Single Malt Report: The Balvenie 15 year old Single Barrel

As you may have gleaned from last week's Diageo-related posts, I have some issues with the whisky industry, and more specifically with the largest of the corporate whisky makers.  In that vein, I often want to drill Balvenie a new a**hole.  Between their Doublewood lawsuit, the filtering and coloring of their products, the "The", and their whole American Craftsmanship marketing campaign, they can make any whisky snoot grumpy.

But I like their whisky.  The Doublewood 12yo is always reliable, Signature 12yo was leaner and less oaky before it flew the coop, Caribbean Cask makes for a great dessert malt, Portwood 21yo is the only port-influenced whisky I've ever loved, and the Tun 1401s render me stupid(er).

Then there's the Single Barrel.  At first it was a 15 year old, looking indie with its cask information, David Stewart's signature, and a higher ABV.  It once went for $60-$70.  Now it retails at $90, and has a younger brother (12 years old) filling in at the old price point.

I liked the 15yo SB the first three times I'd tried it (twice at bars and once at an official Balvenie craft thingy).  But when it made an appearance in my recent blind taste test (posted yesterday), I couldn't even recognize it.  That Single Barrel bottle in question didn't remotely resemble a Balvenie malt.  It wasn't terrible, but it fell short of a Speyburn 10 year old.

Variation must be anticipated in true single barrel releases.  That's part of the point of those sorts of bottlings; it provides the drinker the experience of sampling an individual cask.  BUT, large brands have an interest in keeping a level of character consistency amongst the barrels.  Balvenie needs to taste like Balvenie, because if one of Balvenie's single barrels tastes (for good or ill) like Glengoyne, a drinker may not stick around for another Balvenie Single Barrel bottle, and maybe even go out and buy some Glengoyne.  Balvenie wants you to come back and buy more Balvenie.  Thus there's a balance they try to hit with each of these barrels: it must fit in with their brand's flavor profile of honey, vanilla, apples, and caramel.  As Eric pointed out in yesterday's comments and Andrew Weir mentioned in a K&L podcast, the company will even age a barrel longer than 15 years in order for the resulting malt to gain the desired character.

Still, it appears as if the quality of the Balvenie Single Barrels varies greatly.  Aside from the discoveries that Florin (provider of the blind tasting whiskies) and I have made, a Twitter conversation I had with three folks from three different parts of the US revealed a considerable range in quality in bottles/barrels, from horrible to stellar.  There was some consensus that the odds of getting a great barrel was 50%.  When the 15yo SB was selling for $60, that would be a risk some would take.  But at $90?

The whisky from yesterday's post wasn't horrible.  It was okay -- a little spirity on the palate, alternating between industrial and fruity, a brief finish -- but it didn't resemble Balvenie.  And it wasn't something for which I'd pay much money.

Happily, I just recently consumed a Master of Malt sample that lines up with the qualities I would look for in a Balvenie 15 year old Single Barrel.

Distillery: Balvenie

Ownership: William Grant & Sons

Region: Speyside (Dufftown)

Type: Single Malt Whisky

Maturation: "Traditional oak whisky cask" (refill American oak, perhaps?)

Age: minimum 15 years

Alcohol by Volume: 47.8%

One obvious failing of this post is that I don't have the barrel information for this particular sample.  What I can tell you is that it was from a UK bottle from Master of Malt's store, likely from the last year or two since MoM goes through merchandise pretty quickly.  That is of no help, I know.  Onto the whisky!

NEAT:
The color is amber with light gold highlights.  Butterscotch candies and salted caramels lead the nose. Then, yes, Purple Stuff, followed by fresh bananas, cardamom, orange peel, vanilla beans, and molasses.  The thickly textured palate rolls in leading with vanilla ice cream and hot fudge.  There's some salt, lots of malt, and a little spirity bite that will hurt no one.  It finishes with a peppery zing.  Some vanilla beans, caramel sauce, and barley linger in the moderate length finale.

WITH WATER:
Much more orange and cardamom in the nose.  There's some sweet basil candy (not a thing), soft mild cheese, and something reminiscent of a lower-rye-mashbill rye whiskey.  The palate gets soft and quiet.  A little malt and vanilla.  More of spicy nibble than a bite, but otherwise challenge-free.  Lots of vanilla remains in the finish, along with cinnamon and brown sugar.

MUSINGS:
An odd thing that I will note is the difference in color between this sample and the one from the blind tasting.  This one was amber with a little bit of gold around the edges.  The blind tasting's Single Barrel?  A darker (and rosy) gold.  I'm not diagnosing too much caramel colorant as the problem, but there may have been a significant surplus of e150a in the lesser bottle.  It was the Speyburn 10 that had the mild amber hue.

How about some good news?  This sample represents what I would look for in a Balvenie 15yo SB.  The simple but delicious palate is much better neat.  The nose is solid with or without water.  It seems made to please, and I was pleased.  If THIS was what I could reliably expect this quality and character from the 15yo SB and if I could hunt it down at a price below the current point then I would consider buying this.  But I can't reliably expect this quality and character from the 15yo SB.  And at $90 a pop, there are many better whisky risks to take.

