? What was it like working at Woodford Reserve? How do you elevate the experience? How do balance the history with modern day innovation? Explain the difference between someone coming up the ranks in the bourbon industry vs. someone just taking it. What was it like when you were named the first female master taster? Do you feel like the media is better today that back then? What about diversity in the whiskey industry? Was Lincoln Henderson your Mr. Miyagi? What are you doing today with this master taster role? Let's discuss Bourbon Women. What was your inspiration for Bourbon Women? Tell us about the growth of Bourbon Women. How do you market the organization? What type of members do you have? What are visitors looking for in a distillery experience? How do you deal with a difficult person in the hospitality industry? How did you help pioneer the Bourbon Trail? 0:00 Did you actually consult him and say you should wear an ascot? 0:03 No, no, he he came. I want to make clear to all the audience that the Ascot was his idea. Are you suggesting I shouldn't 0:15 move forward with it? 0:27 This is Episode 204. of bourbon pursuit. I'm one of your hosts Kenny Coleman and per usual we have to go through a little bit of news on June 22. peerless distilling is releasing their four year bourbon. If you caught the Live podcast with Corky Taylor then you may have heard about it, if not no worries as it will be released at a later date. We are very excited for Corky Caleb and the entire peerless team for having the will to hold back sales until this product reached four years old. When we get a chance to try it. We're going to let you know what we think to Buffalo Trace to Hillary is now releasing their next installment in the old charter oak series called French oak. The old charter oak collection is designed to explore honor and celebrate the role of oak in making great whiskey. The oak tree is used in this brand vary from country of origin species, US date and even age there's century barrels that are being used from Oak trees that are 100 203 hundred years old. For this newest release Buffalo Trace contained a small number of barrels from France in 2007 and filled them with Nashville number one. This is the same Nashville used for standard Buffalo Trace Eagle were amongst a few others. The old charter oak is now been bottled and will be available for retail in late June. Last week, we ventured out to Barton for another 1792 foolproof selection, that they started out a little bit different than most because it was raining and there were storms in the area. That meant we had to do our barrel selection inside at the tasting bar at the gift shop instead of the red house because they don't allow people there during the chances of lightning. We made the best of it. And we had six barrels to choose from we narrowed it down to three. And that's I guess fortunate that we ran out of samples there with inside the gift shop. But wouldn't you know the skies parted and we got the sample our barrels inside the house to come away with a winner. After selecting it, we found out that it was barreled on to 29 which of course was a leap year. We were also joined by Father Matt, a fellow Patreon supporter and Catholic priests from northern Ohio, who blessed our bourbon for us to mean how often Can you say something like that happens, it was truly a memorable experience. If you want to join us on barrel pics, go ahead and sign up and be a part of our Patreon community@patreon.com slash bourbon pursuit. If you follow us on social media, you would have seen Ryan and I at will at this past Saturday. We've got big news to share. So you're gonna have to wait to hear more about that one. Let's just say we through 11 barrels and came away with two. That's enough for the teasers for now. For today's show, we have to just talk about Peggy because we love Peggy Noe Stevens, she's an encyclopedia of great information about mini bourbon brands. She was featured back on episode 198 talking about would influence along with bourbon and food pairings with the state as the rave. But this time we get to hear her complete story. You may not know it, but she's one of the biggest influencers behind many of the great distillery experiences that you get to see on the bourbon trail as well as outside of the state to Peggy is a major player when it comes to diversity in the bourbon world. She's a pioneer because she played a big role behind the bourbon women organization that we've also featured on the show previously. Peggy is an incredibly talented person that has shaped the industry from being in front of people leading them bourbon tastings to crafting those one of a kind experiences behind the scenes. Now with that, let's hear from our good friend Joe over a barrel burger. And then you've got Fred Minnick with above the char. 4:04 Hi, this is Joe Beatrice from Bell craft spirits. Every release is intentionally unique and can't be duplicated. Once it's gone. It's gone. Find out more at barrel bourbon calm. 4:16 I'm Fred Minnick. And this is above the char. When I was a little boy. One day, a man came to our house. He wore a suit, nice leather shoes, had a suitcase. He took my father to the table and pulled out a suitcase and dropped five nice leather bound books. He flipped him open. The pages were silky smooth to the touch. And he pointed at me. And he said, Sir, your son can learn the world through Britannica encyclopedia is my father very interested in my education. But the encyclopedias I just sat there for pretty much my entire life. I don't think I ever really looked Adam. Well, I might have pulled him out for a report here and there. But the encyclopedia man always struck me as like one of the greatest salesman in the world. And today, the encyclopedia is gone. So where do we go for information these days? Well, obviously, it's the internet. But there's one source in particular that seems to drive the conversation with most people. And that's Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not a site that I'm actually particularly fond of, because it crowd sources information. And a lot of the information is wrong to include people winning awards, you see a lot of political efforts there to kind of try to change people's Wikipedia pages. I have a Wikipedia page and you know, people go in there and tinker with that all the time. That's great. That is what it is. So side note, I was the most important Ascot where once upon a time someone else took that spot. But the fact is, is Wikipedia is where we go for information today as a society. Now go on there and look for Jimmy Russell, Jim Rutledge, Elmer T. Lee, Jeff Barnett, you name them any kind of prominent person and the American whiskey scene, and you won't find him. I don't know if it's the brand's fault for not trying to make sure that their iconic people are on Wikipedia pages. Or if it's simply that American whiskey hasn't really crossed over into the pop culture of the internet yet. But I think we really should change that. So if you have the abilities, get on Wikipedia today and add a master distiller go add somebody who's important to American whiskey. Because for a lot of people, if you're not on Wikipedia, you don't exist. And that's this week's above the char, hey, this idea came to me from a follower on Twitter, if you have an idea for above the char hit me up on Twitter or Instagram. That's at Fred Minnick again. That's at Fred Minnick. Until next week, cheers. 7:05 Welcome back to the episode of bourbon pursuit, the official podcast of bourbon, Kinney and Fred recording on site at one of our guests place. So we're actually honored to be on site again together doing this. But today that I had the opportunity of meeting Peggy few times, probably probably probably a few years ago was the first time and then the last time which I don't know if that's going to go out and recording depending on how this release counter is going to go but had the opportunity to record her at the higher proof Expo doing some stuff with bourbon and food and chocolate pairings and tasting and stuff like that. And so that was kind of like my really first time really meeting her and kind of knowing some of the the depth of knowledge that that she really had to offer. But, Fred, you've got even a more personal connection to our guest today. 7:54 Yeah. So Peggy, and I go way back and if it wasn't for her, hi would never have written the book whiskey women. And we've become friends. I would say, you know, I don't have a sister. She's the closest thing to a sister I have. And she's the godmother to my son Julian. So, so we are very close. And you know, when we talk about when we talk about bourbon coming back, you know, this woman has done as much for bourbon as anybody. She basically was a founder of the Kentucky bourbon trail. I mean, it was essentially her idea. She It was her idea to create the launch pad of the Kentucky bourbon trail at the Frazier museum. And she founded a little organization called bourbon women. And oh, by the way, she was the first female master taster. worked with a lot of iconic brands and like Woodford Reserve so she's very influential in this world of bourbon. And to me personally, just one of my best friends. Well, I think 8:56 I think we put up on a pedestal and padded that ego enough, we should probably go go ahead and introduce her. So today on the show, we have Peggy know Stevens, Peggy is the master taster and also an experiential expert. So Peggy, welcome to the show. 9:09 Thank you. I was thrilled to be on this, especially with you two guests 9:13 are you know, you you made it? All right, we're 100 and whatever episodes and we finally got you, and you 9:17 waited this long for me know if that's a compliment. I don't know why. 9:22 There was all these rejections because you know, Kenny and Ryan were just, they weren't, they weren't ready for you know, right 9:28 away. Yeah, we had to me to build our build our confidence is kind 9:32 of how it works. Actually, it's very true. They're, they're very sensitive to our various 9:38 crush your ego pretty quickly, there you 9:40 go. They'll look at the text messages. And you'll know exactly like how bad we can, we can really like hate ourselves. But anyway, I want you to first talk about what is an experiential expert, I have something I'm just going to guess that it has to do something with these these tasting pairing things that you do as well as a little bit. 9:57 I mean, that's part of it. Experience ensure, and a lot of people don't understand that word fully. But it's about the experience, someone has been interactive, hands on, you know, engaging a consumer touching them emotionally. It's all of those things. So for years and years in the beverage industry and managed visitor centers, and distillery operations for the consumer. And so through all of that, I learned how to really engage the consumer, whether it be on a tour or teaching or educating or food pairing. And so when I started my company 11 years ago, I decided that that's where I would put a big part of my focus. So I work with kind of the big boy brands and I work with craft distilleries all over creating experiences for consumers on a tour path. 10:47 And so give us an idea of who you've you've actually consulted for so when somebody goes in here, they're going to be like, Oh, I know that Peggy's had something to do with this place. Right? 10:56 Well, recent, most recent, I guess is the Luxe row distillery in Bardstown if you visited there worked with the Luxe family. And the Gosh, I guess that project was almost a two year project very enjoyable. And then the American steel house for Jim Beam. That was my very first project actually, when I started my company, and then that led to the urban still house, which we helped design, and also their Global Innovation Center, which we helped design the interior and what a distributor or retail would experience, you know if they went on tour there, so that was one of them. peerless distillery comes to mind which I have a little peerless today for you. after this is over, or during whatever you want. 11:40 A quarter we'll see what happens 11:42 a little bit on the victors project. And then of course, I go beyond the borders of Kentucky. So a couple Tennessee distilleries like old forge distillery, Thunderbird distillery, and have one up and coming, then it's going to be announced, I think very shortly, 11:58 will awesome. So I guess, one of those things that if somebody is trying to open up a visitor experience, you know, it kind of seems that there's, there's almost like a formula nowadays, you know, you have a little bit of history, get a little bit of retail, but what do you kind of bring to this table that they couldn't just go and say, well, I'll just go visit four or five places write down what I can find, and then we'll go build it ourselves, we need you to justify your job. 12:26 Well, I mean, technically, it is a process because I think that you have to design a visitor center and distilleries in phases, you know, from what is your story? You know, that's where I try to keep people grounded. Where's your authenticity? What do you want the consumer to care about? I call that the takeaway. You know, if you've ever gone on vacation, and you've had a great time, and you get back in your car, your airplane and you're headed home, you say, Wow, that was just a great experience, because you always have a takeaway. And that's what I try to get all of the visitor centers that I work with, to put their anchor in the ground and say, This is what we stand for. This Is Our Story, whether it be history related, or innovation related, or family related, you know, it just has to be true to them. You know, from that, we start to what I call three dimensional eyes it how do you bring that story to life, whether it be through exhibits, whether it be through the production process, or the engagement of the tour guide. And then once we design the exhibits, we work with architects and construction companies to help fabricate it. And after that point, you know, usually we're writing the script. So we'll help with script writing the product profile how we deliver a tasting 13:40 now, when you say script writing, this is like what when you say exactly like your word as much as I can. 13:46 That's right. We we are pretty granular in our business that we even teach the tour guides, how to tell a story, how to train and customer service, how to deal with difficult people on a tour. So 13:58 how to deal with Kenny, you're saying, Yeah, he one 14:00 that actually we teach how to throw out loud now? Yeah, but it's really no more. It's really soup to nuts. And that's what makes a great experience when you thread all of the things together that I just mentioned, because that's when you can say I had a surround sound experience. And so that's what we try to capture with consumer 14:19 DNA. When you had said like, you know, anybody can just open like a visitor center. To me, that's a little bit like, I've had a lot of people come to me and say, Oh, I can write a book on write a book. You know, that sort of thing. A lot of people think they can write a book. But then when they get down to writing a book, you know, they realize they can't do it at visitor centers are actually very complicated AR and and the United Kingdom, go around to the scotch whiskey whiskey distilleries, and you'll see how, how far ahead American whiskey visitor centers are from from those facilities. And actually, you kind of cut your teeth on probably what is considered one of the hallmarks of the bourbon trail and Woodford Reserve What was I did, what were those days like? 15:03 Well, I'll tell you I look back at my Woodford days is probably one of the best times of my life. 15:09 We're talking mid 90s. 15:10 Yeah, mid 90s and 1994 to be exact, and it was a two year renovation, give or take a few months. It was the brainchild truly allows Lee Brown, who I think was probably one of the most intelligent men that I've ever worked for, and worked with. And it was when the bourbon industry was having its resurgence that you know, we were seeing a difference in how we market and the consumer going back to kind of some of the retro cocktails. So it was perfect timing to create this vision for the distillery and so the beauty of it is the team that I worked with people like Kevin Curtis, Dave Sherrick, you probably heard those names. They were right alongside with me on the production level. And we were almost like a small entrepreneurial spirit ticket that Woodford Reserve to where it is the first year we opened. We were so thrilled we had 9000 people and we thought tremendous. And now it's well over probably 150,000 16:10 like in probably two weeks now. 16:12 That's right. But I was really fortunate. Because brown Forman gave me a really great pedigree. I was able to travel around with Woodford Reserve and see other experiences you just meant mentioned the scotch whiskey trail. I went to Ireland, Mexico, one of my fondest memories and one of the best still today for me, as far as an experience goes as a visitor centers choir vo literally we literally went out in the field with a machete and they taught you how to hack with the machete the A gob a plant in your in the dirt and it's hot and sweaty and gritty. That's an experience. You know. So those are some of the the small things that we learned, you know, to try to create Woodford and then I went on eventually to manage the jack daniels visitor experience and all the brand destinations, 17:03 I got an idea for you. So tell me you can bring it to bourbon now. Now you can say okay, we got to go out to the cornfield, you got to go get six Huff's of corn and you got to come back and you've got to get all the kernels off, and I'm going to give you a pest immortal and you gotta get what happened. Yeah, you gotta chop all these up, we're going to make your bourbon in one day. And that's 17:19 experience. That's it. I mean, that's experiential. Because see, I think the consumer these days are so well educated. They want to be entertained, they're dying to be entertained. And so all they want to do is participate with you. And I think that when the industry realizes that and they allow them to play a little bit at the distillery, it's much more memorable, 17:41 too much free labor to its its tracks, 17:43 it will put all the consumers on the bottling line. 17:46 Oddly enough, they'd be like, I'd love to exactly. But another question that kind of goes, I do want to ask you one more while we're on this topic, because you had talked about scripts earlier? Do you still? Are you trying to find people that are like, let's get away from the whole? bourbon 51% corn? Like, is this the same thing? You kind of hear repetitive over and over again? Now? Do you come through and say like, it's just part of like what it is you have to cater to the everyday person that might not know this? Or do you say like, well, maybe we can create an elevated experience that we can slide that in there. But let's not focus on like the basics for a lot of these people? 18:19 Well, actually, it's a little of all of that, I believe in tears of tours. And in other words, there's something for everyone. There's kind of your bourbon one on one tour, where you do learn some of the production methods, but then give the tourists an opportunity to go to that next level, maybe more of an intermediate tour where they dig a little deeper in the production process and the history and heritage. And then for the advanced lover, and true bourbon enthusiasts, you might have private classes or cocktail classes or so I really believe in those tears. It's just a matter of convincing, you know, the distillery that one size doesn't fit all, you know, that you really have to offer because our consumers today, I think it's more demanding than ever, don't you, Fred? I 19:03 do. And they also like to call things out more so than ever, and I certainly more avenues for them to do that. And you got Yelp, you know, you've got Google reviews, and then you certainly have the podcasts and the bloggers and that's right. And one of the things that typically comes up from these, some of these smaller groups that come out, they kind of create, they create a story, and then they talk about it on on their tour. Let's take Boone County, for example. They They told 19:30 us one of my clients actually, 19:31 yeah, that's right. I knew that and they use that heritage. And you know, some people, they're just like, just talk about the whiskey, we don't care about the heritage, we don't feel like it's, you know, genuine to buy this brand or anything. So do you do you ever? How do you balance that, that effort to, you know, to bring out like a cool story. And, you know, staying with, you know, the contemporary desire to not create false back stories. 