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Monday, April 6, 2015

Whisky Observations from Japan (or Where the Hell is the Japanese Whisky?)

I'm starting my two weeks of Japanese posts on a sobering note, but I promise that things will get much brighter and boozier as the days progress....

In hindsight, I should have consulted with The Japanese Whisky Review and WhiskiesRUs before I left for Japan.  But I didn't.  Originally, Japanese whisky was the catalyst for my voyage, but as I planned my itinerary, and other matters came to the surface, whisky became a secondary aspect to my travel.  Nonetheless, whisky made a number of important appearances while I was in Japan.  I drank infrequently while I was there, but what I drank (and what I found) was memorable.  For a comprehensive examination of the current whisky industry from a more knowledgable person, see Dramtastic's, "Japanese Whisky – Where to From Here?".  He talks about the smaller producers as well as the larger ones.  What I'm writing below are my observations from the ground, from the street level (because that's where I'm from, yo), during my seven-day stay.


Before this trip, I thought that the Japanese made the best single malt in the world.  That may sound strange coming from someone who has reviewed 350+ Scotch whiskies and less than a dozen Japanese malts.  But the consistency, the elegance, the richness in the whiskies from Japan's two main players (Nikka and Suntory), demonstrated much greater attention to quality control, and much less corner-cutting, than what has been coming from the Scotch industry's major members over the past half decade.  Perhaps I was misattributing it to a stereotype, but it seemed as if the Japanese distilleries held a greater sense of pride in the product they were bringing to the market.

After this trip, I no longer feel the same way.

As mentioned, Japanese whisky was one of the reasons I went on this trip.  Yamazaki was one of the reasons I scheduled most of my time in Kyoto.  Spending time at the distillery was indeed a lot of fun (as will be detailed in my next two posts) and I am very thankful to have had the opportunity.  But the whisky that Suntory's distilleries are now bringing to the market is not good.  No longer are they putting a 10, 12, or 18 year old on the shelves.  Instead, non-age statement whiskies (called, I believe, Distiller's Reserve) have taken their place.  I tried the Yamazaki and Hakushu NASes twice during my trip, but found them so underwhelming that I decided against buying small bottles to bring home to review.  They're both flatter and hotter than their 12yo predecessors and have nearly no finish.  While the 12s were consistently mid-80s (or grade B) whiskies, the NAS are low-70s (about a C- grade).  And this is all that Suntory is putting on the shelves from what I saw in Japan.

Let me clarify.  Between my time in Shinjuku and Kyoto, I visited 16 liquor retailers.  Out of those sixteen, one had a pair of Yamazaki 12s and Hakushu 12s.  Four had Hibiki 12.  Everything else from Suntory (malt and blend) was NAS.  Nikka fared slightly on their side of things.  Half of the stores had Yoichi and Miyagikyo 10 or 12 year olds.  One had a 15.  The rest, including all of its Taketsuru "pure malt", was NAS.  (Regarding the smaller producers, about half of the time there's one White Oak, one from Ichiro, and one of Kirin's around.)  Of those 16 retailers, seven were large department stores (like Isetan) who as of a couple years ago, not only had Japanese whiskies with age statements, but also often had exclusive single casks.  At this point none of them even had a Japanese whisky product with an age statement.  The duty free stores in Narita had almost no Japanese whisky at all.

It appears as if the lead Japanese whisky company (Suntory) is no longer putting age stated whisky on the shelves of liquor stores in two major wealthy urban areas in its home country.  Do Osaka and Yokohama have all the AS (age stated) whisky instead?  I don't know, but I doubt it.  Yamazaki, Suntory's larger distillery, is just minutes south of Kyoto.  And if the bottles don't make it to Kyoto or even Yamazaki's gift shop......?  Meanwhile, my local Costco here in Southern California has at least three cases of Hakushu 12 on the shelf for a low price.  So is the US getting all of Suntory's AS malt, or are we now seeing the last of it?  I don't know.