Availability - Most major liquor retailers

Pricing - $80-$100, though it can still be found at $70 if you do some snooping

Rating - 86
(This rating is for this sample only. Please note: There is considerable quality variation between barrels. Or, otherwise phrased, there are some crap bottles out there.)

Whisky Fail: The Blind Taste Test

The task was simple yet complex, as many simple tasks can be to a person that thinks too bloody much about every simple task.

Florin sent me two 2oz. samples. One was Balvenie 15 year old Single Barrel, the other was an unknown "Mystery Officially Bottled Single Malt".  My test was twofold.  First, I had to tell him which sample bottle held the Balvenie 15.  Then, I needed to determine the mystery malt held in the other bottle.

The samples arrived in early March.  I didn't engage the test until late July.  Why so long?  Maybe a little intimidation, maybe a little extra Balvenie training, maybe also a little Vizzini-style battle of wits over which bottle contained the Balvenie.

...the most famous is never get involved in a land war in Asia, but only
slightly less well known is...

Of course the battle of wits was with myself, per usual, so there would be no answer, per usual.

After my extra Balvenie training, I was reminded how much I enjoyed the Single Barrel the previous times I'd sampled it.  Tried it thrice, liked it thrice.  Then I figured I was ready, so I proceeded.

Here were my notes:

Sample #1
Color - Light gold / amber
Nose - Roses, American oak, light phenolics?, big cereal grains, caramel, Purple Stuff, oats, dried grass, and butterscotch
Palate - Solid sweet malt, vanilla, a little spice, a little caramel, and shortbread cookies
Finish - Gets much sweeter and saltier, lots of grains again

Sample #2
Color - Rosy gold
Nose - Putty, plaster, band-aids, cherry cough syrup, floral perfume, paper, strong caramel, and smoky Werthers candies
Palate - Mix of refill sherry and American oak?, it's got some alcohol heat, baked fruit bread
Finish - Slams on the brakes here, though it gets sweeter. There's some orange zest in there too.

Sample 1 was full of bold malty/graininess and presented a welcoming easy palate; meanwhile Sample 2, while good, had some odd industrial thing going on, plus there was that feeling of mixed casks I was getting.

The following response is taken directly from my email to Florin:

I would bet 95% of my foolishness that Sample #1 is Balvenie 15yr SB. 

The 5% of doubt is that sample #1 has a very strong cereal note on the nose that I don't remember being in the previous 15yr SBs I'd tried.  But that's the charm of the separate single barrel releases. If I'm right on this one, then I'm going to run out and get a bottle from a local shop that still has the 15yrs at their old price.

Also in the "5% of doubt" was that curious phenolic note, but again there's that charm of single barrel releases.

For Sample 2, my thought process was Bowmore 12 meets Springbank 10, yet neither.  So something between them, with negligible phenols.  I went with Bunnahabhain 12.

Okay, maybe too much confidence, Vizzini.

Florin's reply was that the non-Balvenie sample was an OB from Speyside, and not Glenfarclas nor one of the more exotic distilleries.

And I was thinking, "Uh oh, I've spent so much whisky time far from Speyside, so I'm in uncharted territories now."  I tried Sample 2 again.  With some air the industrial notes vanished, replaced by lots of fruit.  There was still a lot of oak going on, though.  For my guess I went with Glenlivet 18, with Glenfiddich 15 as my backup.

Nope, on either account.

Crap, I had no idea what Sample 2 was.  When Florin asked how I'd rate them, I said 3.5 to 4 stars for sample #1 and 3 stars for sample #2, whatever it was.

Florin then responded with the results.

Sample 1 was not Balvenie Single Barrel.

Oh, The Fail did not end there.

Sample 1, the "3.5 to 4 star" malt was Speyburn 10 year old (old label).  Yes, the very whisky I had rated 1.5 stars last October.  Sample 2, the shifting less-desirable mystery malt was Balvenie 15 year old Single Barrel.

So, not only had I pooped on a surprisingly decent whisky in a previous report, BUT I had also made plans to run out and buy a bottle of the Balvenie since I was so charmed by Sample 1.  I guess I was going to save some money.

From Florin's response:

First, I was quite disappointed in the Balvenie 15yo SB when I opened it - I didn't recognize any of the amazing notes of pure clear floral honey that I knew from another such bottle.  I found it quite muddled, hot, and frankly boring.  Those were $60 not well spent! 

Second, when shortly thereafter I opened the bottle of Speyburn 10yo, I was surprised at how good it was, and at how it reminded me of the Balvenie 15yo SB that I knew from the past.  It out-Balvenie 15yo Single Barreled the Balvenie 15yo SB!  Was that me, or would you agree?  I had to know!  It sounds like you agree (95% confidence is all we ask for in Statistics)!

I did (and do) agree.