20:01 I agree. And and I think it's what we all do or try to do is we have to respect our history, because even though it might not have been history of the whiskey, it was history of their culture, and their surrounding area. And that's what Boone was, you know, they talk about their culture of their backyard. And then they tied in, you know, to the whiskey, and so, respecting the history, but then also have any appreciation for the modern day and innovation. You know, where are we going today? So I think it's what I call a balance, kind of a juxtaposition between between past and present. And that's what you have to bring together. 20:37 Okay, we see a lot of these brands that, you know, talk about, like my grand Pappy carried the yeast back on this toes from the Atlantic. And that's not balanced. You know, that's, that's, that's too far. And so like, if you're, if you're in the boardrooms, and you're saying, guys, you can't do that, then God bless you. That's right. You know, because we, we've gotten tired of that over the years, and we still see it, but it's not as prevalent as it was, I'd say 10 years ago. 21:04 And I think because of all the craft distilleries, you know that I work with and for, I try so hard to say it's okay, if you're sourcing whiskey, just say so, you know, tell them where you're getting it, why you chose the barrel stock that you did, how long it's going to be before your product comes out. Because I think authenticity is really important. And that's another reason why I think the tourists don't want to go to distillery after distillery and say, 51% corn, because everybody's going to say the same thing. And it's just dinner in a movie. 21:37 Let's jump on that authenticity thing for sure. Get some of that. Some just hit me, Kenny. You know, we're in this. We're in this day and age where anybody can come in and say they're an expert, a bourbon. You actually became a master taster at Brown Forman. Explain to us what the difference between someone coming up the ranks in the industry and earning that title and and then someone just taking it? 22:07 Sure. Well, I think that in our industry, what so many people don't understand is that we didn't have a formal definition of for example, if you wanted to be a CMO, yea, then you do all the credentials associated with that you take all the tests and you become a summer. Yeah. You know, in our industry, it's kind of truly up to each and every distillery to decide titles of vocabulary credentials, and master distiller is very different than master taster. Master taster is very different than master blender. But each distillery is going to set the guidelines and training, you know, to advance an employee to become in that position. So again, I think I was in the right place at the right time. Lincoln Henderson was the master distiller at Woodford at the time. And I believe it was about 2001, where the general manager of Woodford Lincoln, they thought I had a really good palate, I kind of have a bit of a culinary background. So I think in food terms, and I think that helps so much and identifying and descriptive whiskey. So I had written the tour understood production, I have a bit of a science mind. So they asked me if I would formally trained with him to become a master taster at the time and my naivete. I think I didn't realize that there were no women master tasters in the industry, if you can believe it. So of course I was eager, you know, to learn love doing tastings really respected Lincoln, in his knowledge and years of experience. So we would do you know, sensory training, we would you know, drill barrels and, you know, pulled from it, and he would teach me the different aspects of that, I had to do quite a quite a few things in the production area. And it's kind of like the whiskey, you know, you're not ready till the master distiller says you're ready. And after a certain period of time, that's when they gave me my certificate. You know, it was putting the newspaper and that's when I first found out when it hit the newspaper, it hit the AP. Oh, wow. And went across. And it is big news, that a woman has become a master taster. In a male predominant, you know, predominant world. And the that's when it hit me that this was really something more special than I ever dreamed than ever thought. And I'm happy to say now there's many master tasters, Master distillers master blenders that are female, I just happened to be, I think, in the right place at the right time that that happened. 24:37 Share with us the 24:40 when that news broke the DJ who called you? 24:45 Well, when I mentioned AP, right, hit the AP, so 120 newspapers it hit. And of course, there was so much interest from radio stations, TV stations. And it was something I wasn't, I don't think I was quite mentally ready for in the fact that there was a particular radio station kind of a shock jock that wanted me to come and do a series or not a series but an interview rather. And they were kind of getting a kick out of the whole piece of the newspaper article that said, she doesn't swallow. You know, she swirls and spits. And they kind of wanted to play on that a little bit. And I remember that, that's when it hit me that I was going to be different. I was not going to go along, just get go along to get along. And I said no to the interview. Because I didn't think that that was going to ever be my persona. And that's not what I wanted to be known for. I wasn't going to joke along with it. I wanted women to be taken seriously. And in a way like men would be, you know, and I don't think there'd be too many radio stations that would ask a man to do that. So I said no to the interview. And, you know, it wasn't very favorably received. But so Obama stood by my values on that. 26:06 Do you think we're better today than we were? From a media perspective? 26:12 I think not really, from a media perspective you ask? So I don't think so. But I guess I want to expand that not just to whiskey. I think on a media level, there are plenty of reality TV shows that, you know, try to get the worst of you the angle to make you not look great. I think there are plenty, you know, of Facebook video, you know, you see this all the time in social media that someone's captured at a certain moment, YouTube video, all of those things. And so No, I don't think media is better about it. But it goes beyond whiskey. 26:54 Yeah. What about the whiskey industry? Is it obviously we've seen growth of diversity. But you still, I still get the sense from from from women, that it's not where they want it to be. In terms of the diversity, 27:12 right, I think we are on a great trajectory right now, I think there's never been a better time for women to be in our industry. The amount of executives and vice presidents CMOS presidents of the different distillery or spirits companies, it's really enlightening, and I'm so glad to see it. So there I think putting women in better positions has certainly improved. Look at the production side of things, we have more master distillers that are women. All of that's wonderful. My question, I think, to the industry is really, once you're out in the field, and when I say out in the field, as far as sales representatives go that are female, you know, marketing representatives who do kind of the day to day job of beating the streets and going to bars and restaurants and it's more of how are they treated these days? You know, that's that's the question mark for me. But I know, you know, internally, it has definitely improved as far as positions go. 28:15 Yeah, I can kind of see that. I can kind of see what you're saying. Because you're still going in to even probably the more male dominated culture of liquor store owners and retailers and bars and stuff that yeah, these people have to go and they have to sell their product. I have to probably put up with some shit every once in a while to I'm sure that's probably not far from the case of what you're what you're what you're hinting at here. You know, one thing I kind of rewind a little bit about that you had talked about going up and becoming the master taster with inside of just Woodford or brown Forman in general what was 28:48 Woodford Reserve decision with Woodford Reserve specifically, 28:51 kind of talk about what those that individual process means are like how was how was Wes? Like, your your Miyagi, if you will? How does he mean like in Lincoln? You mean like it? Oh, sorry. Sorry. How was Lincoln? I'm sorry, I apologize. How was Lincoln kind of like your Miyagi here and your Daniel son, if you will. So the wax on wax off sort of scenario, 29:10 he got so caught up on that scenario, that Miyagi? I know, I forgot. 29:16 It was like, it's like from The Karate Kid, you know, you gotta have you know, and you're maybe maybe a Yoda, if you will. Yeah. 29:24 Well, again, Lincoln to me was was so refreshing every time he came to Woodford Reserve because he wanted to be as much a part of it as anybody who worked there. And he was the master distiller, of course, but you know, had to go back and forth to Louisville, he traveled around the world, you know, worked a lot in Japan, etc. And every time he came in, we would have great conversation, he was a foodie. So we always had that culinary tag that we appreciate a good food, good whiskey. And I have to say he was so well liked by the tour guides, and in the management, because he always had just as calm demeanor. And the reason why I tell you all that is because I think that really helped me when I was learning because he took the time to explain things, the very first time that we met formally to train, this was my first lesson, he had a box of toothpicks, and a glass of water. And then he had all these empty glasses, and I thought, oh, we're just going to taste a lot. And he, as he was talking, he was breaking up the toothpicks and putting them in water. And it's the most bizarre thing I'd ever seen. And I just didn't understand it. And he goes, he goes, I'm gonna let this sit for a minute, okay. And I said, Sure, you know, go ahead, no problem. And then he came back to it about, you know, 10 minutes later, and he goes, smell this playing glass of water. I noticed it. And then he goes, nose, nose, the one with the the toothpicks in it, and I noticed and he goes, do you see the difference would can make? And it was just this? Was he trying to mess with 30:51 me as he means? Well, 30:52 I mean, it was just, it was just his way of teaching and Little things like holding a Glencairn glass, you know, in the small disk that goes on top to keep the aroma, and he would teach me how to move it back and forth, so that I could look, you know, like an expert, you know, tasting it and turn it off. And then putting it back on very quickly 31:14 reminds me of like somebody at the poker table, they're just roll the chip in their in their hands or something. But 31:18 but exactly, that's exactly where the basic so I guess what I'm saying is, I really honored the fact that he brought me to the basics. And then little by little, you know, we advanced her way into the distillery where I was drilling barrels and pulling samples and tasting. And so it was it was really a progression, I guess, is the best way to answer that question. And, again, it wasn't ready till he said, she's ready to conduct the tastings and send around and do tastings. 31:46 What are you still doing today? In regards of a master taster role? Are you actually helping with other distilleries in this sort of thing like trying to dial it in of what they should be releasing or what their barrel should be at? 31:57 I absolutely do several different levels for some spirits judge for the American distilling Institute. So every year, I go and taste product, you know, from craft distillers and rate it and sometimes identify if it's, you know, has been in the barrel too long or still was dirty, or the grains were mold, you know, so we have to give a lot of feedback. And that's kind of tricky. 32:20 That is, that is tricky. I gotta say that that job is that particular competition and that style of competition. God bless you don't do that running. 32:32 But I also think before we get too far from there, I also want you to kind of explain when you just said, How can you tell if something if the if there's something moldy in the still like, how can you How can you get that from the distillate, or I think everybody knows that it hasn't been in the barrel long enough, 32:48 it's a taste. For example, if this still isn't clean, you know, really clean, I can taste kind of wet corn husk that tastes kind of moldy. To me, there's a rubbery taste, you know, and that's, that means something else. So it's all in what you have memorized in your sensory, you know, as a good or not so great taste. And that helps guide me, any anybody who is interested in knowing how to taste, I try to break it down and say it's really pretty easy. It's about food memory, if you know food flavors, you know, like what burnt tastes like? Or what real great savory, juicy steak tastes like, you know, you can equate food flavors to whiskey tasting. And so the American distilling Institute, which we have tons of fun, you know, we have about 70 judges, I think now that come. So that's one area and then for my clients, I do tasting profile. So if it's a new product, I will actually dissect the flavors and come up with the vocabulary to describe it. And then teach the tour guides, you know how to deliver tasting. So that's a job that I do. And then of course, doing food programs, food and bourbon programs, food and spirits programs. food pairings are kind of my specialty. And that's probably what I enjoy the most. When I'm doing tastings. 34:15 Well, there's one other thing that she applies for tastings. Joe went out, tell me she writes for bourbon plus, yeah, well, 34:21 how can I possibly get 34:23 she does tasting notes for the magazine? Yes, 34:26 I do tasting notes for the magazine and do ratings at times when I'm asked but I really have enjoyed that. Fred's taken a very different way of approaching descriptions of food pairings and bourbon pairings. And so I've, I have really latched on to that, because that's, that's my joy. That's what I really enjoy is describing flavors and whiskey. 34:49 So talk about a typical thing that when you are trying to do a food and a whiskey pairing, or food and bourbon pairing, I mean, is it like, okay, on your left, we've got shrimp and grits next goes well with bullet or we've got this and that, but kind of kind of just walk through what's around on a plate here and how you would share? 35:06 Well, the first thing that I tried to have people do is just dissect the whiskey flavors in general. Because if you don't know what you're dealing with, there's no way you could possibly decide on what food that it's going to go with. And then I created something a long time ago called balance, counterbalance, and explosion. And the balance side is simply when you take the whiskey and you taste a particular flavor of the whiskey that's, you know, pretty predominant. And then you match that flavor. Let's say it's Apple, you match that flavor to the food and so it let's say it's Apple, you know, so a slice of Apple, you taste apple in the bourbon. So it's a balance nothing's overshadowing anything. Then counterbalance is when you take a food flavor or descriptor from the whiskey and you try to do something completely opposite. Very similar to if you were drinking a Riesling wine and eating occasion pecan. You know the reasoning is so sugary sweet that it takes over the spice of the Cajun pecan kind of dousing it. You can do the same with bourbon, with really heavy caramel notes and vanilla notes. I could take an Asian dish and have my bourbon with Asian food because it's actually going to that caramels going to wrap around that spice and it's lovely. And then a explosion is when I want to really do surround sound tasting and I might take a great for example, you know I've got a bottle of peerless here I'm I take a great chocolate note out of peerless rye, and then I'll have a really chocolatey, you know, truffle or majestic to go with it because it's almost like too much of a good thing. You know, you're trying to create a flavor that you can't even believe it's taken over your mouth. And that's explosion. 36:54 Fred, did you know that you can pair bourbon with egg rolls? Because apparently you can. 36:59 The only thing I have now I've been able to successfully pair bourbon with has been like fishier styles of sushi. Like I compare bourbon really well with salmon but like, like, let's say a spicy tuna roll. I've not been successful and fine. I've been able to pair a scotch with that, but not a spicy 37:19 scotch is so easy with seafood because it 37:21 really is. Yeah, but there's not. When it when it comes to some of those more flashy or tunas. When you hear those spices, they're hard to pair to. 37:33 I mean, most of our listeners, they would say well of course you want to go at Jefferson's ocean and because apparently it's supposed to bring in this briny, salty taste to it what would what would be your response to that? 37:43 Me? Well, I or or Yeah, I think Jefferson's ocean is 37:50 sometimes it has brightness to it. Sometimes it doesn't. I don't always get it. 37:54 Well, I remember I was very skeptical. The first time I heard you know valve and putting it on the sea, all of this and I thought you know what, I'm going to taste this thing. And surprisingly, salt is not a descriptor that I use ever when I'm doing whiskey profiles. And I will tell you, I really do get a little bit of that sea salt taste 38:16 as I did in the later batches, I it's been inconsistent for me. 38:20 So what I try to do if I'm if I'm pairing with Jefferson's is not to overdo the salt. You know not to have a real savory dish to pair it with because I think it can overtake 38:34 so go ahead. I you know, we're I don't want to get too caught up in all the tasting side of things because we really want to talk about you know, bourbon women. 38:49 Do you love bourbon? How about festivals? Of course you do. So join bourbon pursuit in Frankfort, Kentucky on August 24. For bourbon on the banks. It's the country wells premier bourbon tasting and awards festival. You will get to taste from over 60 different bourbon spirits, wine and beer vendors plus 20 food vendors all happening with live music. Learn more about bourbon from the master distillers themselves that you've heard on the show and enjoy food from award winning chefs. 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And, you know, your company was a consulting company you've you've been a you know, personal consultant. Yes. image consultant. By the way, She's the reason why I have a beard. 41:14 I told you I've been trying I've been trying with 41:16 Fred This is this when he was baby face when he had the goatee and you're like, you gotta you gotta grow it out some more. Or is it actually 41:21 it was it started with the goatee was the other It started with a goatee. And I said fill it in and fill it in. But yeah, that's one of I am an Image and Etiquette expert. And, and believe it or not, that's come in very handy because I work in the hospitality industry. And so it's about the look and feel of your employees and professionals. So Fred's 41:43 con wrote a book on it. 41:45 I wrote a book called professional presence. And I teach on that still, you know, too many organizations and corporations, but 41:53 when she's with bourbon groups, she just throws it all out the window. 41:56 Do I Do I dress down? No, I'm just so last thing is I 42:03 usually wear a coat and tie to see me today. 42:05 I did not Yeah, but I also usually wouldn't know which one of the nine spoons I'm supposed to use that are in front of me sometimes at a nice dinner as well. 42:12 Well, and you know, it's funny that you say that because that's where the bourbon industry is just been great because it's so approachable. And even though I'm an etiquette expert, and I had a woman at bourbon and beyond from California came up and she goes, Peggy, you're the Emily post of bourbon. And I kind of got a kick out of that, because I wasn't trying to take that she was no, you're really teaching us. You know how to do things and use things. But one thing lesson I've learned from all these master distillers who I really admire is to make it approachable, you know, teaching people what they can do and how to enjoy it, but not making it intimidating for them to enjoy it. Because we don't want to make it untouchable. 42:51 Scott's dictating 42:54 to listen, and he says his way or the highway. 