The Whisky Gaze: Two Black & White TV Commercials from the 1970s

I'd like to say that my Black & White stash motivated this month's thematic content, but the true inspiration was the discovery of two old Black & White TV commercials on YouTube. The commercials are from the same time period and carry the same message.

And that message is: Black & White = Hot Chicks.

To wit, Commercial 1.



A summary of the plot: The real life Artie Ziff is down in the dumps, standing at a cardboard bar in Pretend Morocco. Suddenly a blonde woman sees a chance at getting a free drink out of the sad sap. Because she's three feet larger than him she gets a tall drink. The end.

Weighing in at 59 seconds, this ad feels at least thrice that length due to its wretched editing. The editor either fell asleep on the flatbed (see what I did there?), or the commercial was cut by a drunkard's feet. At half its length the ad would have been twice as effective. But even then, the eye lines never match. The continuity is so poor, the final result seems like footage from two ads were smushed together.

Between the garbage direction, unfortunate editing and kick ass soundtrack, I half expected underexposed hairy hardcore sex to follow. Or maybe I've watched too many Joe D'Amato films.

Now, Commercial 2:



A summary of the plot: Black & White being poured over the rocks. A woman in a white bathing suit gets wet. The end.

Wow! This ad works so well, I think I saw breasts floating in the scotch. Someone out there had been studying his or her Kuleshov and Eisenstein. Unlike the other commercial, this thing blasts through like shit through a goose. Unlike the other commercial, this ad never hesitates on its way to completion. The woman and the whisky are put on equal ogling grounds, and then you the viewer get BOTH at the end of the day. Sounds legit. I'll buy a case.

According the comments on these videos, there was at least one more commercial from this campaign, one with a woman in a black bathing suit climbing out of a jacuzzi. So the theme was consistent. Though these ads worked in one way since people remembered them 35-40 years later, were they effective beyond simple voyeurism?

This objectification of women was not unique to these Black & White's advertisements, or the industry as a whole. An advertising campaign like this (or this) demeans, at minimum, 50% of consumers. As referenced in a previous post, Black & White's sales declined rapidly from the late '60s through the '70s, into the '80s. This campaign did not salvage the brand in any way because three more decades passed before Black & White's sales ascended. The need to objectify women overrode the need to expand the customer base, and the brand gained nothing.

Black & White Scotch Whisky print ads, a brief commentary

Every bio about James Buchanan says he was an animal lover. But the following sentence, in every bio, states that he raised racehorses from which he gained considerable financial return. Does that not sound like a man who rather loved money and exploited animals for profit? I don't know, but he did put horses in some of his advertisements. I mean, not wild or free horses, but draught animals:

circa 1903

He did like dogs — as far as I know he did not raise them to race or fight — and per the brand's myth, he got the idea of using wee terriers as part of Buchanan's advertising after attending a dog show in 1920. Though this ad, my favorite, is from 1914:

Though it would be a few additional decades before they graced bottle labels, the black and white terriers, Blackie and Whitey, were the focus of Black & White's print campaigns by World War II. Here are two ads, ca. 1942, that help promote the war effort. Note the terriers' shaded ad space features larger than the bottle itself.

The company went with the "The Scotch with Character" slogan for at least two decades as well. And by the 1950s, the advertising campaigns committed to fully establishing the terriers' adorable, playful characters. I mean, look at these little faces:

And now they're playing American football!

And baseball!

And celebrating Christmas, of course!

Here, in a 1957 ad, they are at the beach:

Now, note that the dogs are portrayed as lifeguards. They're positively dependable, like the whisky. Keep that in mind when you look at this beach-themed ad from 1974:

So, comedy(?), I guess?

Either the dog is turned on by human women, specifically human women who have undergone the sexual humiliation of a suit top slipping in public. Or that humiliation is seen as funny? Or women are being lowered to the level of dogs. Or all the above? And why? And how does that sell whisky?

Not all of their '70s ads were this baffling, but with the whisky industry's historical and current abysmal treatment of women, I thought I'd just dump this one onto the fire.

Let us now cleanse our palate with an image of happy doggos.