Another lesson here: I feel like I need to provide a disclaimer when I review a whisky via a mini bottle.  Though there's a definite risk in all purchased samples, most minis have very poor seals.  And frankly we don't know how they are stored, especially if they are of the $0.99 sort.  Again, even well-sealed purchased samples have the potential for problems (see my Hakushu issue here and here).  Yet, I'm finding a higher percentage of issues with minis, from the Bastard's Share lost on a Glenfarclas 105 to the weird stuff floating in a Bruichladdich.  As fun as it is to collect minis, some doubt is arising about their test quality.

But let me not shift all the focus to minis.  I flubbed this test.  I did potentially discover a great cheap malt and was reminded about the "charms" of single barrel releases.  When trying whiskies without the benefit of labels, names, or ages we are left to our senses and pure objective judgement.

Or is it so pure?  Could I have rated Sample 1 higher because I thought it was Balvenie Single Barrel, a whisky I already thought I enjoyed?  Is Speyburn 10 really that much better than the stuff I had in the mini last year?  Luckily, a follow-up wouldn't be too expensive.

Stay tuned for reports on Balvenie 15 year old Single Barrel and Speyburn 10 year old (old label), as I try them with the blindfold off.

Talkin' Diageo Boycott Blues

Monday: The Diageo non-whisky brands
Tuesday: The Diageo whisky brands
Wednesday: A summary of my larger Diageo conflicts

I used to write whisky industry-related posts almost once a week.  But then I stopped.  Writing about corporate actions and rising prices made me angry.  But writing about actual whisky made me happy.  So I focused on my single malt reports instead.

Each time I've found something enjoyable to obsess about -- baseball, music, movies, whisky -- I get to the point where I discover how business and finance shapes or limits those pleasures.  Then the fun drains out.  So here I am, left index finger in a splint, typing very slowly (a total martyr, right?!), brain running very quickly, writing about how the business is ruining my joy.  I'm already grumpy (I mean, you try washing your right arm with your right hand), so maybe this was the perfect week for Done With Diageo.

Yep.

For this week's series, I wanted to air out my issues with Diageo in one place rather than gripe and snark about them here and there.  I also wanted folks to think about what they drink before they drink it.  But don't think too much while you're drinking.  Seriously, or not so seriously, I don't want to ruin people's enjoyment of everything.  I'm also not a complete communist.  Not all businesses are bad.  Just most of them.  ;-)

I don't take back anything I've written this week, though I may have overstated my pricing issue.  As of today, the regular "Classic Malts" are priced well and if you have the coin to buy 25yo single malt then Diageo's are comparable to the rest of the market.  Because I do agree with many of the counterpoints presented this week, I'll clarify where I stand.

To begin with, I'm in the camp that thinks when it comes to whisky prices, we are in the new market reality.  Yes, whisky is getting more expensive at a rate that far exceeds discretionary income growth.  When those price increases are no longer tenable, then assets will be liquidated, overhead will be reduced, and prices may plateau.  But they will not go down.  For those of you in my boat who wish prices would go back to where they were even three years ago, get used to disappointment.

And it's not just Diageo and LVMH at fault here.  Beam, William Grant, Edrington, Inver House, Suntory, Burn Stewart, and Pernod Ricard are all actively raising prices -- mostly because they know we will continue to pay them.  The independents will raise their own as well, especially as they get fewer and fewer casks to sell.

The auctions are at fault as well, from the fools (the politest term I can manage) who are grossly overpaying for items, to the houses themselves (like Bonhams and McTears) providing misleading information and selling easily identifiable fakes.  As the secondary market prices go up, so will the primary market's prices.

How about my gripe about dwindling indie casks?  Diageo is far from alone on that one.  Glenfiddich has let maybe a handful of casks go since I've been born.  Balvenie and Glenfarclas indies are either teaspooned or have to go by another name.  Meanwhile non-OB Macallans are getting rarer.  The Big D isn't the only one hoarding malt.  This was also demonstrated when most of the major owners pulled their own vatted malts from the market at the same time Johnnie Walker did so.

And my qualm with Diageo barely bottling any of their distilleries' single malts?  Pernod releases single malts from less than half of their distilleries.  Bacardi doesn't release any [Correction! They do regularly release a 12yo and 21yo from Aberfeldy. Thanks, Eric!].

But just because everyone else is guilty of some of the issues, doesn't mean that Diageo is in the right.  In fact with their size and influence, their choices carry much more power.

I also don't care what the reasoning was behind Diageo killing off Green Label.  It was a brand I liked, and they took it away, so it's a personal frustration.  Their pricing on Talisker 18 essentially killed off another of my favorite whiskies.  Another personal frustration.  And I don't take back anything I said about the goofy Diageo PR machine.  Nor how I feel about the crappy presentation of what is some of the most glorious whisky in the world, before it is tampered with.  Nor will I stop questioning how Scottish their Scotch actually is.  Nor am I comfortable with a single international conglomerate controlling such a considerable part of the liquid.  Nor do I forgive them for some very ugly corporate actions.

But is it enough for a boycott?

Well, I'm 97% there already.  I've purchased one Diageo product all year.  (I had to get that Talisker 10, didn't I!)  In the bigger picture, I'm making an conscious effort to slow (or stop) my whisky buying in general because: 1.) prices are higher; 2.) I have less discretionary income than I used to; and 3.) my whisky cabinet is almost packed tight.