42:57 So the inspiration for bourbon women? Yes. What was that? 43:01 Well, I think bourbon women, for me personally, my inspiration was when I was still working for Woodford, because I would travel around the world. And when I would conduct tastings, nine times out of 10 predominantly male, which was fine that there'd always be like a little trickle of women in the back. And they would only come up to me, after the tasting was over to ask questions, you know, or ask what I do for a living or, or expand a little bit more on my career. And I always found that very odd that they wouldn't raise their hand when a lot of the men would be flooding me with questions, you know, during the seminar. And then I attended a women's weekend and Kiawah Island. And again, this is back in the 90s, early 2000s. And it was a women's weekend not about whiskey. It was just a women's weekend where the hotel was doing different things, excursions etc, shopping, the normal thing, and they asked me to come in and do a bourbon tasting. And when I got there said how many women It was probably 100 women in this room. How many women enjoy bourbon? No one raised their hand. Nobody, no. Time is over. But then I said, Well, how many of you drink margaritas? They all raise their hand? Oh, yeah. Now we're talking Now we're talking. And I said, I'm going to teach you something now that I think you'll appreciate. You know, when you have a shot of tequila in front of you, you're probably less likely to drink that than you are to have a margarita. I said so we're going to start slow and I'm gonna teach you how to taste bourbon, and what cocktails you can put in bourbon. And then maybe you'll decide, you know, the Bourbons okay for you. And by the end of the night we were singing New York, New York and doing the cancan. Yeah. Yeah, it was it was wildly successful. The women had son, they loved it. And so I think that was part of my inspiration. Also, another event that I did, when I was at Woodford, I have a picture of it actually with Lincoln. We did a women's group, cigar and shopping night. And women came from all over Kentucky to attended Lincoln gave the tasting. We had a cigar aficionado there, you know, showing you how to smoke a cigar and then we shopped and it was wildly successful. So in marketing, because I was in marketing for so long, we'd be waving the flag saying there are all kinds of women out there that want to be part of our franchise, but marketing dollars or marketing dollars, and the demographic skewed always to the mail. And it was just really never took off. So when I started my own company, and there's a long way of explaining it, but when I started my own company, I said I'm gonna start my own damn thing. And so with bourbon women, I did focus groups across Kentucky, and I grabbed some really great friends and then in over Manhattan's, we said, you know, let's, let's test the market. Let's test these women. Let's see if they'd be enthusiastic about creating a platform a conversation. So we did the focus groups, I got all my research together, and I went to go see the one man in this industry who would tell me the truth. And that was Bill Samuels, and I sat down with Bill Samuels, and I said, Bill, I have an idea. And he was always great about listening to me, he truly was, even though I worked for Woodford for years, I was in my own company. He didn't have time, you know, to talk to people like me. But I sat and I showed him all the things that we did with focus groups, and he was like, You know what, I think you've got something here. He was the one I used the word earlier conversation. He was the one that said, Peggy, you're starting a conversation. That's what you gotta do, you're gonna start a conversation with these women. So that gave me all the power I needed to know that it must be something there. So we did an inaugural event at the governor's mansion. Fred was in attendance and you should tell that story actually. 46:53 Speech 46:53 Well, when when we gave the speech and in the catalysts for wisdom women. Okay, so 47:00 yeah. So when she, when she had came up with this, this idea to do bourbon women, she one of the things that she would talk about was like women were some of the early distillers and they were always a part of the industry. And kinda you know, how it is when, you know, kind of my calling card, especially at that time, was to find, you know, kind of call people out a little bit. And I was looking into that. It's like, when I saw that when she told me that all right, I'd saw it. I said, That's not true. You know that, you know, no one's ever written about this. There's never been any, any ads. Like I was like, surely if there's this is true, then brands would be all over you, we'd have all kinds of brands named after women. And I started looking at she was right. And not only was he right, I found women that the brands didn't even know about. And so I said, not only is this awesome, I have a book here. And so that was kind of the catalyst for what became whiskey women. And really at that book more than anything propelled my career to where I am now. But it all We joking, I 48:06 just want to say I haven't made a dime off that book. I don't have commission I don't have I don't have title. I don't have anything. movie rights. I don't have anything maybe 48:16 maybe Oscar Oh, like playing the NBA or something. 48:20 Oscars Fred son, by the way, it's my godmother. It's probably gonna be five, six. 48:24 Yeah. Likely, let's see can dribble Really? 48:26 Yeah. Well, the anomaly. 48:29 Beauty of that whole story, though, is that Fred was unlocking something that he couldn't believe no one had. And so I was unlocking something that I knew needed to be unlocked. Yeah. 48:40 And no, that was in that moment, that that's like, you know, you look back on life. And you know, there's probably a dozen moments where you're like, that will always stand out. And that was one of them. And to be honest with you, if you did not run with that, you know, I because now what Berber women was the first but now they're probably we 30 women centric whiskey groups. Sure. 49:03 National. Absolutely. 49:05 And it started with you. 49:07 Thank you. I appreciate that. We're really proud of the fact we were the first female consumer group to talk to the industry. And now we're in six cities formally. We have thousands of women across the United States that attend we've done over 200 events, if you can believe. And then we have our annual what we call sip podium, si p symposium 200. Women came in from 23 states this year to Kentucky to go on excursions, learn about whiskey, bourbon, the culture and heritage that surrounds our great state. And it's been I don't know how else to say it. It's more than networking. It's more than educating, which is what we stand about. But it's empowering. And these women come together from all over they've never met each other and the camaraderie and that's why I always say, bourbon brings us together. Yeah, it's a universal welcome. And bourbon women's not a demographic. We're a psychographic. You know, it's these women are love soft adventure. They're curious. They have bravado, confidence, a lot of them are really just professional women who want to have a little bit of an escape, you know, from the normal business life. It's been probably I would say one of the best things I've ever done in my career. 50:26 One of the things to Kenny that she's that they're doing is that they are getting data from their, from their members and what they released some data recently about where they like to go well, on the bourbon trail, right. And that was stunning to me. He was like, 50:43 Yeah, what do you think about that? I was 50:45 shocked. It was it will. So it was Maker's Mark and Buffalo Trace, they were kind of neck and neck. Those are the two that I always recommend. But then after that was like, who wasn't on there that shocked me like we didn't see us. That's a Weller. You know, we do didn't really see any of the craft brands. Woodford had a small pie, small piece of the pie. It was it was very stunning to me, like what was appealing to bourbon women. From a tourist perspective? Well, 51:12 I'm glad you brought that up. Because one of the things we do do is pride ourselves on some of our research. And what we're trying to do is kind of debunk the myth to the industry. This is part of our mission that you have to pink, a whiskey for a woman to like it. And so what we found universally, whenever we do tastings with the women, or whenever we're at an event, and we're doing surveys or blind tastings, they undoubtedly choose the spicier, more robust, and higher proof bourbon is a 51:45 memory serves. Booker's almost always wins these things. Yes, 51:49 yes. And also, heaven Hill did one more the Elijah Craig, barrel strength, oneness. So that's part that's really that's information that helps the industry because again, you don't have to dumb it down for women. They like it like you like it. 52:05 So as long as Jim Beam and Heaven, Hell are listening, you figured out a new target for these brands, you know, 52:09 our cohorts coming 52:11 along? We're seeing more, 52:14 or any our co host Ryan, you know, he like he's not here, but he he secretly likes flavored whiskey. So I don't think he would want the brands to listen to that part. 52:25 The other question I kind of wanted to roll with this as well is, you know, we've talked to groups about how they start. bourbon societies and stuff like that talk about what the the growth was here. And was it? Was it small growth at first, did you plateau? In the past six months? Have you seen a hockey stick? Kind of what did this look for 52:47 bourbon women? Yes, I would say we shot off like a rocket when we first began. And then just like when you're selling whiskey, it's easy to get into distribution. But then you need pull through or retention, you know, you need that second order. And because we were in Kentucky, I mean, it shot up. But until we went outside the borders of Kentucky we plateaued a little bit. And then once Indianapolis came on, you know, Tennessee, DC, Chicago, in these other cities wanted to be part of this. And that was the unexpected. I never designed bourbon women to be something that we make $1 off of. I never designed bourbon women to really be a national organization. It was it really wasn't there for me at that time. The women spoke to us, the women demanded it. And we listened. And we we stepped up and we said, okay, we're going beyond the borders of Kentucky. And that's when we really took off. 53:48 How are you marketing it nowadays? 53:51 Well, nowadays, of course, largely through the internet, largely through our website, invitations. We have branch ambassadors in each of those cities that I mentioned that are creating events for women and excursions that they can go on. So that's a big piece of it 54:06 are using like meetup com or something. 54:08 We we do event bright we do. You know, it might be what we call meet needs, which are just real simple meet at a bar and have some cocktails together just to enjoy camaraderie. Or it might be a really formal event. You know, 54:21 you said camaraderie, they're looking to make new friends in a new city. So So kind of what is that? What is that profile nationality is 54:28 the the freshest information I have is just us coming off a symposium in August. And it really took me back because the women I were meeting, they'd been to the last five symposiums and they keep coming back and coming back. But this time, for example, we had a woman that brought her five nieces, you know, all female nieces that were 21. And over. And they made an excursion of it. You know, there was an aunt, or I'm sorry, a mother, who brought her her mother and grandmother to this event. We have a mother that it brings the daughter who just turned 21 we have women's weekends, where a bunch of girlfriends are getting together, and they want to go away. And we're the tickets. So we're seeing all kinds single married, Grandma, you know, young 21, who just got her her, you know, driver's licenses says she can drink now. So all of those things, all of those things, it's a combination. 55:24 So it was there. Is there one that kind of fits more the bill than the other? Or is it just 55:29 say that, but we're all across the board. We are all across the board in age, we're all across the board. geographically. We're all across the board from mother, grandmother daughter. And, and I love it. I think that's that to me, said, this is how women come together. 55:48 Are you trying to do something that's that's unique as well just for just for an all female audience versus something that would just be for a general bourbon meetup? 55:56 Well, what's so interesting to me is more and more we're seeing and more men come to our events, because they think we do very buttoned up events and a very deep in the education, which is part of what we do, and we're proud of. So we're seeing more and more men, so men can come to it. But as far as the camaraderie of the women who are coming, it's the it's what they want it they get as much as they want, how they want it. 56:24 So I kind of want also rewind a little bit to some of the had some questions that were lined up from some of our listeners about distillery experiences and stuff like that some things that that they kind of wanted to know. Sure. And in one of them was kind of thinking about, what do you really feel that visitors are looking to get away from an experience there? Like you mentioned earlier, that they want to come away with some some vivid memory? Like, what, what else? Is there something that is? Maybe it's physical, maybe it is intangible? What else do you think is missing there? 56:57 Well, I you know, I've been in hospitality for 30 years. And when you really boil down hospitality, it all goes back to human needs. You know, everyone wants to be heard or listen to or feel appreciated or feel special. Those are human needs. And so to your question, you know, I think aside from saying I had a great experience, when they meet a tour guide that treated them a little bit differently. That's a great memory, 57:25 or they Eddie Johnson's the best ready 57:26 Johnson is magic. I mean, he's magic. That's what he does. So well, I don't care what level of person he meets, where they're from, what they look like Freddy Johnson's gonna make you feel like you're the only person in the world? 57:41 Do you think he could probably just go out and start consulting? 57:44 I don't think you can. I don't think he can teach what he has. 57:48 It's really an art. Yeah, it really is as much as we do customer service training at different distilleries, and it's an art. And I can almost tell the people who have it or don't after doing it this long, but to me, it's about human need, and making you feel like you're the only person in the room. And that's really what so many of our master distillers have done over there like Jim or Jimmy Russell, to me, I call him the gentleman distiller. He was always in Fred and I just did bourbon and beyond, you're on stage with us for the Jimmy Russell tribute. And that's what I quoted was, he had that magic about him, that there'd be 1000 people in the room. But he was only about you at that moment. So when you ask that question, what's the consumer looking for? What's the tourists looking for? They're looking for a special moment where they were recognized, or they had fun with you and being part of somebody's memory, their entire memory of all the vacations they've gone on? You know, that's a real honor. So that's my philosophy of hospitality is to never forget your part as you're part of a family's memory for the rest of their life. 58:55 I think that's accurate for probably 99.9% of them. But then there's the crowd the old bourbon geeks, 59:03 yeah, 59:04 there are. They're out there. What are you? How do you? How do you prepare your staffs for, for the guy who knows everything and won't hear it otherwise? 59:14 Well, the only way that you can deal with what I call a difficult person, and I see the sometimes in the tastings, I do, I'm sure you do. And you do. There's always one in the crowd. 59:26 There, they're always old ladies, for me, like I always have an old lady, lady bourbon has to be from Kentucky. 59:37 Well, first of all, my advice always to defuse the situation. Because usually when you have a difficult person, they love being in the spotlight. And they want to draw attention to themselves. So you have to kind of diffuse that person, like pull them aside and say, oh, let's have this conversation over here and get them away from the crowd. You know, or Oh, great question. Do you mind if when we're on break, you know, we we asked, we all answer that in just a little bit. Because when you defuse it and pull it away and kind of steal the thunder, it definitely helps. definitely helps. 1:00:09 One thing I don't think we did touch on that we need to before we wrap it up is about the the kind of how you pioneered the the bourbon trail as well. Oh, okay. Right. Yes, we definitely need to kind of talk about that be what the original process was the idea? Who did you say something to I heard it first, it was just a brochure like, 1:00:29 Oh, it was definitely just a brochure. But what's really a funny story, and it was more out of I think, trying to do our job, then it was great marketing, creative minds. There were two women in the industry. That one worked at Maker's Mark door, our, let's see, Don anally. And then Doris Calhoun worked at Jim Beam. And we were all visitors, center directors, I was at Woodford, and we were friends because and that's a great thing about our industry to even though we were competitors, we were also friends, we really enjoyed each other's company, we would travel to tourism shows, and we would drink each other's bourbon, you know, and taste each other's bourbon, and we just had fun together. But we were all in the same boat, we had to bring people to the visitor center. And so we start talking about it. And we said, you know, people are going to see you and they're going to see you and they're going to see me wonder if we did some kind of, you know, cross marketing, that these visitors could come to all of our facility and we mark it all together, you know, in a way that it's kind of a road trip. So that being said, So Daniel, who I don't know if you know that name or not Katie, he was the Eric Gregory of Katie a at the time. And we took it to him and said, Hey, why don't we bring all the distilleries together and put it in a brochure and market it so that, you know people have a choice to go everywhere. And maybe we'd save some money on marketing, and maybe we would get more traffic. And so over a million stops later, as reported, this past year, a million over a million stops on the on the bourbon trail. And I'm very, very proud of that. And Eric Gregory, in my opinion, when he came on board really brought the bourbon trail to life, and put it in a marketing, highlight and importance and priority. So that our infrastructure that all of our distilleries are investing in would pay off. And it's worked. And it's worked. So yeah, so I can't take credit, there was me that it was a small team of women. 1:02:33 How cool is that to say like, you were part of the team that spearheaded the bourbon trail, what is now probably the the most successful tourist 1:02:42 strategy in Kentucky. 1:02:44 Oh, easily. I mean, it's it goes hand in hand with with wine country. Yeah. 1:02:49 And again, I will say, I have not gotten a commission, or anything. we debated back to something's happening here. We'll get you a plaque. Oh, no, thanks, Kevin. I'm 1:03:00 getting something out of these visitor experiences. 1:03:04 People should have taken a penny from every transaction at every distillery and then you would be retired forever. It was, you know, 1:03:09 really, at the end of the day, when I think of the industry and how great it's been to me and the legacy that I want to leave. You know, these are the types of stories that I hope people will say, you know, and I hope I'm not finished. I think there's more to come. I got more 1:03:25 in me where we're starting to see the next wave of Peggy know, Stevens, and that's the writer. She's she wrote me some time ago and said, I'm going to be your best rider before it's all over. And competitive. I said, I said, All right. And her stories have been fantastic. Well, fantastic. 1:03:47 I appreciate that. I do have one more question about this bourbon trail map. How many were there on there when the first one was released? I believe seven. 1:03:54 And what do we have now? 23. Plus, 1:03:57 was Buffalo Trace on 1:03:59 he was called ancient age. Also agent at Buffalo Trace was on there. They were called ancient age 1:

The weekend festivities continue at the Destin Charity Wine Auction, and this popular springtime gathering is more than just a wine event. Brian sits down with legendary distiller Bill Samuels, Junior from Maker's Mark, Jacksonville's award-winning Chef Scotty Schwartz, and event organizers who are expecting another record-setting year.

Campbell Brown, President and Managing Director of Old Forester is back on the show. If you've been a long time listener, you may have remembered him back on Episode 98. As the President of Old Forester, he oversees a lot of the brands momentum and strategy. We get his take on bourbon tariffs with international expansion along with his hope for future movie partnerships. Anyone interested in a business background, you're going to find this one entertaining. Show Partners: Barrell Craft Spirits takes blending seriously. They spend months obsessing over hundreds of combinations until they figure out the perfect blend for you. Find out more at BarrellBourbon.com. Receive $25 off your first order with code "Pursuit" at RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Show Notes: This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about Marianne Eaves. Talk about the Brown influence on our city because you've got the Brown Hotel, The Brown Theatre, the Hot Brown, etc. Is there pressure to keep the Brown tradition going? How did you work your way up at Brown-Forman? What got you into the Old Forester category? Talk about the building and distillery. What about the fire in 2014? What chapter are we in right now in Old Forester history? Let’s talk about international markets and tariffs. What was the international growth plans for Old Forester prior to all the tariffs? Did they change or are they staying the same? Where do you see the Old Forester brand? What are you doing to elevate the Old Forester brand into a premium category? Talk about your team and what goes into the bottle. Do you take a Bill Samuels approach about not interfering with what goes in the bottle? Is there a brand rivalry in the company? Do you have to fight Woodford for barrels? Will you ever have 100% of production here? What impact did the Kingsman movie have on Old Forester business? Do you have a strategy to do more than Statemans? If you could do a movie tie in, which movie past or present would you do? How far down the gene pool are you to George Garvin Brown? 0:00 Basically what I'm hearing is Chris and Jackie go into a room, and they're fighting over a barrel. And Jackie's winning the fights right now. You know, I wouldn't say that I would say I mean, I mean if it did come down to a physical battle, I would put my money on Jackie. 0:28 This is Episode 201 of bourbon pursuit. I'm one of your hosts, Kenny. And let's go through a little bit of news but really the big news this week, and maybe you're living underneath a rock you weren't looking at social media you weren't looking at any of the news articles that came out but Marianne Eave's the master distiller castle and key, the one that was renowned as being the first female master distiller since prohibition, in a joint press release has announced her resignation from the distillery with mixed emotions and various news articles she expresses that she isn't done yet being a master distiller. 1:00 And we'll continue to stay in the industry as a consultant. We recorded an episode back on I think it was actually was 18 back with Marianne and this is before castle and key the name was even ever conceived and it was being referred to as the former old Taylor distillery. So make sure you go and you check that out and kind of check out her past and her you know, everything that she had built because we started this podcast pretty much the same exact time she was coming online with castle and key. So we wish Marianne all the best and her future opportunities endeavors. And we look forward to having her back on the show. Once again. This didn't get much publicity, but I was a part of Media Day at Churchill Downs during Derby week. And Fred along with I we got to hear Chris Morris and listen to the call talk about Woodford batch proof. And we didn't really know all the details about it. But come to find out it's going to be a new product line extension and will only be released one time per year at the beginning of spring which happens to be around Derby time. Of course, batch proof is somewhat like barrel proof but not exactly what's 2:00 they do is they have their standard offering of Woodford Reserve. And then every barrel is rinsed out with a gallon of water and added back into the batch. And most of us kind of know that or we call it the devil's cup. So just a little tidbit of information. So if you're looking for a more higher proof version of Woodford, and it's gonna be different every single year, go and check out Woodford batch proof 2:22 on our news pursuit series episodes 10 and 11 are now on sale this week to our Patreon community at first, you know, we've been talking about Episode 10 for a while and we're super excited release it because this is a five year we did bourbon coming from Finger Lakes distilling, and this distilleries getting crazy good accolades. We featured them back on the Empire right episode, and they get good reviews from pretty much everywhere. bleak driver of bourbon or as well as and Aaron Goldfarb of hacking whiskey sold out a barrel of their Ice Wine finished bourbon in 48 hours. Michael Veatch recently reviewed their Mackenzie bottle and bond bourbon and breaking bourbon even named that 3:00 bottle and bond bourbon, one of their best Bourbons of 2018. And now we have the first ever barrel proof release at five years old. Episode 11 is right around the corner as well and it's a short barrel. And who doesn't love short barrels only 112 bottles were in this barrel. And it is the second highest proof we have released thus far coming in at 114.3. It's also 10 years old. So it's got that good middle age Eurostar, middle of the road sort of age to it. As usual, first access is to our Patreon community, so make sure that you're checking out your emails to get your password for access. We're excited to have Campbell Brown back on the show. If you've been a longtime listener, you may have remembered him being a part of the legend series partnership that we have with the Kentucky Derby Museum. And that was back on episode 98. As the president of old forester he oversees a lot of the brand's momentum and strategy with anyone interested in a business background. This is what you're going to find entertaining and with that, 4:00 Let's go hear from our good friend Joe at barrel bourbon. And then you've got Fred Minnick with above the char. 4:06 Hi, this is Joe from barrel craft spirits. I work with a team that takes blending seriously. We spend months obsessing over hundreds of combinations until we figure out the perfect blend for you. lift your spirits with barrel bourbon. 4:22 I'm Fred Minnick, and this is above the char. When I walked into the brown Forman office to interview Chris Morris, I sat down in a nice leather chair. The PR person's office was surrounded with like fishing photos and family photos. It felt very friendly. And then in walked a young woman I hadn't ever met before. She was tall, blond hair, very pretty. And she extended her hand and said, Hi, Marianne Epes, so nice to meet you. 4:52 Chris looked at me and said, Marianne is our new master taster. Brown Forman had just named Marianne 5:00 To be the master taster of the Woodford Reserve brand. I later learned that she was on a path to become the next master distiller for Woodford Reserve. Imagine that being in your early 20s and having the opportunity to become the master distiller for one of the greatest bourbon brands on the market. Now, at the time I thought to myself, I never met her, and what is this young woman know? And despite my 5:32 my background and covering women in whiskey writing the book, whiskey women, I had only just met Marianne, I felt like Marianne needed to prove herself a little bit before I could officially think in my mind that you know, she is capable of being a master distiller and so I talked to her. And what I learned from her within 30 minutes, was that she was one of the brightest young minds, not just in Kentucky, but in all of 6:00 American whiskey. She could tell you everything there was to know about corn and how much starch to extract and how to distill it and what are the different distillation techniques to get whatever you need out of something. She was an engineer. And she chose to go into bourbon versus making ethanol or something else because bourbon was her passion. And when she announced her departure of brown Forman for a new distillery that would be starting up at the old Taylor facility, which is actually near Woodford Reserve. I was kind of stunned because who, after all, would leave the opportunity to become the master distiller of Woodford Reserve. And then I got to know Marianne even more. She has that entrepreneurial spirit. She wanted to do her own thing. She wanted to be a part of something new. Well, this past week, Marianne announced her departure of castle and key 7:00 It's a little bit of a historic one from an American whiskey perspective. You see, Marianne was the first woman to take the title master distiller at a Kentucky distillery. Now don't get me wrong, there were women in the past, who actually were doing master distiller work, but they did not take the title. And I think when you put the master distiller title on your card, you got a little bit of a target on your back. And after her departure, you saw that target, getting pelted for Marianne. There were people who were making fun of her for her how she is on social media saying things like well who will take selfies now, at the distillery there were people who were pointing out the fact that heard bourbon had not yet hit the market. How can she call herself a master distiller and I gotta tell you, all of that disappointed me greatly because here was a young woman who took a risk 8:00 And left one of the most comfortable position you could possibly be in the distilling business. She took a risk for something new. It didn't work out. It happens to all of us. We don't know the reasons. It could be personal, it could be professional, there could have been conflict there. She may have not gotten along with her bosses and who here has not? Who here has not been in a position where they were working for someone they couldn't stand? Maybe that's what it was, or maybe it was vice versa? I don't know. I don't know the reasons why Marianne left. But she did not deserve the vitriolic comments that she got from people on social media didn't deserve a single one of them. But I also know Marianne rises above all that, because at the end of the day, she's a very talented young woman, and she can do whatever she wants to include being the first master distiller and Kentucky whiskey history. And that's this week's above the char. Hey, if you have an idea 9:00 For above the char hit me up on Twitter or Instagram at Fred Minnick. That's at Fred Minnick. Until next week. Cheers. 9:11 Welcome back to another episode of bourbon pursuit the official podcast of bourbon. The whole team here today recording at the I guess you could say me, the old forester studio, something like that. We're actually in the old forester distilling tasting room, actually seeing a pretty cool behind the scenes, kitchen esque cocktail mixing sort of area. But this is going to be a fun episode because our guest today was actually somebody that unbeknownst to him, he was he was on the show before from the Legends Series, but of course, 9:45 yeah, the Kentucky Derby Museum legend series that was that's probably my favorite of the of the legend series I've done because Campbell's one of these guys have been so instrumental not just in bourbon, 10:00 But all spirits and people, people just here you know, he's a member of the brand family and everyone thinks I just get things handed to him. This guy worked his way up, you know, worked in foreign markets did a lot of grunt work that a lot of people in bourbon royalty wouldn't do. And so he's one of those people I like bringing to the forefront and telling his story a little bit because he's done a lot. He's done a lot to help people like us. You say grunt work I also know that at some point he was the the soco Ambassador at one point right so that's a little grunt work. This is so co by Soca we mean Southern Comfort and you know i one time that was a that was a brilliant brand. Oh yeah, absolutely. And it helped it was a part of the brown Forman family of course they sold it to SAS rack and and you know, I think we should ask him about like what was that like for him because he did have such an emotional connection to it and of course he's also came out with soco long shots you know. 10:58 I'm not really interested. 11:01 Well you You're always wanting to drink fireball or something comfort sounds right up my alley, you know, should we really mean should we have him on anymore? With all this like, whiskey? I don't know. I mean, he tell you what we before we started recording, you know they offered us a drink and Ryan kind of piqued his interest so tell everybody what we're drinking as well we got him in front of us. Well, so Jackie was in the cabinet, you know picking some selections when she said I have some president's choice barrel she kind of whispered Campbell and he was like No, no and I was like I heard that will be like that barrel proof or appreciated Jackie. But as you can see, I think this episode will be a lot juice here then the legend series because we've been here boozing all day and the the research lab Yep, just kidding responsibly, we respond. 11:44 Absolutely. So with that, let's go ahead introduce our guests. So today, we have Campbell Brown Campbell is the president and managing director of old forester for brown Forman. So Campbell, welcome to the show. Good to be here. Thank you. Absolutely. So, you know, we kind of gave you a little bit of 12:00 Have a head start of what you did and growing up into here and doing some grunt work and kind of cut your teeth in the history but I kind of want to take it back a little bit because as some of our listeners may not know, you're from originally Montreal. I was born here in Louisville. I turned five I moved to Montreal and I turned five in Montreal. Yeah and I grew up there Wikipedia my research Yeah. 12:26 We get it right. So somebody update the Wikipedia page before I have to but I also want to give anybody that's from out of town in in fretted already hinted at it to have the name Brown. And what that means to the city of little because you've got the brown hotel, you got the brown theater, I mean, you got a damn the Buddha Cancer Center, you got the brand, you've got all different browns, you've got the hot brown you got every night, right. So kind of just talk about kind of wish that one was 12:53 but kind of talk about the brown influence of just in Louisville just for anybody that's listening. That's across the nation. 13:00 Well, our families, you know, been a part of this city 13:05 in for generations even going back before George Garvin Brown, you know, we've had, you know, family in Kentucky and and i think involved in, in the state from a political standpoint from a commercial standpoint, philanthropic standpoint. 13:24 You know, it's it's our home. I think we're so proud that you know, the city's been really quite good to our family and to this business. 13:34 My, you know, my, you know, I was born here in 67. Kind of spent my early years here, but growing up in Montreal, it was all a little bit foreign. I remember, you know, coming back here in the summers for a couple weeks and just remembering how incredibly hot sweating your ass off. Yeah, yeah, it was I was like, wow, that's, that's a new heat that we don't get up and can 14:00 Uh much and then, 14:02 you know farms everyone like everyone had a farm and so we would go out to my grandmother's farm 14:08 or you know, an uncle and and you know, you just, you know, see these animals you just don't see and in West Mountain Montreal where we grew up and then you know eating like lima beans I never really was into lima beans until I got here and frankly, I don't think I've been into lima beans until about 10 years ago. That's really an acquired taste. That's something I never thought we would start talking about. 14:32 The lima beans is Pat Steakhouse. It does Yeah. Yeah, right. 14:37 on track. We expect a royalty check from Pat's after the yes he 14:42 Well, he's a cash operating business. He actually started taking credit cards. Yeah, yeah. 14:51 That'll do it. So yeah, I mean, look, Louisville, Kentucky, obviously, you know, our family's been around here for a number of years and generations. I 15:00 I think, you know, it's a great city. 15:02 It's got a great attitude. I think it's an exciting time to be a part of the city. And I think, you know, 15:10 I like having a family here, Mike, you know, I, my eldest child was born in Annapolis, my youngest was born here in Louisville. You know, 15:18 it's great raising a family here. It's 15:22 good. I just I like, I like what's happening and sitting, I want to be a part of it. And I think that, you know, most people that have been a part of this city for a lifetime, you know, we talked about our high schools and where we went to school, I mean, that I think there's a reason for that is that we all have these great, really strong emotional connections that go back to childhood and you've got people that come in and out of the city. I mean, I was out of here 15:44 for six or seven years, always knowing that I was going to be coming back in so it's, yeah, it's a unique place. And I think we've been fortunate that we got into the right business at the right time, and it's thrived for for quite some time. Now. And 16:00 gives us a chance to 16:03 kind of enjoy being in an industry that's got so much to do with, with the city in the state. And I'll add to, you know, a little bit of the brown legacy. You know, 16:11 Campbell mentioned politics, they've, they've had a lot of people in high places there. But to me, the brown family is really about philanthropy. And 16:21 if it was not for the brown family, I mean, we wouldn't be talking about whiskey row today. I mean, they essentially saved whiskey row where we are right now. And they when a Louisville was crumbling from an art perspective, the brown family kind of held it up, you know, so you go around our museums here, and you'll see a brown at the top of every one of the donors. So they're a very, very important family for our community. Absolutely. Absolutely. And so is there like, you know, as Kenny and Fred said, the Browns are like one of the most famous families probably in the city is there like a pressure or like something to get out like, we got to keep this 17:00 thing going or How's that feel to be a part of that tradition and keep it going? 