We can ignore the awkward cutting and pasting within the image. And the weird background. And that either the dogs or the bottles are in the wrong order. Let us instead focus on the simplicity of the idea. Two dogs, two whisky expressions.

The Extra Light version didn't last long, even in dog years. But Blackie & Whitey live on.

A cheesy hashtag as well as awards won by everything in a bottle, yes. But at least Whitey isn't chasing someone else's tail.

Image sources:

--http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/

--https://www.etsy.com/

--https://www.ebay.com/

--MacLean, Charles. Scotch Whisky, A Liquid History. London, UK: Cassell Illustrated, 2005.

Black & White blended whisky, a history

Born in Ontario and raised in Scotland, James Buchanan began working with Charles Mackinlay & Co in London in 1879, at the age of 30. In 1884, he started his own company, James Buchanan & Co Ltd. Sourcing whiskies from W.P. Lowrie, Buchanan began selling The Buchanan Blend the following year. (Buchanan and W.P. Lowrie later had Glentauchers Distillery built in 1896, and together bought Bankier and Convalmore in the following decade.)

Buchanan's goal with his Blend was a whisky, light in character, that would appeal to the English palate. It was such a success that Buchanan & Co received an exclusive contract with Parliament, the following year, to supply them with Buchanan’s House of Commons Finest Old Highland (also known as, House of Commons).

James Buchanan, Lord Woolvington

The House of Commons whisky, also sold by English grocers, came in a black bottle with a white label, and that's how customers began ordering it: "that Black and White whisky." As he began exporting the whisky around the world, Buchanan renamed it "Black & White" (with the quotation marks) in 1902.

As one of the most influential Scotch whisky producers, Buchanan chose to expand his business further by merging James Buchanan & Co Ltd. with the company of Scotch titan, John Dewar, forming Buchanan-Dewar in 1915. Their company was then consumed by the giant Distillers Company Limited (DCL) in 1925.

Black & White — the quotes were dropped around 1970 — included Dalwhinne, Clynelish and Glendullan malts for many decades, with Dalwhinnie often being the main ingredient. It's likely that the blend had Glentauchers, Bankier and Convalmore in it at various times as well. Though it usually had no age statement, Black & White was at various times an 8 year old. A 12-year-old version was briefly offered post-Prohibition, then again a half century later. And, as if the light-style whisky wasn't enough, there was an Extra Light version in the mid-20th century.

Said to have been an animal lover, Buchanan often used images of horses in his early adverts. But, as the legend goes, after attending a dog show in 1920, he got the idea of using two terriers, one black, one white for all his advertising campaigns. Early on, they were known as Scottie and Westie, but became better known as Blackie and Whitey.

Black & White has appeared in novels as diverse as Fitzgerald's Tender is the Night, Fleming's Moonraker and Vonnegut's Breakfast of Champions. It has also shown up in films such as La Dolce Vita, Dr. No and Father Goose.

In 1964, the year of Father Goose's release, Black & White was one of DCL's best selling brands, trailing only Haig and Johnnie Walker. But as the market changed, and DCL experienced management struggles, Black & White's sales fell 50% over the next five years. Volume declined throughout the 1970s, until the brand was eventually pulled out of England and became an export-only product.

By focusing on emerging markets, Diageo was able to revive Black & White's sales in the latter half of the 2010s, expanding its volume 100% between 2013 and 2017, raising it from the 18th best-selling Scotch brand to the 10th. Two decades into its third century, Black & White has left its original demographic, finding more welcoming new homes in South America, Asia and Africa.

Sources:

--MacLean, Charles. Scotch Whisky, A Liquid History. London, UK: Cassell Illustrated, 2005. (also, the photo source)

--https://scotchwhisky.com/whiskypedia/2322/black-white/

--https://www.diageobaracademy.com/en_zz/know-your-liquid/our-brands/black_and_white/

--https://thewhiskypedia.com/black-white-scotch

--https://www.thespiritsbusiness.com/2018/06/scotch-whisky-brand-champion-2018-black-white/

Glenfiddich: An Introduction and History

source

Though he had a stable job to support his nine children, William Grant chose to quit his gig as Mortlach's manager in order to build his own distillery. Constructed from the stones of River Fiddich, the distillery was dubbed Glenfiddich, or "valley of the deer". In 1886, Grant caught a break when Cardhu distillery sold off their used distilling gear — including stills, water mill, worm tubs and mash tun — for all of £120. Glenfiddich spirit first passed through those stills on Christmas day, 1887.