One of my biggest frustrations about the whisky community is that no one (aside from Mr. Scotch and Ice Cream, Tim Read) seems to be satisfied with that what he already has.  And by "satisfied" I do not mean the obsessive narcissistic posting of bottle pics on the Malt Maniacs and Friends Facebook page.  The drive is to buy more, more, more or (worse) buy/flip, buy/flip, buy/flip.  Because retail therapy can turn into an addiction, and because the real pleasure of whisky is in the drinking and sharing -- not the hoarding -- I'm trying very hard to learn how to be happy with what I've got.  It's not easy, and I fail often, but I'm going to keep focusing on that pursuit.

With all of that in mind and with a reduced whisky budget, I need to be selective about my purchases.  And the question goes back to, who do I want to support?  Not Diageo, directly.

I will continue to support small malt producers.  Distilleries like Arran and Kilchoman must bring a great product to the market in order to survive, then keep it great in order to stay open.  Having grown up with small businesses in my family, I want to support the little guys because I know how difficult it is to turn a profit when resources are small and how much the human aspect is needed in order to succeed.

Many of my purchases will be from independent bottlers.  And if one of those bottlers get its hands on a Diageo cask, then I may just avail myself of one of those bottles.  Since Diageo malt and grain whiskies are inside almost every single blend out there, I will continue to buy (tasty) blends.  There's no way I would stop supporting Compass Box; Glaser è il maestro.

I won't can't stop my wife from buying Diageo products.  Do not get between that woman and a pint of Guinness.  And speaking of Guinness, when I am back in Ireland and Scotland (oh, that will be the day), I won't resist buying Diageo stuff because at least some of my money will go directly to Irish and Scottish publicans and retailers.

With Diageo owning 34% of their drinks segment, there's a real dearth of LVMH whisky I desire to buy, especially with Glenmorangie putting the kibosh on Astar.  I've never found an officially bottled United Spirits (now owned by Diageo) malt that made me yearn for a second sip.  But I'm in trouble if Diageo ever does buy Beam Inc.

For the time being, you will find more Diageo single malt reports here because I have a bunch of goodies in the stash.  After those goodies are gone, I'll have to consider how I'll treat samples.  Inside my brain, arguments rage about both sides.

I worry that this week's series came across holier-than-thou.  I don't want to be the guy standing in front of the store, holding the sign that says "EVERY TIME YOU SHOP AT WALMART, GOD KILLS A KITTEN", because we all know that God only kills a kitten every time you masturbate.

Not the reason behind my hand injury

What was my point?

Thank you for your comments, tweets, and facebookages.  I actually agree with most of your challenges, and they all made me think about what I wrote.  And my intent wasn't to be a bummer, so I'm sorry if I pissed in your whisky.  Industry leaders piss in my whisky all the time.  Diageo, with their big D, is the preeminent perpetual pissing perpetrator, and I'm tired of it.  So, I won't give them my money.

Next week, I'll go back to reporting on the fun stuff.

A Diageo boycott: The Motivation

Monday, I wrote about Diageo's brands.
Tuesday, I wrote about Diageo's whisky.
Today, it's about the B word, and why...

Boycott is an act of abstaining from buying or using.  The definition sounds simple, but it's a word that holds significant connotations.  We shape much of our lives around the things we buy and consume.  I like to buy and consume whisky.  Diageo owns a hell of a lot of whisky.  To say "no more Diageo products for me" means there will be a lot less whisky out there for me to purchase.  But when I buy something, that money goes to support a person or a series of actions and policies which constitute a business.  Thus my money = me.  Do I want to support the actions and policies that are Diageo?

The only reason for me to say "yes" is whisky.

Here are some personal motivations for me to say "no":

1.  Let's start with the Special Releases' pricing that I mentioned on Monday.  Diageo has doubled, tripled, and quadrupled prices on these annual releases over the past few years.  And this isn't just on closed distilleries, but also open ones, so they cannot use the "closed distillery" reasoning for the boosts.  Consider that while they are priced higher than similar single casks on the market, these Special Releases are not single casks.  Instead, ten to twenty casks are utilized for each release thus there are many more bottles for sale.  So this action isn't just there to silence the secondary market, but also to manipulate the primary market via pushing prices up and creating increased scarcity for their future "Special Releases".  For more information and a better take on this, please see Oliver Klimek's "Whisky for Fools" post.

2.  Next, the termination of Johnnie Walker Green Label.  There are now two posts about this (here and here) so I won't belabor this point much more.  Green Label was one of my favorite Diageo products and possibly their highest quality blend.  So there's a personal gripe built into this, in addition the BS PR involved.

But one additional note that I did not include yesterday... For the folks who claim that blended malt sales fell dramatically in 2011 -- triggering the Green Label axe -- it's hard to know how blended malt sales could do well when there was a 55% drop in exported blended malt in 2011.  If you give us less, we'll buy less.  Otherwise, it looks like companies like Diageo wanted to keep their malt for higher profit-margin lower-malt whiskies.  Don't slap us and say we deserved it when we didn't.