17:04 Well, 17:06 I don't know. I mean, I think you just, you certainly you want to be respectful to what the city represents and reflect that, you know, appropriately. I think, 17:18 you know, I don't know if it's pressure. I think that at all, really, I think, you know, you're many of us have different jobs and doing different things. And I think there's a, there's a, I think, a bias towards staying engaged, staying interested understanding kind of the issues and the opportunities of the city and figuring out ways in which we can help, like anybody would really in our own individual ways, 17:45 you know, to help to find solutions and empower people and empower ideas. And I think that, you know, frankly, there are so many people in this city in particular that are doing that every day. I mean, I work with Holly McKnight, her husband, JK me 18:00 ignite is done a ton for this city through, you know, his Philip philanthropy, philanthropy and through his interest in music and they can throw a party party. Greg great taste. You know, so I think that and there's, like, individual after individual like that are that are here, you know, looking I think because it's a city that's fairly manageable size it gives individuals an opportunity to kind of make things happen that would be much harder to do even in a Nashville certainly in a New York or Miami but I think there's still as an economy of scale that allows a good idea or a strong individual to make something powerful happen. It's a big small town. Yeah, yeah. So also want to kind of just talk about your, your rise with inside the ranks of brown Forman too, because little research shows that you started off in the mailroom at Brown Forman so kind of talk about the steps that you took up the ladder to to kind of where you are today. Well, I mean, we've got 19:00 Great internship. I mean, the internship programs gotten a whole lot better since I was a part of it. 19:06 And that's how I got involved. You know, I didn't know anything about really the business I grew up in Montreal, had a chance to move spent a summer in Louisville. I got a job in the mailroom. I think, you know, those types of opportunities in a mailroom gives you a real perspective on who people are in a company, what different groups do individuals do you learn about the brands, I remember walking in and to my cousin Mac Brown's office, and I think he was part of the Jose Guarino company at the time, and was running maybe Martel and just seeing the point of sale in his office and going God, he got this job, this would be great. Look at that. I mean, you know, just some neat stuff and, and I think it's a business that kind of captures your imagination and you see kind of neat things that you can touch and feel and and so that certainly gives you a nice kind of 20:00 insight into, 20:02 you know how people get their jobs done. And it's a beautiful campus. If you've ever been down to brown Forman it really is set up like a university campus. And it's a great place to work and so that that certainly draws you in. And then, you know, I went and got a graduate degree and came back in 94 and started to work actually, we were talking you're talking about in the intro about Sasha Sasha Mark Brown, who run says rack was hired me at Brown Forman when he was running the advancing markets group. And so I began working in that like our emerging markets group in 94. I went to Chicago for a bit of supposed to be there for a couple years and an opportunity opened up for me overseas and I got asked to come back to go over to interview for the job, but they wouldn't tell me what the job was. And so I you know, I spent basically the better part of a day trying to figure out why 21:00 I was in what I was, what job and then I kind of figured it out. And as it turned out, they wanted me to go to India. And I think they were just nervous about telling me that while I was living in Chicago thinking I might not come for the interview, just because it's such a far way to go. And you know, it's a it's a difficult market. It's not like, you know, when you're 2425 years old, and somebody says, Hey, do you want to go to Australia? Yes, I do. When did you want to go to India, it's such a foreign place. And you really don't have the same kind of immediate 21:34 interest, frankly, and kind of moving up there and go into a country that big and that vast, 21:41 and I ended up moving there. I was supposed to go there for four months, ended up spending a year and I left that place in tears. I absolutely loved it. It was one of the best experiences of my life. I got to travel all over the country helping set up a joint venture where we were local bottling Southern Comfort. So that was my first kind of 22:00 introduction into a relationship with the brand that I had off and on for over a decade at the company. And I was just great. It was fantastic. Great people great food. What was your favorite Indian food dish? Chicken Tikka Masala. Oh yeah, yeah, like Assad pioneer London on yet naan bread delicious. I mean everything about it I loved 22:25 and then I moved to the Philippines to help set up the joint venture over there also around the Southern Comfort brand, and was on my way to Thailand to be a country manager and I got 22:39 persuaded to go help open up an office in Istanbul in Turkey for regional marketing office that we had there and I went to do that and I ended up staying in Turkey for three and a half years before coming back to the US. As a US brand manager for Southern Comfort. You should have been the dosa keys and World's Most Interesting Man 23:00 Well, yeah, maybe like some nice locations, but not nearly the exotic experiences that that guy had. For sure. Yeah. And so what got you into the, I guess the old forester category? Was it to the point where you said, I kind of want to move on or was at the sale of Southern Comfort and you said, Okay, I'm looking for a new home, you know, what it was? 23:20 I think we began to see some interesting things happening for old forester. We had we had had a great brand team that was coming up with some pretty wonderful ideas that are now we're drinking, you know, the whole whiskey roll concept. And there was an opportunity with the, you know, with the we finally got the approval to go build this distillery at the location we're at today. 23:45 And we wanted to bring that story together a little bit like you know, the story of a brand that's been around for 100 and almost hundred and 50 years that's been in our family and our company. That kind of the business we started with was old forester and 24:00 Bringing that story of our family, the business and the community together. At that point, I had about 20 years experience. So, you know, here's a person that actually, you know, may have the, you know, commercial sense to go lead this and, and, and had the, the obvious, you know, the right DNA to connect the dots on this five generations story and so I, you know, I was asked to kind of head up the building phase of this and the capital project and then help lead the brand and tell the story of, you know, one of America's unique alcohol products and and it's really been a pleasure to be able to kind of have that role. Let's go to the, the construction part of this first. I mean, first of all, 24:52 it from a business perspective. You gotta be nuts to try and build a distillery in a good little lab. 25:00 better places to do this right? I think this area burnt down yet two times. Yeah. Can you take us through that process of like? 25:09 Well, I what I loved it what makes me feel good, like smarter people than me made the decision. 25:16 So, yeah, that that location site was picked well before I started. 25:21 Yeah, I think it will I mean that but that's what makes it so special. You know, like, here's a location that we actually like our founder office out of, for from whatever 25:33 1882 to 1919. And, you know, we get to move back in here decades, generations later, I mean, so that's a special thing that when you get a chance to take advantage of that you do it. 25:47 We I feel like one of our core capabilities at the company is building wonderful home places that allow us to tell 25:56 great brand stories while displaying a process. 26:00 And we worked with some great partners here in town and out of town that 26:06 you know, frankly put together a proposition that was hard to say no to and that you know, and frankly, you know, as you get into these projects, you like any kind of renovation or building you know, something happens all the time that you're not expecting certainly the fire being a big obvious one. Tell us about that. let's let's let's let's go there because 26:30 Was it 2014 Yeah, the right one. I started right when you started so 2014 fire there's smoke all downtown Louisville, the news crews are here. I see it on the news. That's how I find out about it. How did you guys work because it was over you your tweet, you know through here I'm a first responder so I was I was the fights right? I actually I forgot I came on the site and I was tweeting about it. I forgot about that. But what was what was that like for you? Where were you? Yeah, what was going through your head when 27:00 When the fires when the fire hit, so I was in the office at 850 Dixie Highway and I got a phone call from a buddy of mine in corporate development who had a friend down here works for one of the law firms or one of the banks I don't know and he was looking out his window and called my colleague and said look, I think think buildings on fire and so I got the phone calls I get Look, I just got a friend a call from a friend who says that the buildings downtown on Main Street are on fire I don't know if it's the distillery or not but you may want to check it out. And so I just you know, I had my computer up and I i there was this live feed on I think wave or one who is one of the stations of a helicopter and I pulled it up and 27:46 for sure, it was obvious that the block was on fire. less obvious was was it did we was it in our building or was it down the block and you knew no matter what it was going to be a problem. 28:01 And your first reaction was, it was shocking how violent the fire was how much flame there was the, the number of the amount of smoke, the amount of water being thrown at it. It was it was a big, big time fires like yeah, like watching a movie almost. And you're kind of paralyzed. And I called Mike beach and Mike and his team are already down here. And Mike is the project manager who really is the guy that built this place, manage all the of the contractors and whatnot. 28:34 And so, you know, we had our folks down here and kind of trying to understand it and really you're thinking about safety. I mean, what happens if somebody is killed as they're trying to kind of put this fire out what you know, and you know, that they're taking the right precautions, but it was pretty 28:51 it's pretty devastating. You know, 28:53 I and my wife You know, my wife hears about it, you know, we're then we're later at night we're at home, the things still burning 29:00 I begin to get a lot of phone calls, just from friends and and, you know, they're trying to find out about it, it was pretty awful. And you know, 29:10 you we were already planning on the groundbreaking right? Like, what that ceremony was going to look like and everything else and, and so that everything gets put on hold and Now fortunately there there were no injuries. You know, we're standing we're sitting in the building today So look, it was it was a horrible thing when it happened, right? It's now a chapter and a long story. And this whole block looks stunning, you know, and so I think we're pretty fortunate and given the work it took to get it there because you a lot of people would have just let it you know, kind of tear down the facade and start from scratch. You all invested the money to actually save the the front Yep. And hold the brick in. I mean my I mean the we have braces out here for months. Yeah. 30:00 You guys are trying to protect the integrity of the bill as much as you could I mean, it was a dangerous dangerous 30:06 construction site for a long time. I mean, even as you're trying to clean up the inside in there been so much water put on the on the on the building site to to extinguish everything that it just eroded the ground and eroded all the brick and then you know, things are loose. When you're up front on Main Street on this side as we're trying to kind of dig through that and brace it all things are kind of crumbling as it's happening. And, you know, 30:35 we had to call in special engineers, it took a lot of time. A lot of smart minds looking at it, figuring out ways in which we could make it a safe environment to allow people to go back and work and so we really just had, you know, you know, 30:50 experts in there and just very few at a time and that took it just took a lot of time and you know, you kind of make these connections in the romance copy of what we do you know, we're in a business 31:00 Uh, you know, we're we spend our time waiting around for stuff to get ready. And so 31:06 you know, you want to you want to be you want to be quick and you want to make decisive decisions, but you also want to make the correct decisions. And, you know, 31:13 we took our time, I think we've got it right. You know, 31:17 this building, I think is fascinating the way that you have constructed it now, and it's a beautiful facility, I think, you know, 31:25 whether you're coming in here on a tour, or you're going to George's or you're just here to, you know, 31:31 walk walk around Main Street, it's, it's been done right. And, you know, 31:35 again, the fire is a chapter of the long story. Where are we at right now in the chapter? 31:42 Yeah, I think this is that whole fun Renaissance chapter. Right? It's, 31:46 it's the chapter you want to be writing and, you know, we're thrilled with what's happening with the brand. I mean, even in Kentucky, I mean, this brand has always been a great brand for the city and for the state but to see it grow 32:00 And the out, you know, the rural parts of Kentucky, embrace old forester in a way that I mean, I just never saw in my lifetime. It's fantastic. You know, there's, there's always been this core heartbeat of the brand here in town. And it's just kind of expanding there. And then you see what's happening in these other markets. And you know, how people are responding to some of the whiskey, the innovation, it's exciting, you know, I think there's a lot more to be written 32:27 with the whole category, right? I mean, we're just scratching the surface as it relates to bourbon in an American whiskeys outside of the US. And I think that's going to be really exciting and a lot of fun for us. I think innovation continues to kind of push the envelope of the category in a neat way. You know, 32:46 we've got bourbon in general, you know, it's just, it's, it's, you know, it's, 32:53 it just can be consumed in so many fun, different ways. I think it's really really versatile. And so you bring it you bring up the international 33:00 markets and, you know, this is very, very crucial time in American whiskey history because we haven't had this kind of export interest before. And now, we're in addition to having that interest we have we have some trade concerns where people are pressing tariffs. And 33:21 and, and you know that I can't think of a company that's more vulnerable to tariffs than brown Forman. Yeah. And, you know, I think that's, that's one of the tough outcomes of this as as these this terror of things going on. You know, we're an industry that's for the most, in most cases, it's single source production, right? We don't, the inputs of this product are 100% American. 33:51 And so it's an easy target for tariffs outside of the US because it doesn't really impact 33:59 any of the 34:00 Any supply side stuff that would be occurring from a European market for instance. I mean, pretty much everything is for bourbon and American whiskeys are made in America. So it's isolated. And so it's the perfect target to be in the middle of a territory, unfortunately. And it's it's a timing couldn't, you know, it's it's, 34:21 it's not great, you know, it's not a huge deal for old forester. Obviously, we're, we're a smaller brand that's got, you know, some nice momentum. 34:33 But it's not, it's not, you know, 34:36 it's not it's we don't have a huge footprint, a global footprint yet, but jack daniels, you're in the sister brand that's in Tennessee. That's, that's correct. It hit some hard. It does. It does. So you're not going to think of any sort of long term effects that old forester could have on this. I mean, is it because I'm sure you've had some sort of international expansion and thoughts. I mean, so we're lucky we actually have a nice 35:00 Really nice business. That's, that's got some great momentum in Australia. But that's not a tariff issue. You know, 35:06 we're in the UK. 35:09 And and that is more of a thing for us, but it's still a small brand that's being built in the on premise and, you know, 35:17 friends, right, I mean, this is really about the Woodford and the jack daniels of the world and and, and that that this has a real impact on on those brands and how we go about resourcing and how we go about brand building in, in in the European and Asian and Latin American market. So I'm not the best guy to talk about, you know, the, you know, 35:39 how that's impacting those brands, but it's obvious that I do think that like, yeah, you get the PDF every morning that says like, Oh, I will. I will say that. If there's, if there's a brand within the brown Forman portfolio that would survive like a tear for the countries that would be old for sure, because 36:00 It is. It is such 36:03 that powerful. Yeah, there was an article. My brother lives in London. And there was an article that came out and it was kind of a tongue in cheek thing. Okay, five things to do facing this terror floor on bourbon and American whiskey and I think one of the points was make jack daniels popsicles and last longer. I think people are coming up with ways in which to survive this period of time, I think will will survive, although i've i've screamed about it enough for the past. 36:39 So I want to ask a question is about the old forester brand and kind of where you see it. 36:45 You've probably heard of finishing beer using whiskey barrels, but Michigan distillery is doing the opposite. They're using beer barrels to finish their whiskey. New Holland spirits claims to be the first distillery to stout a whiskey a folks at Rock house whiskey club heard that claim 37:00 Had to visit the banks of Lake Michigan to check it out. It all began when New Holland brewing launched in 97. Their Dragon's milk beer is America's number one selling bourbon barrel aged out. In 2005. They applied their expertise from brewing and began distilling. At beer barrel finished whiskey began production 2012 and rock house was the club is featuring it in their next box. The barrels come from Tennessee get filled with Dragon's milk beer twice, the mature bourbon is finished in those very same barrels. rack house whiskey club is a whiskey the Month Club on a mission to uncover the best flavors and stories from craft distillers across the US. Along with two bottles of hard to find whiskey rack houses boxes are full of cool merchandise that they ship out every two months to members in over 40 states. Go to rock house whiskey club com to check it out. And try a bottle of beer barrel bourbon and beer barrel rye use code pursuit for $25 off your first box. 37:55 So I want to ask a question is about the enforcer brand and kind of where you see it. Do you see it as a 38:00 An everyday category premium category in are you doing anything to kind of elevate into a premium category? Well, for sure, I think it's a great question. And it's the one we wrestle with most regularly 38:15 is, you know, one of the wonderful aspects of the brand, if you talk to anybody that's been drinking it for a while, or that's familiar with it. 38:24 It's so accessible, you know that it's a great value bourbon, and, and I think that's something that is core to that brand DNA. And so maintaining that accessibility, both in the flavor profile and the price point. It's part of how we look at brand building for old forester so that's always going to be a thing. 