When whisky broker William Williams & Company quickly bought up the distillery's entire output, Grant then increased the 400 gallons/week yield and started supplying whisky to Pattisons Ltd. Many distilleries were crushed when Pattisons went bust in 1898, but because Grant pivoted his business and started producing his own blends, Glenfiddich survived. Their most successful blend for more than a half century was Standfast (named after Clan Grant's motto).

source

William Grant had a stroke in 1900, and in 1903 the family business was turned into an LLC known as William Grant & Sons. The company has stayed in the family ever since.

In 1957, the company contracted modernist designer, Hans Schleger, to rework their packaging design. The result was the industry's first three-cornered bottle, an iconic design that only changed once, in 1964, when its clear glass was switched to green glass for their new product.

Single malt whisky had existed since legal whisky production began, but what made Glenfiddich's 1963 foray into single malt unique was the decision to promote and market it, worldwide, with the same effort put towards blended whisky. This sudden, risky maneuver wasn't blind chutzpah. It was prompted by necessity.

In 1963, Distillers Company Limited ended its grain whisky contract with William Grant & Sons, putting Standfast's production at risk. William Grant's great-grandchildren adapted just as he did when circumstances became difficult. They built their own grain distillery, Girvan, within the year. And Glenfiddich 8 year old Pure Malt made its debut.

Thought it took a few years, the gamble paid off. In 1964, Glenfiddich Pure Malt (or Straight Malt in the US) sold 4,000 cases. In 1974, it sold nearly 120,000 cases. Around 1,200,000 cases of Glenfiddich's single malt were exported in 2017. With its jump on the rest of the marketplace, Glenfiddich has been the number one selling single malt brand for 54 of the past 55 years. As recently as 2007, Glenfiddich had 18% of the single malt export market, which was more than the 2nd and 3rd single malts combined. As of 2016, they still held 12.5% of the market.

source

In addition to trailblazing the single malt marketplace, Glenfiddich was the first single malt to show up in Duty Free shops, in 1968. The distillery was also was the first in Scotland to build a visitor center, in 1969.

The distillery has outsourced its malt supply since its floor maltings were closed in 1958. They've used the same water source, Robbie Dhu, since the 1880s, but their production levels have increased slightly, approximately 173x. The distillery now has 32 stills (some of which remain direct-fired), 32 Douglas Fir washbacks and two stainless steel mash tuns. The fermentation time is either 60 or 72 hours (depending on one's source).

Though Glenfiddich's entry level single malt has kept the same bottle shape for more than five decades, its name and label design has shifted more than a half dozen times. It's been known as a Pure Malt, Pure Single Malt, Straight Malt, Unblended and Single Malt, though it's always been 100% malt whisky from the same distillery. It went by the same Special Reserve or Special Old Reserve name for at least 30 years, but is now labelled as "Our Signature Malt". It's been an NAS, 8yo, 10yo and 12yo whisky at different times. Its balance of sherry to bourbon casks (15/85 in 2008) has also likely changed a bit over the years.

Glenfiddich 12 year old was the first single malt I ever tried, 20-ish years ago. I've been curious to find out how the liquid has changed, so I collected eight bottles from batches produced over the past four decades. Now I'm going to open them up and drink 'em. Gird your loins, it's going to be a 'Fiddich February.


Sources:
--MacLean, Charles. Whiskypedia. A Compendium of Scotch Whisky. New York, NY: Skyhorse Publishing, 2010.
--MacLean, Charles. Scotch Whisky, A Liquid History. London, UK: Cassell Illustrated, 2005.
--Ronde, Ingvar (Ed.). Malt Whisky Yearbook 2018. Shropshire, UK: MagDig Media. 2017
--www.scotchwhisky.com

Single Malt Scotch in America: Prices Begin to Stabilize

Welcome to Part 2 of 2019's Scotch Stats! We're in America now, so things are going to get huge.