One of my Kyoto neighbors
I've been told by a couple of fellow whisky curmudgeons that Suntory "f**ked up" when it came to underproducing and underpricing their AS whiskies as well as anticipating the market's movement.  As you may have noticed, I am suspicious about the claims and motivations for the Scotch industry's descent into NAS releases.  Thus I was somewhat doubtful about the claims about Japan's aged stock shortage.  But now, I think it has to be at least somewhat true.  I can't envision the same companies who had released gems such as Yamazaki 18 and Yoichis 15 and 20 now having much pride in the uninspiring, almost generic, NAS products whose labels hold the corporate name.  These new products certainly have their place as sub-$30 starter whiskies, but they are taking the same price spot as the old 10/12s.  Suntory's and Nikka's malts may still have the consistency, but I no longer see the elegance, the richness, or the quality control.  (To be fair to Nikka, the Yoichi NAS is better than both of Suntory's Distiller's Reserves and is priced lower.)  Whether or not someone did f**k up or there was an unforeseen volume boom, consumers are losing out.  Customers have a lot of choice in the world whisk(e)y market right now.  How much loyalty will they feel towards the large Japanese brands?

If any of you have found similar or different whisky circumstances in Japan this year, please let me know in the comments below.  It was disorienting to walk into shop after shop after shop and find only a small corner of NAS Japanese whisky every time.  I'm hoping that I was only caught up in a synchronicity that left everything from Takashimaya to Yamazaki to Lawson's to the corner liquor shop devoid of the same things for a small window of time.

But if you're traveling in Kyoto or Tokyo you may be comforted to know that many of the bars still have the old Suntory and Nikka AS malts we've come to know and love.  And the bars, dear god the bars, the whisky in the bars.  I won't spoil the upcoming posts here, but......there is whisky in the bars.  Will the bars still have the Japanese classics next year?  I have no idea.

BUT!  And I shall end on another but.  There is sooooooooooooo much Scotch whisky to be found in Japan right now.  Holy moley.  Most of the hole-in-the-wall liquor shops (not to mention the bars) I visited had a slew of Scotch single malts (some of which have been on the shelf for more than 5 years) at very good prices.  A few shops had staggering (not hyperbole) selections.  While there, I thought to myself, "So this is where the Scotch has gone."  Had I not been carrying my home on my back like a bespectacled turtle, I would have returned with a case of goodies.
(source)
So, take heart whisky explorers, you can find all of the Scotchy gems (from indies to officials) that I left behind in Japan.  Just don't expect to find much, you know, Japanese whisky.

20 comments:

  1. From the sound of things, even America is going to be getting very, very slim allocations of Suntory whiskies in future. Oregon is just about out of Yamazaki 12, though the other standards are alright, albeit continually creeping up in price ($69 is now the low end).

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    1. Sounds about right. Winesearcher says that Yamazaki 12's US price has gone up 70% in four years. The 18yo has gone up 113% in that time period. Hakushu 12 has only gone up 10% in that time. Yamazaki 12's not even available in SoCal anymore, but Hakushu 12 can still be found for $60.

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    2. American booze obsessions tend to be narrow and focused.

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    3. That's true, and then the obsessions move onto another booze.

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  2. Unfortunately what you encountered is the reality of the situation, and getting worse on a weekly basis. You can fare better in smaller cities as you go North, or by making friends with shopkeepers sick of investors and hoarders. My experience is that displaying a genuine appreciation of whisky goes far and will sometimes produce a bottle or two that is available for sale.

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    1. Yeah, the shopkeepers I met were very nice, though I spoke no more than a half dozen words of Japanese and would have loved to have chatted about the whiskies on the shelves. Next time I go to Japan (if there is a next time) I do hope to go up North.

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  3. I live in Osaka and I can tell you the whiskey didn't make it here either... Chatting with the owners of the shops it appears that buyers just started showing up and buying everything by the case. There are signs now in the department shops like Isetan stating that one client can only buy one bottle (certain types of whiskies like Nikka's 40 year old). You used to be able to find Hanyu card series or even owner's casks (as per whiskies r us) in the dept. stores as late as 1.5 years ago.

    There's also rampant speculation about Japanese whiskey right now on the market. I bought a limited edition 2014 yamazaki single malt for 8,000 yen, it now sells for 15,000-30,000 in some places.

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    1. That sounds like what's going on with the premium-priced whiskies in the Scotch and American markets, but even more intensely so. This speculation movement is disappointing for those of us who just want to drink a bottle. I mean, it IS whiskey and all. I was told by two different Japanese whisky folks that Chinese buyers were behind a lot of the Japan purchases. Not sure if that's true or just a little bit of subtle cultural antagonism.