3.  Talisker.

Talisker?  Talisker.  Talisker might produce my favorite malt.  Or, at least I think it might but I really have no options to explore it further since Diageo hasn't let any casks slip to other bottlers in almost 25 years.  But that's a company-wide issue I'll leave for #5.

This year, Diageo raised the price on Talisker 18 year old by 40% without explanation or without limiting the supply, leaving many of us fans to go WTF?  It is now priced up there with similarly aged products by a "luxury" brand (Macallan), a "friggin' quackers pricing" brand (Dalmore), and a hand-run small business (Springbank).  I can only assume they were trying to pull a Dalmore (whom they now own) by declaring, "This is luxury because the price is high."  Anyway, one of my favorite whiskies is now out of my price range.  Cheers.

Then there is Talisker Storm.  I've already snarked about this one.  I'll put sarcasm aside for a moment.  I don't mind distilleries releasing young non-age-statement (NAS) whisky onto the market.  A lot of folks are doing it now and pricing it at the bottom of the range.  Instead, Storm is priced about $20 higher than its classic age-listed older brother, the 10-year-old.  So, Diageo, what you're saying is that in order for me to try a younger NAS Talisker full of oak manipulation, I'm supposed to pay more?

In the end, I'm only left with Talisker 10, the first of the 10-year-old single malts to reach the $60 price range.

4.  Poor presentation of a high quality product.

First, they strip whisky out of their whisky in order to make it look pretty in cold climes.  By chill-filtering the hell out of the malt, they strain out oils that contribute texture as well as taste and smell compounds.  Then they add a significant amount of E150a.  And by "significant" I mean my last Oban 14 was brown.  I don't mean dark amber or rich gold, I mean brown.  That is not the color of watered-down filtered whisky that spent fourteen years in refill bourbon oak.

As consenting adults, we know that the alcohol we drink isn't great for our livers.  But with proper hydration we can help remove the alcohol from our bloodstream.  I don't know how long lab-created caramel colorant takes to exit my body, but I'd rather not introduce it when I'm already socking my liver with delicious whisky.  One poison at a time please.  I'll choose malt w/o E150a.

5.  No indie casks.

And by that I mean at some point around 1998 Diageo decided to end any further distribution of their casks to independent bottlers.  There wasn't a whole lot going out to the indies at that point anyway, but the faucet was shut off.

The independent bottlers are very small businesses that in no way compete with a $80B market-cap slug like Diageo.  Instead, with their limited resources they bottle unfiltered uncolored (and often cask strength) whiskies that provide anoraks with the opportunity to experience a malt from an alternate angle.  They expand the whisky experience.

Diageo puts several hundred thousand casks into bonded warehouses each year.  Couldn't they let a handful out every once in a while?  Apparently not.

6.  Did I mention that Diageo rigged an independent beer competition?  Who does that, really?

7.  Back in the 1820s, a grocer......what was his name?.......um......oh, John Walker, began blending whiskies to sell to his customers in Kilmarnock, Ayreshire, Scotland.  Business eventually picked up a bit, you may have heard.  Almost two hundred years later, ignoring protests by tens of thousands of locals (you know, actual Scottish people) and efforts by the Scottish government, Diageo closed the Johnnie Walker bottling plant in the home of Walker's Kilmarnock Whisky, delivering a pounding to the local economy.

8.  Let's add into this mix the fifteen distilleries proto-Diageo closed and demolished during the last whisky drought.  Does Scotland trust a company -- a non-Scottish company with stakes and ownership around the world, paying tens of millions of pounds to its executives and board and more to large stockholders -- to have this much control over its most famous export?  What will Diageo choose to do the next time the market lags?  Meanwhile, their human distillery jobs were decided to be redundant and their tax receipts go to the UK at large.  With Diageo buying their barley from around the world, how Scottish is their Scotch?

9.  To throw a little seasoning in there, Distillers Company Limited (DCL, proto-Diageo) distributed Thalidomide, the pharmaceutical drug that caused horrific birth defects in over 10,000 newborn babies around the world.  It took over forty years for Diageo to set aside substantial compensation for the surviving mutilated victims.

10.  Is that a little too long ago?  How about the '80s?  As far as corporate ethics goes, there's the share-trading fraud that tripled Guinness's share price, allowing them to takeover DCL, which is pretty neat.  Some of the wealthy fraudsters claimed anti-semitism was behind their eventual punishment -- as a Jew, very little disgusts me more than knowingly guilty parties claiming anti-semitism when they are caught (that includes you, Ryan Braun).  Former Guinness CEO Ernest Saunders was able to stay out of prison by claiming he had Alzheimer's Disease.  A few years later he magically became the only person in history to have been cured of Alzheimer's Disease.  A few years after that, with its massive holdings in tow, Guinness merged with Grand Metropolitan, forming Diageo.  So there's no Diageo without billions of dollars of fraud.

I'll stop at ten today.  Tomorrow, I'll wrap this all up and try to define my next steps...

A Diageo boycott: The Whisky

Yesterday, the non-whisky brands.
Tomorrow, the "why?".
Today...