38:46 Now, recently, we've been we've had some success with the introduction of whiskey row, which allows us to play in price points that are, you know, attractive, you know, these are $40 and above price points. There's a ton of 39:00 consumer interest in those price points and I think if you create a bourbon that's worth that price, or even considered a value at that price, it's a special place to be. So I think we'll always try to look for ways even at $40 and $55, or even looking at birthday bourbon, which is basically 100 bucks. Now, that's still a good value for a 12 year old, you know, 39:22 a highly allocated bourbon that you know, is got a recommended sales price at 100 bucks, it's hard to find it for that, but 39:31 know that that's, I think that's, that's part of, you know, what we look at and in our strategy so I'll say that, you know, if we take a look at some of the, of the releases of the last two or three years of what's really hit the mark, and in our community, old forester has been right there in the thick of it. The 2018 birthday bourbon, has probably the best birthday bourbon of the past decade. The 39:58 camera should have some 40:00 By the way, me a bottle. But I think you know, you never gone well you all. 40:08 But I mean, everybody really regarded the 2013 is one of the best. Yeah, it was very good. And then then the old forester 1920 is fantastic. Yes. And I look at i and i look at, you know, what has changed within your within your team. 40:23 And I think I feel like Jackie, and you may be a moral compass it like have happened. I feel like you've got somebody inside, you know, who's doing a great job of selecting stuff for you. So what Yeah, and I've also noticed that you walk around here, this is probably the most diverse distillery in the state. 40:49 You see more diversity, see more women, more people of color here, and I applaud you for that. But talk, talk us through your team and who's actually you know, picking 41:00 What what's going into the bottle right now? Yeah, well, I mean, I mean so Chris Morris is the continues to be our master distiller and leads the innovation. 41:11 You know, one who works at this distillery is you know, he's a big part of making sure what's coming out of here. Tastes like what we've got at Brown Forman distillery where the vast majority of old foresters made. Jackie's came on board I think about three years ago, right when I came on board, she was one of the first people that kind of was on our radar screen and the first person I think I hired as when I took over. 41:39 And there's no question that she has had an impact on how we talk about these brands, how we present them both in flavor and in kind of the copy and the positioning of them. She's allowed us to think differently about innovation. I think she's worked really well with Chris 42:00 And helping kind of you've got these two characters, two individuals that are really good at what they do that have I think fairly 42:13 I mean, they I think they just have they they have very well refined palates. Basically what I'm hearing is Chris and Jackie go into a room, and they're fighting over a barrel. And Jackie's winning the fights right now. You know, I wouldn't say that I would say I mean, I mean, if it did come down to a physical battle, I would put my money on jack. 42:34 But I think that they work well together now and Jackie, I mean, look, the birthday bourbon, how we proofing some of this stuff. I mean, she's really the the brains behind president's choice. 42:47 You know, it's we are lucky to have her and and she had a great impact. Do you take a little bit of a bit bill Samuels approach, or at least what he used to say is like, I don't mess with the whiskey. Do you? You let people kind of 43:00 make the decisions on what's in the bottle and you just kind of official Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, 43:05 I'm a great consumer. Yeah. 43:08 And and I'm proud of my, you know being a good long time responsible consumer. 43:14 But I mean, since I've been in this job I've probably spent more time thinking about, you know, my palate and like, frankly my biggest problem with you know, being like a whiskey taster is that I just don't have the reference points like I don't know what a scone Welcome to the crowd. 43:33 Like I can't Fred starts revealing or like, Yeah, he's got he's got his t shirt on it says like got marzipan. Yeah. 43:42 I don't know. I mean, I just so I mean, I feel like I've got a sense of what I like But yeah, I mean, Jackie's I can feel it yet figured out what consumers would like. Yeah, yeah. You know, 43:54 and there's frankly there's just people that are you know, it's in their DNA and 44:00 They've worked really, really hard to develop a palette that's responsive to liquids that they're tasting. And we've got some really good people at that, that do that here. But there's a little bit of responsibility your shoulders because there's another bottling called president's choice, that kind of falls within your realm. Now, I can talk about that more involved with that. But, you know, 44:24 Jackie, narrows it down to a point where it's hard to make a bad decision. Yeah, it really is. And will you were part of the first one I've leaned into, you know, a lot of really good. I know. 44:41 We all we all certainly looking around the room and look at how people are responding. But I mean, it was it was, it was interesting, you know, and, look, I'm still learning you know, frankly, you don't want me picking going out there. And, you know, you've got to understand where the barrels are and why those are 45:00 barrels would possibly taste different than another barrel. Certainly as you kind of fluctuate the proofs around, you know, it's easier for me to kind of taste stuff that's below 110 proof and get a sense of, you know, the character of that whiskey. But 45:18 yeah, I mean, I, I'm not the whiskey. 45:23 I want to I want to talk a little bit about that culture of brown Forman, you know, so you have three really prominent, you know, arguably all three iconic American whiskeys and jack daniels, Woodford Reserve, old Forester, and it feels like within the company, it's a little bit like University Kentucky versus University of Louisville. Like there's like a rivalry rivalry with within the company. would you would you do you see that or are you too close where I think Fred's creating one. 45:59 I have never 46:00 Done. Yeah, no, I I don't look I mean, the one thing you recognize any if you're fortunate enough to have a brand in your portfolio that's jack daniels or anything remotely close to that. It's a benefit. There's no doubt about it, you know it in so many different ways it's even hard to put into words opens a lot of doors I mean, it sure does and but they don't have a president's choice jack daniels you know you can hang your hat on that 46:29 they have a Sinatra Yeah, they got great they got a great portfolio I mean what if it's got a great portfolio you have to because 46:38 Woodford does you guys kind of share some some barrels you know, they you know, the warehouses Do you ever have to fight for barrels? Or do you already have everything kind of allocated to you within the company we have we need? Yeah, yeah. When will you be closer to like 100% of production here. Never. 47:00 They'll always be you'll always have a little share a little still time at Shively. Oh, for sure. I mean, that's Yeah, I mean, we have the capacity to do about 100,000 cases here. The brand's already, you know, everything all included is over 200,000 I think and so we're, we're, we're, you know, 47:19 we're growing so the majority will continue to come out of Shively. 47:24 Another question I cannot bring up is the statesman. Right? What kind of impacted old forts or statesman and aligning yourself to a movie? kind of have it as an impact on the business? 47:36 Interesting question. Yeah, so that was a little bit out of left field, right. It's not you know, if you look at how we've innovated or come up with products, it's been basically using our, our history to drive that and we had, you know, a really unique shot, that brands of this size with the kind of awareness we have would never get and we jumped at it and it basically 48:00 We took a brand that didn't really exist, and we put it on the market. And so that's, you know, close to 10,000 cases in under 12 months. And it was a, it was a huge impact for us. It You know, 48:13 it got us new points of distribution, all of a sudden, we're in all these amc movie theaters and, and around the introduction of that film when it came out, and we're doing, you know, some menu development in those places. And so, you know, 48:26 we got, we had a great partnership going with total wine, they got behind the product, and so it opens a bunch of doors, it allows you to talk for one, it you know, 48:37 that that movie itself has such a huge following in the around the world, that I think it probably gave us an avenue into consumers that would never ever buy a bourbon, or old forester for sure. But they love the movie and they see z and the cast drinking and they're like, well, geez, I gotta try that and wonder what that's all about. And so you get your already 49:00 Kind of as a recruitment tool it's wonderful market like Korea where we're nowhere we really don't have any product if it's there it's come through duty free in some way shape or form. 49:11 That's the number King's been was the number one movie in the country historically, it's the biggest movie. It's there like Star Wars. And that's weird. You explain I know I have no idea. No idea. But I mean, and so all of a sudden, you know that our Korean markets call and say hey, we got to get some of this stuff. So we're like getting pallets of it and flying it off to Korea. So that's available in the market there and you know, if you look on you know, I follow whatever old forester on Instagram and so I'll see a lot of these Instagram posts from Asia 49:46 as tax days when Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And then the kind of what you know, Campbell from, 49:53 from a historical perspective, that was very big for bourbon like I I'm glad to hear that. It in it. 50:00 was a success for you but from a category perspective, if you look back to the 1960s you know James Bond really started dictating what a lot of people would drink from a spirits perspective. You would start seeing people go to white spirits over brown spirits in large part because he wanted a martini shaken but not stirred. And so to see bourbon to continue to have this pop culture presence and madmen Boardwalk Empire the state's been that's a huge play for continuing to capture consumers are you will? Do you have a strategy, you know, to do more than just the statesman. I mean, are we going to start seeing you when 50:36 some TV series or anything like that? I mean, look, our strategy is like, be lucky. And and so I approached us about it. Yes. 50:48 So there's a show that just started I think on 50:52 Amazon called the Romanovs and so they reached out to us and they needed a, you know, a period type of a decanter. So 51:00 Grab them one of our old holiday decanters. And they use that in the TV show. I have not seen the show. But I mean, you know, you're always getting these types of opportunities. This movie came out recently called, like, father was like a huge hit on Netflix. And that movie has old forester in it and Woodford Reserve in it. And that was something that just came around because, you know, somebody knew somebody and they needed a, you know, some Bourbons for the scene and turned out that movie did really, really well on that Netflix platform. So a lot of people saw it and, and I think, yeah, you look for opportunities to do that all the time. It's a great tool. It's fairly inexpensive and it gives you a huge audience if it turns out to be a hit show or hit movie. Alright, so are you a movie buff by any means? I like movies. So if you were to do a movie tie in and have old forester being anything, what would it be past or present? Oh, gosh. Oh, good question, man. I mean, you already said Star Wars. So I don't think I'm 52:00 Lucy sitting there, oh, he's afraid that star wars are handled it. Like, you know, it's it's tough because movies I like are a little darker and so you don't always want your product feature 52:15 darkness 52:17 like like Unforgiven you know, okay, I love that movie, you know, but pretty dark, you know. And and so that that's a tough one. I mean, I look, I think it you know to me, jack daniels is the example of great products showing up in great scenes of great movies that are unforgettable. I mean, whether it's Animal House or any Paul Newman film, I mean, that that jack daniels is by these heroes and villains by their sides, and it's, they become it becomes part of the character and I so I think that's what's important that if you're going like we're with Matthew Vaughn and King's Men mean he really built a big portion of his movie, around the 53:00 idea of distillers from Kentucky. And that's pretty spectacular. I mean, each of the his characters were, you know, had a very specific trait and they were, you know, associated with a particular style or a whiskey or a tequila or whatever it was. And it made sense. I mean, the story when we got into the how we got old forester that was that is that he actually referenced as he was kind of given us the short stick on it that look, this is like 1919 pre prohibition and he goes on and fit in. So he finished his telling me the story. I was like, hey, look, you mentioned pre prohibition. Is that why? Why would you know about that? It's like, well, I just need something if these guy if the the agency was started in 1919, Kingsman, right, you know, on the heels of the First World War, you know, 53:50 that would have been around 1919 so have been pre prohibition. So I think you need to have this, like look, the brand new want to do it with that is old forester. We're the only brand that's been around before 54:00 During and after prohibition is like you're right, I'm going to do with old forester and so just fit his story and I think that's when these things work well, and it's something like that. I mean, do you have to 54:11 how does how does it work? are they paying you a royalty? Are you paying kind of like a get in any of that? 54:20 He's because he's not going away to expand the Ascot business. 54:25 By the way, 54:27 I did their main, the guy 54:31 who plays The Big Lebowski, what's his name? 54:34 is 54:36 Jeff Bridges he weren't asked God in the film. He was here for Derby. Who's the worst Fred minute this guy? 54:45 Is that you said there's only three people in the world. It's still women. Yeah. So now we got two of them. Got to find that third. Yeah. 54:51 Guys, some random winemaker in France. 54:55 And so there's kind of like one last question that we got to do and just part of the service of this is you 55:00 You know, you'd mentioned the history of this building and being able to be at the place where we're George had his own office and stuff like that. We're actually sitting in his office. Oh, can see that photo right there. That's him and whether 55:16 that's him sitting back there leaning in the chair. Oh, it's amazing. Is there a cool windows? Is that a Samsung or an iPhone? It's an iPhone. 55:24 I think it's a Canadian, Blackberry. 55:27 Pony Express. 55:29 But the how because I guess we everybody kind of wants to know is either I'm sure you've looked it up in the family tree like how far away You're moved from the gene pool of George himself. I'm George Garvin. 55:43 Fifth Generation fifth generation so as your great great, great grandfather, okay. Yeah. Now the internet. The funny thing is that So Mike is gonna want to swab your cheek later 55:54 on a test we're going around right now. So we're going to get the 23andme this done the 56:00 So my dad was a George Garvin brown the third. I was born in 67. 56:09 My grandfather, George Darren Brown, the second passed away in I think 69. And so my brother was born in July of 69. And he was named George Garber on the fourth. So you can imagine, as the eldest child, why, how come I didn't like Hamlet? 56:33 How come I don't get the loom? The Roman numeral, you know, and so you end up there. I mean, the reason was, is that I think it's a little distracting when you've got three gardens running around the same kind of household. And my grandfather just passed away and my my, you know, my mom, my dad had got my my brother and so that was a nice tribute to him. So yeah, we're so he's my great, great grandfather. real cool. Well, yeah, definitely a good story. And I want to say also 57:00 So thank you again for taking the opportunity in time to come on the show and tell us your story. The history. More about statesman. I think it was your favorite movie. Yeah, then yeah, yeah. So that movie was cinema, movie tickets, and then we'll go watch a deep dark mystery movie or something. I would like to say that I think old force would fit very nicely in the hustler. But yeah, was actually centered around a lot of bourbon. Oh, yeah. It wasn't here. He was a he was a wholesaler. Yeah. He was a wholesaler. And he was like a big he came down to Kentucky for tournament. Yeah, I'm getting hammered on JT is brown eight year old and it was eight year old bourbon that that drew him in. So it's a Seattle thing. For sure what a fit there. I was thinking like Lieutenant Dan in Forrest Gump would be a perfect fit. Yeah, I know that Lieutenant Dan needed rock get stuff. Yeah, he didn't want anything in quality. He just wanted to get hammered. Very true. Yeah, yeah, what do I know? I would just say like something like Jurassic Park, just like running through the rest of the fields at the bottom portion here and I can see it right. 58:00 Yeah something like yet the short Art Museum Park 58:07 Well, thank you i this is a lot of fun. I appreciate you guys having me always a pleasure. Absolutely. And you know people want to learn more about you they can Google apparently there, you know getting the Wikipedia and fix all the stuff that I was getting incorrect. I'm very nice if there's anything I mean Wikipedia. You'd be surprised most of what's good. Yeah. Most of it. 90% Yeah. But make sure you also you follow actually, you should come to the old forester distillery distilling company here downtown, go and take a tour. It's a great experience. They've got literally everything here. They've got bottling, they've got Cooper fridge, they've got distilling, they've got a barrel warehouse, you mean you name it, the lady salary? As you can see, get lit on fire. It's it's the coolest elevator experience you'll ever see. There's an elevator here at the old forester distillery that I would say rivals something Disney. It's a fantastic elevator ride. I'm going to say Charlie mention 59:00 aka flattery, something like that I was gonna rival that one too. I haven't seen that in a while. I mean, you know, it goes up it goes, maybe it goes in there like can have like, Charlie Chocolate Factory bourbon ball with old forester. We're thinking, now we're thinking. So make sure you go you check that out follow bourbon pursuit, as well as Fred Minnick on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. And also, if you haven't done so yet, subscribe to bourbon plus, because there's a lot of great news stories that come out through their great magazine. It's thank you again, just great imagery and everything like that. But if you also like what you hear, support the show patreon.com slash bourbon pursuit, because without you the show, it would be very tough to keep going. So we want to say thank you, for everybody that helps support the show to do that, as well as all the questions. I mean, some of the questions we asked, are actually from some of the Patreon supporters out there today, all the show suggestions, questions, feedback, we've listened to you all, and we asked, so we really appreciate everyone listening and keep those comments. And, Fred, good to see you, man. Always a pleasure to see you. Thank you. So we'll see you next 1:00:00 Cheers Cheers.