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    2. Actually that's exactly what the shop keepers told me, Chinese buyers just came in and bought the whole lot of them.

      I think in terms of getting a bottle of the special expressions the only real chance, apart from popping by Isetan frequently, are events like Whiskey Festival and Modern Malt Market. Which is really a shame, like you said some of us just want to drink a bottle.

      Good news is that the more common age-statement whiskey like Hibiki, Yoichi, etc., at least in Osaka, can be found pretty much everywhere.

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    3. But why don't they buy Scottish whisky then?
      Do they like JP whisky so much or are they trying to profit?

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    4. All of the department stores (including Isetan) were very picked over when I was there. That might be due to the fact that I was there during prime tourist season (cherry blossoms!). And I had a lot of difficulty even finding Hibiki 12. Yoichi and Miyagikyo 10 were the most prevalent age stated ones I found, in about half the stores.

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    5. @Anonymous #2 - I have heard that certain groups of new Asian wealth are cleaning out many of the auctions for super-premium Scotch whisky. But my assumption with the many of the Chinese buyers of Japanese whisky is that they're flipping it for much higher prices back home.

      When I was in Duty Free in Narita Airport there was a Chinese family (or at least they were flying back to Shanghai) that bought ALL of the chocolate in the shop. And I mean cart loads of it. Perhaps they were going to eat it all themselves...

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  4. The good bottle shops here in Tokyo can go weeks without having Yamazaki 12 or 18 on the shelves, but this has been the way since Jim Murray called Yamazaki Sherry Cask 2013 the world's best; whether or not people actually understand that the Yamazaki they're buying up isn't that Yamazaki is unknown to me, but I can assure you, it's not just the Chinese buying it all up. As for Nikka single malts, Yoichi and Miyagikyo 10, 12 and 15 are still fairly easy to get hands on, but with the popularity of a TV show about Masataka Taketsuru's life, combined with Taketsuru 17 being named world's best malt blend at WWA, Taketsuru 17 and 21 disappeared from shelves almost overnight. Right now, you have to be a Johnny (Jenny)-on-the-spot to get a bottle, and I'm willing to be this is not because the Chinese are buying them all up.

    The best young whisky (3 years) being produced in Japan right now, and it's not even close, is Ichiro's Malt Chichibu, a small craft whisky distillery in Saitama Prefecture.

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    1. Thanks for your comment, Will! A Tokyo resident!

      Yes, Jim Murray's declarations seem to cause a lot of trouble even though so few people have a palate like his (for good or ill). And I had a sinking feeling the moment I saw his most recent Whisky of the Year declaration. You enumerate a number of very good reasons for the shortage in the shops. And I'm glad that the Nikka malts can be found with age statements in some places. They were indeed more prevalent than the absent Suntory age statements, but they were still challenging to find in all of my searches, which is too bad because I'm a big Yoichi fan.

      And yeah, I agree that Chichibu (and a lot of what Akuto-san does) represents a good future for Japanese whisky.

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  5. Gone because of the price rise on April 1st, Jim Murray publicity stunt, the morning drama (asadora) based on the Nikka founder and his wife, the general increase in popularity over time, and last but not least - Chinese buyers. (That may be right or wrong, but what I've been told by a major bar owner in Tokyo and several shop owners - observationally the influx of Chinese tourists is very evident)

    The speculator and secondary market is a self powering machine and reached critical mass a while ago....perhaps that is the true source of the frenzy.

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    1. Thanks for the comments, Bret! Yep, I think your list sums it up. I wouldn't be surprised if you and I heard the Chinese buyers thing from the same bar owner. The secondary market has become a hell of a creature, and I wonder if it will someday begin to eat its own tail.

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  6. Additionally, there is amazing stuff available in bars for silly (low) prices....so if you want to try, do that. Good stuff available to buy at some distilleries too....

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    1. Yes, the bars are incredible. Sometimes they provide the only way for many of us to try certain whiskies. If (or when!) I go back to Japan, I'll definitely visit Nikka's distilleries.

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  7. Additionally, there is amazing stuff available in bars for silly (low) prices....so if you want to try, do that. Good stuff available to buy at some distilleries too....

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    1. Hmm. Looks like my comments section hiccuped. :) But it does bear repeating that the bars are the place to go for the good stuff.

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