Here's the pressure point.  The whisky.  The distilleries fully owned by Diageo produce 38% of all of Scotland's malt whisky.  Their top selling blend, Johnnie Walker, is not only the largest Scotch blend (with more market share than the next three brands combined), but Johnnie Walker alone sold more than twice the LPA (liters of pure alcohol) of the entirety of the single malt market in 2011, 69.7M versus 34.7M.

So if a person was considering never again purchasing Diageo products, his Scotch choices would be significantly reduced.

Let's start with the blends:

Blended Scotch Whisky
Bailie Nicol Jarvie (via LVMH)
Bell's
Buchanan's
Dimple Pinch
Haig
J&B
Johnnie Walker
Logan
Vat 69
White Horse
Windsor Premier

Many of these aren't available in the US.  For the ones available here: White Horse isn't terrible, while Buchanan's, J&B, and Dimple Pinch are decent for cocktails/highballs.  But their absence would not be felt here at home.

That leaves Johnnie Walker.  I have done PLENTY of posts about JW.  Black Label was one of my starter whiskies and was, until last year, the go-to home blend.  But it was last year's news about the termination of Green and Gold Labels that had started my boycott talk.

For more about this particular act of Diageo's whisky killing, here's a link to my original post.  Here's a teeny bit of the issue I took:

In an interview with the major wine & spirits journal, Shanken News Daily, Diageo's Head of Whisky Outreach (really) says:

“As we reviewed the brand offering, we found that the range wasn’t meeting consumer needs and providing the best consumer journey through the range as far as taste profiles and price points.”

And...

The revamp was meant to spread out the Johnnie Walker portfolio’s pricing in order to better motivate consumers to move up the brand ladder.

The whole "consumer needs" reference is cute.  The actual "needs" are Diageo's malt needs.  They are investing hundreds of millions of GBP to expand their malt production in order to fulfill the blends needed by emerging markets.  At the same time, Green Label was their only all malt blend (or blended malt).  Without cheap grain whisky mixed in, Green Label had a much lower profit margin than regular blends.

Per the Malt Whisky Yearbook, Diageo released 220,000 cases of Green Label in 2009.  That's 1,980,000 liters of malt whisky.  That same quantity of malt whisky could be spread out to 550,000 cases of grain-light or 733,000 cases of grain-heavy blended whisky.  There's a quick way to triple one's blend production, spread out the malt.

Meanwhile, to "motivate customers" and tend to consumers "needs" and "journey", Diageo replaced a 15-year-old 100% malt blend with a no-age-statement (read: much younger) 30-40% malt blend, at the same price point (from Green to Gold Reserve, $60).  Then they traded out the old regular Gold Label for Platinum Label, swapping an 18-year-old blend for an 18-year-old blend at a $20-$30 higher price point.

To sum that rant from a year-and-a-half ago, even though PR content is usually mostly untrue, Diageo's PR was particularly insulting to this "consumer" and "customer".  Plus, I really like Green Label.  And my disappointment was only heightened by the dipsy corporate message.

All this malt talk leads me to the Diageo distillery count!
Included: The recently absorbed United Spirits facilities. The LVMH distilleries, of which Diageo owns 34%.
Not included: The closed distilleries.

The open distilleries
Auchroisk
Benrinnes
Blair Athol
Caol Ila
Cardhu
Clynelish
Cragganmore
Dailuaine
Dalwhinnie
Dufftown
Glendullan
Glen Elgin
Glenkinchie
Glenlossie
Glen Ord
Glen Spey
Inchgower
Knockando
Lagavulin
Linkwood
Mannochmore
Mortlach
Oban
Roseisle
Royal Lochnagar
Strathmill
Talisker
Teaninich

The United Spirits distilleries
Dalmore
Fettercairn
Jura
Tamnavulin

The LVMH distilleries
Ardbeg
Glenmorangie

There are a lot of great distilleries on this list, including a number of my favorites.  Diageo owns so much super malt that it would be so hard to part with many of these.  I guess I'm lucky(?) they bottle almost none of these historic high-quality products as single malts.

Remember that Whisky Outreach gentleman from Diageo I'd mentioned in the blend section above?  Well, he also laid out this whopper at the 2011 World Whiskies Conference:

"Diageo is a blended whisky company. Diageo does not make single malts for me to enjoy. We do not make single malts for the aficionado to enjoy. We make single malts for our blending team."

As I mentioned in an earlier post, the first and last sentences are true.  The ones in the middle are, well......

Diageo is in the single malt business, but they don't commit much to it, thus their success is limited.  "Aficionados" do enjoy Talisker, Lagavulin, Caol Ila, Clynelish, Cragganmore, and the rest of their Classic Malts series.  Sadly, those "Classic Malts" make up only 1/3 of their distilleries.  And those "Classics" get but one regular bottling each.

They also turn out Special Releases, Rare Malts, Managers Selections, Distillers Editions, and other limited bottlings.  So, again, they are in the business of making single malts for "aficionados".  They just don't commit much malt or other resources to it.