This week I sit down with Bill Samuels Jr and Frank Fernandez of Maker's Mark. We discuss his storied past that has taken him from driver of Colonel Sanders to Nasa, to head of Maker's Mark. Bourbon Hall of fame inductee Bill Samuels was an absolute treat. Whiskey Neat is a podcast and Radio show on iTunes and 94.1 FM in Houston. You can find the show on iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Podcast arena, YouTube and Facebook.   Or follow us at IG @MyWhiskeyNeat Twitter @MyWhiskeyNeat www.MyWhiskeyNeat.com

State Senate Candidate Blake Morris and Bill Samuels of Effective NY talks about the Democrats  winning back the majority in the NYS State Senate

In this science heavy episode, we have to re-evaluate the Gravity Triangle, Hubie and Bertie find themselves a new profession, and the Three Bears have some bee trouble. Also, we play you a good, good song.

Steve and Jeremy talk to Bill Samuels, Jr. of Maker’s Mark. Bill shares some of the amazing stories from his life in the bourbon industry. Be sure to listen to their interview on The Bourbon Daily where they discuss his contributions to the world of bourbon by clicking here. Today’s show was sponsored by Steve Akley’s book, Mules and More (https://goo.gl/EN3wEj). The Bourbon Show music (Whiskey on the Mississippi) is by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com). Check us out at: abvnetwork.com. Join the ABV Network Revolution by adding #ABVNetworkCrew to your profile in social media.

Bill Samuels talks about Stephanie Miner

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Bill Samuels discusses the Governor's State of the State Message

A panel of four bourbon industry experts discuss the local, national, and global economic impact of Kentucky's favorite spirit. The panel included: Bill Samuels, Chairman Emeritus, Maker's Mark Distillery Susan Reigler, Certified Executive Bourbon Steward, President of the Bourbon Women Association Reid Mitenbuler, Author, "Bourbon Empire: The Past and Future of America's Whiskey" Michael Veach, Bourbon Historian, and Author This event is sponsored by the John H. Schnatter Center for Free Enterprise and was filmed on Wednesday, November 15 at the University of Louisville College of Business

Bill Samuels discusses why there was a no vote for the Constitutional Convention

Steve, Renee, Baby Hooch and Brodie all talk about one of our absolute favorite people in the bourbon business, Mr. Bill Samuels, Jr. Please check out Flaviar, our newest sponsor. Flaviar (flaviar.com) is a club where you can enjoy many great benefit and sample some increidble whiskey, rum and gin offering on a quarterly basis with their unique tasting boxes. Flaviar is also hosting an event in New York City on September 14 called the Craft Spirits Celebration. Head on over to to our website, abvnetwork.com to click on some links to get more info or buy tickets. Bourbon Daily intro music (Welcome to the Show) and outro music (That’s A Wrap) are both by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com).