First off, there's The Spreadsheet or The Price List or The Sleep Deprivation. There are now 225 whiskies on the sheet. And there are at least 225 stories to be found within it. Today I will spare you, and tell only a few tales, including the one in the post's title.

Here's where The Spreadsheet's numbers come from:
I use Wine Searcher's Average Wine Price system, selecting only US retailers. Their site has an explanation behind how they arrive at their averages. To summarize, their averages don't include auctions; all prices are adjusted to 750mL bottles; the highest and lowest 20% prices are removed in order to correct for pricing errors and grievous retailer choices. Aside from the ability to view pricing history, Wine Searcher's big draw (for data and consumer purposes) is their large data set. For instance, if you search for Johnnie Walker Black Label or Talisker 10 they'll actually stop their listings at 500 because they have so many retailers in their system. Please note, this is not an advertisement for Wine Searcher. Their Average Wine Price history requires a paid subscription and I've been known to mooch off of other people's accounts from time to time.

My spreadsheet has gotten so extensive that I encourage you to check out my shared Google Doc at this link. It should be easer to follow and scroll through than it is here.



About the spreadsheet:
I'm using a methodology similar to the last time around. There are 225 whiskies (99% of which are official bottlings) listed in total and, thanks to spreadsheets, I have data back to 2007 for 115 of them. Each time I assemble one of these annual posts I include more whiskies. This year I added only those that had at least three years of US pricing history. Whiskies with ten or fewer retailer listings were retired in 2019, but were kept on the list for historic pricing purposes. They received a blank gray field for their efforts. Whiskies with fewer than 20 listings are marked "scarce" in the notes column. Don't be too surprised if all the "scarce" whiskies are retired next year, like the entire old Benriach range was this year.

Because directly comparing a 12-year price change percentage with a 3-year price change percentage with an 8-year price change percentage is crap math, I'm using the same metric as I did during previous years to measure the increases: Multiple of Inflation (or MOI).  MOI takes the total price change and divides it by the US's inflation (CPI) rate over the related period of time (12, 8, 6 or 3 years).

The color-coding is based on the MOI, as follows:
Dark blue = price actually decreased, thus a negative MOI
Light blue = price increased between 0 and the actual rate of inflation
Green = price increased between 1 and 2 times the rate of inflation
Light pink = price increased between 2 and 5 times the rate of inflation
Fire Truck Red = price increased between 5 and 10 times the rate of inflation
Black = price increased more than 10 times the rate of inflation

Unlike last year, I'm ditching the MOI in my charts because I'm approaching the information from a different angle this year. Weighted calculations were laboriously factored into my formulas to correct for the different time spans involved in the averages.

If this is your first time seeing The Spreadsheet, I encourage you to pour yourself something delicious and then click over to the spreadsheet and dig in.

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Now, for some pictures to go with the words.

THE STORIES!

The Rise and Pause of the NAS

Here's the headcount of the whiskies from the spreadsheet:

Yes, those tall black bars are NAS single malts. It is now the largest age category. The infection has set in. Nearly every official range has at least one single malt without an age statement. Some brands have multiple NASes. Some are made entirely of NAS whisky. And the prices?

There's a lot going on in this chart, especially the right side of it. But look over at the left side. The average price of the 52 NASes is higher than than the average 8-10 year old whisky, higher than the average 11-13 year old whisky. Let that soak in a bit...

...

...Okay, that's enough time, because something interesting has happened to the NAS category:

On the surface, it appears as if the average price has barely moved over the past three years. But within these numbers is another story.

Out 52 NAS whiskies, 21 dropped in price between 2016 and 2019, while another 15 rose in price less than 5% during that time. Leaving out the two Dalmore NASes, this category actually averaged a drop of more than half a percent over the past three years.

You'll see more low or negative numbers for NASes further down this post. I think we will need at least one more year of data before it can be determined if the category is truly trending down in price. But it's fair to say that it has at least plateaued, and that plateau is only being held up by a few pricier outliers.

Luxury is expensive

Yes, this chart again:

Those tall bars on the right get taller and the bars on the left get smaller every year. The prices for 25-40 year old whisky are rising at such a fast rate that they screw with my line graphs.