While much of the rest of the single malt world is focusing more and more on higher ABV, non-chillfiltered, and uncolored whiskies, Diageo continues to turn out watered down and heavily filtered malt full of industrial caramel colorant.  Thus they're not even bottling a good version of their product.  At the same time -- due to their emerging market needs/desires -- Diageo has cut off cask access to independent bottlers, making it impossible for "aficionados" to access better (or at least, alternative) quality versions of this malt whisky.

Here comes the kicker:  Maybe they should get more serious about the single malt market.  In 2012, the US was the largest export market for Scotch whisky.  Its revenue was almost that of the second and third largest markets combined.  And this big export market has seen massive growth in its single malt sales.  In 2000, single malts made up 7% of the US's total Scotch volume.  Now it is at 15%, a nifty little growth of around 114%.

Meanwhile, Diageo North America showed only 1.3% in volume sales growth last year, while the rest of the market grew by 3.5%.  That means they were slacking everyone else by over 63% in annual volume growth rate.

So maybe a little commitment to the quickly growing single malt category in this largest of export markets wouldn't hurt.

I can dream, can't I?

In the end, I would miss Talisker, Clynelish, and Lagavulin the most.  It's just......I wish Diageo would make it harder for me to go.

A Diageo boycott: The Brands

Four weeks ago, Diageo dropped their annual single malt Special Release pricing turd into the market.  It is likely that price bloating -- such as Port Ellen's boost from $500 to $1000 to $2400 over the past three years -- was intended to try to silence the secondary market.  If their customers can buy an official PE for $500 then immediately sell it at auction for $1000, why would Big D want to lose out on that extra $500 revenue?  This is a drug after all, so an addict and his money are soon separated, thus without pause people were flipping their PEs for $1500.  So this year Diageo raised the price even higher to make sure that this secondary market wouldn't sap any of their potential income.  I'm sure that such a hike will accomplish a bit of what they've set out to do, but I can't help but think that this pricing will do a number on the primary market as well.  The industry is constantly testing to see how much we will spend on all of our whisky, including the stuff at Trader Joe's.  So if folks will continue to pay 10%-20%-30% more each year for a 25-year-old malt, then let's see if they'll do the same at each step in the brand rung.  And we are.

After reading the press release for the new limited releases, I was reminded that I was supposed to be discussing my Diageo boycott idea one of these days soon.  In fact, I said that I'd do so after the Summer of 2013.  It is after the Summer of 2013.  So let's talk about it.

Diageo PLC (DEO; NYSE) has a market cap near $80,000,000,000 (or for folks who like to go by Enterprise Value, it's nearing $95,000,000,000).  Its annual revenue will likely top $18,000,000,000 in 2013.  Its stock value has tripled since a low point in mid-March 2009 and they still give out a nifty dividend of two to three percent to their investors.  Diageo's nearest competitor (though it doesn't really have one) in the whisky industry is Pernod Ricard SA.  Pernod as a whole is valued at less than half (possibly closer to 40%) of Diageo's worth, turns half as much profit, and has considerably less cash on hand.

So really, if I stop buying Diageo's products it's not going to mean a darned thing to their books.  It's more a personal choice: To which company would I like to hand my money?  The answer is not Diageo.  The reasons are legion and I intend to attempt to list them later this week.  But for today, I'm going to list their brands (not including Scotch Whisky), in order to demonstrate what's theirs on the store shelves and thus what I wouldn't purchase under such a boycott.

Because Diaego owns 34% of LVMH's (Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy) drinks unit -- and are looking to buy it out in its entirety -- I am including their brands with a parenthetical.  Though there was much discussion of Diageo buying out Beam last winter, nothing has yet come of it so I won't include Beam's brands here.

Please note, this does not include brands distributed by Diageo, nor the 130+ Indian brands absorbed via the purchase of United Spirits Limited.

Brandy and Cognac
Bertrams
Hennessey (via LVMH)

Gin
Booth's
Gilbey's
Gordon's
Nolet's
Tanqueray

Liqueur, Schnapps, and Aperitif
Archers
Bailey's
Goldschlager
Pimm's
Romana
Rumple Minze
Sheridan's
Sirop de Picon
Yukon Jack

Rum
10 Cane (via LVMH)
Bundaberg
Cacique
Captain Morgan
Myers's
Pampero
Zacapa

Tequila
Don Julio

Vodka
Belevedere (via LVMH)
Ciroc
Ketel One
Popov
Smirnov

Irish Whiskey
Bushmills

Canadian Whisky
Crown Royal

American Whiskey
Bulleit
George Dickel
Jeremiah Weed
Seagram's Seven

Beer
Bell
Guinness
Harp
Kilkenny
Meta
Red Stripe
Serengeti
Senator
Smithwick's
Tusker
Windhoek

Wine
Acacia
Beaulieu
Blossom Hill
Canoe Ridge
Chalone
Chateau d'Yquem (via LVMH)
Dynamite
Dom Perignon (via LVMH)
Domaine Chandon (via LVMH)
Hewitt
Justerini & Brooks
Krug (via LVMH)
Mercier (via LVMH)
Moet & Chandon (via LVMH)
Moon Mountain
Navarro Correas
Plat d'Or
Provenance
Rosenblum Cellars
Ruinart (via LVMH)
Sterling
Veuve Cliquot (via LVMH)
Vignobles

Seeing some familiar names up there?  These brands often take up more than half the shelf space at small bars, grocery stores, and corner liquor counters.  So if one wanted to stop buying Diageo products cold, one would need to consider his or her drinking experience without those bottles.