Bill Samuels, founder of Effective NY, comments on Sheldon Silver

“You have to be able to let go.” As brand builders, we’re used to being in control of our brands. But that’s something we have to get over today. Our brands are owned not by us — but by our community. Nicole Ertas knows this. That’s why she helps companies like Wrigley, Johnson & Johnson, and General Mills become what she calls “Free Range Brands.” This is also the focus of her new book. We spoke about all of this and more on this week’s On Brand podcast. About Nicole Ertas Nicole Ertas is a recognized global brand strategist, best-selling author, and speaker who has helped build many of the world’s finest and most powerful brands. Her thinking has been embraced by companies such as Beam Suntory, Wrigley, SC Johnson, Mike’s Hard Lemonade, Johnson & Johnson, General Mills, Con Agra, Kraft, and Nestle. Nicole’s success in global innovation and brand leadership gained her recognition in Forbes, The New York Times and selected to be one of Crain’s Chicago “40 Under 40.” Based in Chicago, she and her team transform brands and cultures and train business teams to become Free Range Thinkers to thrive in the age of unpredictability. Free Range Brands is available on Amazon or you can sign up for free tips and tricks on how to Build a Free Range Brand at www.freerangebrands.com. Episode Highlights So what is a Free Range Thinker and a Free Range Brand? “It’s preparing for unpredictability. You have to be able to let go today.” We’re not in control of the ecosystem in which our brands exist today. “The old way simply isn’t working anymore.” How do you create a Free Range Brand? “There are two very distinct objectives — authenticity and relevancy. And sometimes these are at odds with each other as authenticity is very static. Today you also have to be a part of what’s going on in the world around you.” So who is an example of a Free Range Brand? “To see this you can ask yourself, ‘Who is the hero of the (brand) story?’” Traditionally, it’s been the brand. Not so, anymore. “You have to make your community the hero of your story.” Ertas advises brands to create multiple “entry points” for accessing the brand story. Taco Bell is a Free Range Brand. They’ve used their 7,000 stores to create a “cult of food.” They understand something else that’s important for brands to have — a brand purpose. What brand has made Nicole smile recently? “Dollar Shave Club’s ‘Butter Safe Than Sorry’ campaign. I love brands that are spot on with who they are. There are some … suggestive fruit arrangements.” You can see for yourself below. To learn more, go to freerangebrands.com or follow @freerangebrands on Twitter. As We Wrap … Before we go, I want to flip the microphone around to our community …Recently, past guest Mack Collier gave us a shout on Twitter for our episode featuring Bill Samuels, Jr. of Maker’s Mark. Thanks for listening! Did you hear something you liked on this episode or another? Do you have a question you’d like our guests to answer? Let me know on Twitter using the hashtag #OnBrandPodcast and you may just hear your thoughts here on the show. Subscribe to the podcast – You can subscribe to the show via iTunes, Stitcher, and RSS. Rate and review the show – If you like what you’re hearing, head over to iTunes and click that 5-star button to rate the show. And if you have a few extra seconds, write a couple of sentences and submit a review. This helps others find the podcast. OK. How do you rate and review a podcast? Need a quick tutorial on leaving a rating/review in iTunes? Check this out. Register now and SAVE for Social Brand Forum 2017 — September 14, 2017, at the Iowa Memorial Union featuring past On Brand guests Jason Falls, Marcus Sheridan, Melissa Agnes, and more. Learn more. Remember – On Brand is brought to you by my new book — Get Scrappy: Smarter Digital Marketing for Businesses Big and Small. Order now at Amazon and check out GetScrappyBook.com for special offers and extras. Until next week, I’ll see you on the Internet!

Bill Samuels, Jr., is wired to achieve and seeks opportunities that have a beginning, end, and outcome. Samuels is the president and CEO of Maker’s Mark bourbon in Loretto, Ky. Samuels comes from a long line of whiskey makers tracing his distilling heritage to Robert Samuels who came to Kentucky in 1784. Samuels never intended to work for the family business. After earning a law degree at Vanderbilt University, he agreed to spend a year helping out at the company and never left. Samuels began his career in 1967 and became president and CEO in 1975. The Wall Street Journal profiled Maker’s Mark on its front page in 1980 which was a catalyst for growth that would make Maker’s Mark one of the most iconic bourbons in the world. Samuels is active in his community lending his talents and expertise to various organizations. He is chairman of the board of trustees of Bellarmine University, chairman of the board of Greater Louisville, Inc., and was past chairman of the University of Louisville board of trustees.

Bill Samuels of Ecffective NY talks about the failed promises of Governor Cuomo

“For us, marketing meant polishing the apple. Not chasing people, letting them find you.” Over the past 59 years, quite a few people have found Maker’s Mark. The distinctive bourbon has grown from being the hobby of founder Bill Samuels, Sr. His son, Bill Samuels, Jr., led much of that growth. From their wax-dipped bottles to their brand ambassador program, Maker’s has built a brand as unique as their spirits. I couldn’t wait to discuss all of this and more with Bill on this week’s episode of the On Brand podcast. About Bill Samuels, Jr. Growing up on Distiller’s Row in Bardstown, Kentucky – son of Maker’s Mark Founder Bill Samuels, Sr. and godson of Jim Beam – Bill Samuels, Jr. has been an eyewitness to many milestones in bourbon history and has made history himself. As the current Chairman Emeritus of Maker’s Mark, Bill ran his family’s company for 35 years as President and CEO. Under his watchful eye, he followed his father’s stern but simple piece of advice for him: “don’t screw up the whisky,” which is the advice he passed on to his son Rob Samuels, Maker’s current COO. Before passing on the torch in 2011, Bill left quite a legacy which included the introduction of Maker’s first new expression, Maker’s 46, the brand’s beloved Ambassador program, and more. Bill’s current role is perfectly suited for the very first Maker’s Mark Ambassador: travel around the world, introduce Maker’s Mark and Maker’s 46 to folks and share a story or two about all of the incredible history he’s been an eyewitness to. Episode Highlights Commercializing a hobby sounds daunting. But that’s exactly what Bill Samuels, Jr. was charged with doing. His mandate was simple — “never compromise on the spirit.” Bill Samuels, Jr. had to carefully exploit this hobby. “We hired an agency not to do advertising.” What Bill and their agency partners did instead was building on the “discovery” process. “We didn’t want to sell something that people didn’t want to buy. It had to be something you heard about from a friend.” What about those distinct dipped bottles? “Mom was a chemist and started playing around with wax.” As a patent attorney, Bill Samuels, Jr. patented the process, cementing the red wax drippings as a key brand touchpoint. And the ambassador program? “That was the mother of necessity. All of our customers previously had been in Kentucky. All of a sudden a credible source praised our product — The Wall Street Journal. That was the moment we became a national brand. Everything we did with customers was personal — 1:1.” The ambassador program helped them identify and embrace those fans who “raised their hands.” Another benefit to ambassadors … “It’s not a story you want to tell but every once in awhile you screw up.” Like when Maker’s thought the only way to answer demand was by reducing the proof the spirit. They communicated this to their ambassadors first and were met with immediate resistance. “It took Coke nine months to see what they did (with New Coke). We knew in two days.” They took immediate steps to reverse their decision, restoring the spirit to the delight of their fans. “We like to have fun with it, too.” That’s why Maker’s sends out gifts to ambassadors at the holidays. What brand has made Bill smile recently? Bill reminded us about the story of the Kentucky Bourbon Trail, a collaborative effort between competitive distilleries that’s been a big hit with tourism in the state. “Don’t try to do it all in one day,” cautioned Bill. To learn more about Bill and Maker’s Mark, check out the Maker’s Mark website. As We Wrap … Before we go, I want to flip the microphone around to our community …Recently former guest Bruce Kennedy and Rogue Jess gave the podcast a shout. Thanks for listening! Did you hear something you liked on this episode or another? Do you have a question you’d like our guests to answer? Let me know on Twitter using the hashtag #OnBrandPodcast and you may just hear your thoughts here on the show. Subscribe to the podcast – You can subscribe to the show via iTunes, Stitcher, and RSS. Rate and review the show – If you like what you’re hearing, head over to iTunes and click that 5-star button to rate the show. And if you have a few extra seconds, write a couple of sentences and submit a review. This helps others find the podcast. OK. How do you rate and review a podcast? Need a quick tutorial on leaving a rating/review in iTunes? Check this out. Remember – On Brand is brought to you by my new book — Get Scrappy: Smarter Digital Marketing for Businesses Big and Small. Order now at Amazon and check out GetScrappyBook.com for special offers and extras. Until next week, I’ll see you on the Internet!

On the season finale of Food Talk with Mike Colameco, it's a 4/20 celebration (mostly), featuring Cheri Sicard, an LA-based cookbook author and frequent High Times edibles columnist, John Whiteman of Wana Edibles in Colorado, baker Peggy Moore of Love's Oven in Colorado, and Bill Samuels, Jr., Chairman Emeritus of Maker's Mark. Also sitting in is mystery guest co-host "Henry" aka Daniel Sklaar of Fine and Raw chocolates.

Bill Samuels, founder of Effective New York, talks about his Constitutional Convention initiative

Today’s Boutiques Offer Quality and Value This is the first episode of our ‘Boutique’ series. Today’s guest advises clients on protecting, enforcing and leveraging their intellectual property, the Founder of WR Samuels Law, Bill Samuels. Bill Samuels Bio Listen in as Bill and Nicole talk about: – Seeing what people need and providing it to them – Being a resource – Client’s niche specific needs driving expansion – Never stop building relationships – Following-up Episode Mentions: ALT Legal and TradeMarkNow This episode is sponsored by ALT Legal:

Bill Samuels founder of Effective NY talks about a Constitutional  Convention in NYS

Bill Samuels of Effective NY talks about why there is no early voting in NYS

Bill Samuels founder of Effective NY, Blair Horner of NYPIRG and Bob Port former Investigative Editor at the Albany Times Union talk about the failure of the NYS Legislature to address  ethics reform

Bill Samuels, Founder of Effective NY, Blair Horner of NYPIRG and Bob Port, former Investigative Editor for the Albany Times Union talk aboutThe Failure to Enact Ethics Reform this Legislative Session

Bill Samuels founder of Effective New Yorktalks about a Constitutional Convention in NYS

  Bill Samuels of Effective New York reflects on 2015

Part 2 of the Panel Discussion of corruption and dysfunction in the NYS Legislature with Bill Samuels of Effective NY, Blair Horner of NYPIRG, Susan Lerner of Common Cause, and former NYS Senator Cecilia Tkaczyk Among the topics discussed How do we address the issue of money in politics How do we change the Pay to Play culture in Albany How do we change 3 men in a room and what is to be done about gerrymandering Also, the role of the party and the role of the press in the political process    

Former State Senator Cecilia Tkaczyk and Bill Samuels of Effective NY discuss the special election for the seat in the NYS Senate seat being vacated by Tom Libous

A Panel Discussion of corruption and dysfunction in the NYS Legislature with Bill Samuels of Effective NY, Blair Horner of NYPIRG, Susan Lerner of Common Cause, former NYS Senator Cecilia Tkaczyk and Greg David director of the business and economics program at the CUNY Graduate School of journalism

Bill Samuels of Effective NY talks about the Working Families Party one year after Cuomo's promise to win back the State Senate

Bill Samuels of Effective NY & Blair Horner of NYPIRG talk about the leadership change in the NY State Senate

Bill Samuels of the New Rooseveelt urges Como to give back Litwin's money

Bill Samuels of the New Roosevelt and Dr Robert Maher will be discussing the State of the State and the events that have transpired since then

Bill Samuels of the New Roosevelt, Willie Janeway of the Adirondack Council and  Dr. Robert Maher,CEO at St. Christopher's join Cynthia Pooler on Focus on Albany for a round table discussion throughout the 2015 state legislative session.  Today's discussion will include reflections on the 2014 session and what's ahead for 2015

Bill Samuels of the New Roosevelt talks about Proposition 1

It may currently be campaign season, but it's always corruption season in NY... This week's show is about Political Dynasties. Enjoy!

Bill Samuels of the New Roosevelt talks about the July 23rd New York Times editorial on the Moreland Commission

This is the first in a series of interviews Focus on Albany on the IDC deal to unify the Democratic Majority in the New York State Senate. My first guest to speak on this issue is Bill Samuels of the New Roosevelt

Bill Smauels of the New Roosevelt shares his thoughts on the Working Families Party and their convention last weekend

Bill Samuel,s founder of the New Roosevelt Initiative voices, his concern about Governor Andrew Cuomo

Bill Samuels, Co-Founder of EffectiveNY.org and founder New Roosevelt discusses his October 8th Conference discusses the proposed 2017 NYS Constituoinal Convention      

Bill Samuels of New Roosevelt talks about the events that has transpired in the NYS Legislature during the past week

A conversation with NYS Senator Liz Krueger and Bill Samuels of  the New Roosevelt Initiative who proposes funding campaign reform with Casino Cash

On the road again...this time at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas for the Maker's Mark "When in Rome Weekend". Nearly 1500 Maker's Mark Ambassadors descended on Caesars for the distillery's first major event outside Kentucky, with bourbon tastings, cooking classes, and a toga party. We'll hear from some of the Ambassadors, along with master chef Bryan Ogden of Bradley Ogden's restaurant in Las Vegas, and a lesson on bourbon history from Bill Samuels, Jr. in the biggest episode of WhiskyCast yet!