Like so:

Or this:

40 year old whisky has become irrelevant. A $5,000 whisky is superfluous for 99.9% of the whisky drinking public. 99.9% of us are ignored in its production, release and marketing. It wasn't always like this, but it's come to this because 40 year old whisky's price increases have been operating on a different plane than all other single malts.

Speaking of which.

EDRINGTON DRUGS

I guess the Internet Way to write about this is to toss up a ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ and say "Macallan gonna macallan".

And that is valid. But I'ma write a little more about Edrington.

As I noted in reviews last year, Macallan's and Highland Park's branding has recently devolved into unfocused, confusing gibberish. But that hasn't stopped them from hoisting up their prices every time a marketing exec creates a different range, names it after something he just saw outside the window, then hoovers a line.

The "Average" in this table is the per year per whisky per owner. Yes, The Egregious Group is on a whole 'nother level.

The Main Story

But you didn't come here to read all that. Or did you???

Different charts tell different stories, and all can be true. There's a chart like this...

...which shows little steadying or plateaus other than with the NAS category (as mentioned earlier) and some straightening out with the younger categories.

All the percentages in this chart are compounding. A whisky whose price goes up 3% each year for 12 years won't be $136 at the end, but rather $142.58. It's not lies, nor damned lies. It's statistics. And it's why money market accounts used to be hella lazy awesome during different economic times.

But if I take the overall increase for each of the 225 whiskies, then split out the average annual increase for each available year compared to its first year on the spreadsheet (2007, 2011, 2013 or 2016), and then create a weighted average of all of it, I hopefully get a chart like this:

See things starting to even off now?

Prices are still going up, so why does this chart do the flattening thing? It's because price increases have been easing off, bringing the averages down. Thus the lines aren't heading towards the stratosphere (sorry Edrington). Some may even be slanting slightly down. Most are just pointing rightwards.

Here's a chart that shows the average ACTUAL year-to-year increases.

click to embiggen

The magic year is 2016, peak craziness. It is at that point, for the vast majority of whiskies in the spreadsheet, that a calming of price increases began. By 2019 most whiskies, and half the categories, were increasing by a rate lower than inflation.

This doesn't mean the prices are going down, except with the NAS category. It means the line is starting to flatten out, as shown in the previous chart. The 8-10, 11-13 and NAS categories' prices essentially did flatten out between Jan 2018 and Jan 2019. One wonders if 14-16 will follow suit by next year.

Of all companies, Diageo (yes, Diageo) has shown the most promise. They're the largest owner, and have the most whiskies on the spreadsheet. Their entire portfolio's average price has gone down 1% since 2016.

So......what's the cause? I don't know. As mentioned in Monday's post, single malt exports to the US are certainly not hurting (which also leads me to believe that prices are not going to drop soon). Are corporate executives — at companies other than Edrington — beginning to sober up and drift towards reason, easing off the acceleration? Could this be a reaction to the pricing of American whisky? Is the overproduction from the past decade about to come home to roost? Or is there something else on the horizon?

It's possible we're at the beginning of a new era of the Scotch business. It's also possible there are many years of more-of-the-same ahead. Either way, I'd be happy to see the end of the price hikes. Now can someone tell the independent bottlers about this?

Scotch Whisky Exports in 2017, or The rowboat still pulls the steamship

Welcome back to my annual analysis of the Scotch Whisky export market! Yes, one year was skipped. And there will be only two posts, instead of three, this year. This is because the Scotch Whisky Association no longer shares their annual Statistical Report. That report was my data source. So now I am piecing together data from various publications, including smaller items from the SWA and summaries from IWSR.

That means there are no new data for whisky consumption in the UK, nor annual production levels by SWA members, nor the age of whisky sitting in warehouses. Is this information being withheld on purpose? I don't know. But those data points certainly clashed with nearly every press release squawking about the burgeoning Scotch market.

Those narratives aside, the most noticeable change in the SWA publications was the categories. No longer was it Malt and Blends, but Single Malt and Blended Whiskies. I almost gave up writing this post entirely because I thought my big data sheet was rendered useless. But it wasn't. I just had to rethink the comparisons. Blended malts and bulk malt had been removed, and what was left was a more familiar, relatable subject: The Single Malt. And therein breathed the solution to today's post.