For me, there's not a lot being sacrificed from this list.  Of the gins, Tanqueray is the only one I've bought.  I've been trying to buy gins from smaller companies, and the results have been pretty good.  The craft companies seem to be having more luck with gin than whiskey so far.  For the liqueurs, I don't drink 'Schlager or Bailey's anymore.  In the rum category, I haven't had Captain in years.  Having been a vodka drinker in a previous life, I have purchased all of their brands.  Though if I never drink vodka again, I won't be too disappointed.  Whiskey-wise, I was just starting to dabble in some Bushmills, but I'm not convinced it will be that much of a loss.  Nor will Crown Royal.  I like Bulleit, especially at its price range, but there are many other non-Diageo brands that use similar juice.  As you may notice, LVMH holds most of the good wine brands on the list.  Some fun champagne in there, but I'd rather support smaller producers.

The beer section is the tough one for me.  Guinness is a mainstay in our home and it is divine when served in Ireland.  Harp and Red Stripe are also favorites of mine.  Tusker is a beer I share with my dad when I see him, ever since we drank tons of it in the Kenyan heat thirteen years ago.  So that's the sensitive spot.

Again, look at the big ol' list above.  How hard would it be for you to part with all of those brands?  This isn't about snobbery, it's about what tastes good to you.  And would the pleasure those brands bring be worth giving up if their company's policies and corporate actions offended you?

It's something I've been considering.  The beer brands are one of my weak points.  The other?  Scotch whisky.  That list follows tomorrow.

Willett Week: Willett Family Estate Single Barrel Rye 6 years old, Barrel #57

I love Willett rye.  I LOVE Willet rye.  But after five of them in one week, whew......I don't know how Serge does it with his 7-part Caol Ila verticals on a Tuesday, then 6-part Bowmore horizontals on a Wednesday.  Here's how I structured things:

Tasting #1, Sunday night:  4 year old from barrel 82 and 4 year old from barrel 85
Tasting #2, Tuesday night:  5 year old from barrel 38 and 5 year old from barrel 64
Tasting #3, Thursday night: leftovers from Tasting #2 and 6 year old from barrel 57

It's been a whole lotta...

This final Willett rye was from my own bottle that I'd opened this past winter.  I stashed away a sample at the halfway point.  I forgot to take a pic of the sample, but here's the original bottle:

You see that "Distilled in Indiana" at the bottom of the back label.  That's good news for me.

Bottler: Kentucky Bourbon Distillers (formerly Willett Distilling Company)
Brand: Willett Family Estate Single Barrel
Type: Straight Rye Whiskey

Age: 6 years

Maturation: New American Oak

Region: Bardstown, Kentucky (Distilled in Lawrenceburg, Indiana)
Barrel: 57
Bottle: 155/204

Alcohol by Volume: 55%

The color?  Let's just call it Willett brand maple syrup.  The nose holds all things for all people.  First, it's very desserty.  Caramel sauce, vanilla ice cream, and cherries.  A rye sundae!  Mango and dried cranberries in there too.  And Cow Tales, the candy.  It's got the spices going on: cloves and cardamom.  It's rocking the barbecue: wood smoke and charred meat.  And -- like most of the other Willetts from this week -- give it 20+ minutes to breathe and a maple syrup note wafts up.  The palate also hits many good spots.  It has the sweets, the sours, brine, and heat, all in balance.  It's a little bready, has lots of cloves, some bubblegum, mint, and cherry-flavored cough syrup.  The dense thick rich finish brings the caramel and sweet cream combo, as well as a lot of fresh fruits (peaches and berries, I think...).  Possibly some rye seeds in there too.

Kristen noted the big alcohol heat.  But she also said the nose reminds her of the cranberry quick bread her church used to set out on Sundays when she was a kid.

This was some good stuff.  There were a number of these 6yos in the stores during Spring 2012.  I haven't seen them since.  With all the good word of mouth the Willett ryes have gotten, KBD may not be able to keep the barrels aging for much longer than 4 years anymore in order to meet demand.  That's not too tragic.  I adore the three and four year old bottlings, but hopefully they have a chance to keep a few barrels going for the extra couple of years.

If I were to give recommendations (I can see your eyes rolling via your webcam), I'd say that the 4 year olds have been reliably awesome in my experience (3 for 3!).  But if you're a fan of big ryes and you see a 6 year old single barrel Willett rye sitting on the shelf for the same price as the 4 year olds, you'd best scoop that up.  And make sure you check out where the rye in that bottle was distilled before laying down the cash.

Best Autumn wishes to everyone!  May you have plenty of whisk(e)y weather.

Availability - Not sure who's still carrying the 6 year, either

Pricing - $35-$40 (East Coast, Midwest), $40-$45 (West Coast)

Rating - 91