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Since the great peak of the Scotch Whisky export market in 2011, volume sales have had a bumpy ride year to year:

2012: -5.2%
2013: +2.6%
2014: -3.0%
2015: -2.8%
2016: +4.0%
2017: +1.6%

Even with those last two gains, export volume in 2017 was still 0.4% under 2013 levels, and 3.1% beneath 2011's totals.

Meanwhile, the value of Scotch Whisky exports was 3.3% above 2011's amount. As mentioned in previous years' posts, value can increase while volume decreases when the value per unit rises. In this case, it's GBP (Great British Pounds) per liter. Thus the price of exported whisky went up enough to offset drops in actual whisky being sold.

But it's not that simple. Three other factors have had a considerable effect on the Scotch Whisky export market's monetary gains: inflation, exports to the United States and single malt sales. Bring out the charts!

click to embiggen

I always start off with the above chart to show that Scotch volume sales are indeed up and look healthy since the 1980s and early 1990s. But then I always follow it with this chart:

This chart does a number of things. First, it puts all that volume growth into some perspective. It also shows what looks like stratospheric increases in value and GBP/liter. Scotch whisky appears to be a booming business. But those gains aren't quite what they appear to be.

This graph shows the monetary gains from the previous chart adjusted for inflation, starting with 1980 (the beginning of my data set). What one sees is an industry that has struggled to out perform the UK's inflation. In fact, the GBP/liter price in 2017 is still lower than the adjusted 1980 amount. It wasn't until 2011 that export value jumped ahead of inflation, but that was largely due to the peak volume sales mentioned above. Annual value sales were trending back to the 0% mark until the solid gains made in 2017.

I'm going to zoom to look at the past decade:

As referenced in previous years, volume sales have been anything but flourishing. And for a few years the reported annual value was also slumping. Yet there's been a 55% gain in value sales over this 10 year period. Again, this seems like business has been awesome.

But this shows again that the industry was in danger of underperforming the UK's inflation rate. Adjusting for inflation tempers all value gains, but as one can see from these charts, there have been actual increases in sales. One of the drivers behind the boosts is Scotch Whisky's highest valued export market, the Occasionally-United States of America.

Even as the whole market's sales (in value) dropped after 2011, whisky exports to the United States continued to rise.

Between 2008 and 2017, the value of Scotch exports to the US increased by nearly 150%, while the non-US export market saw gains of 28%. When adjusted for inflation, the US gains were still 116%. The non-US gains vanished, turning into a loss of 3%.

The United States is the largest export market in terms of value not volume, which means there's a higher than normal GBP/liter rate for its Scotch. That substantial rate is due to the fact that US is the biggest recipient of single malt whisky in the world, with totals larger than the second and third largest single malt markets combined.

And if one is still searching for some sort of Scotch Whisky Boom, one may find it in single malt sales.

While sales of blended whisky have plateaued (at best), single malt exports have zoomed in terms of volume and value over the past decade. And, unlike almost all other indicators in the Scotch Whisky export market, it shows no signs of letting up:

With these massive gains in single malt exports, why haven't Scotch exports blasted off as a whole? Well, single malt whisky still makes up a tiny portion of the market when it comes to volume.

But, as can be noted from the charge above, it is no longer an insignificant part of Scotch's value. Though it makes up only 10% of the volume, it will likely cross the 30% marker in terms of value by 2019.

On the flip side, blended whisky has been bleeding value market share:

And it's not just value. Blended whiskies' annual volume sales total in 2017 was still beneath that of 2008. But blends are such a behemoth that their declines always weigh down the entire market. Single malt sales are the rowboat pulling the steamship in Buster Keaton's The Navigator.

(pic source)

What's causing blended whisky's stall out? Blended whisky brands are much more recognizable. Names like Johnnie Walker, Dewar's, Chivas and Ballantine's are synonymous with Scotch, worldwide. And blends are priced much more affordably.

Of course this chart doesn't show the actual prices of single malts and blends, but it does show the difference in how the exports are valued.

Single malts are more luxurious (price-wise) and have the reputation of being well-aged premium spirits, but their names are less familiar, appearing as various Glens and/or cryptic Gaelic phrases. Are consumers leaving blends for single malts (and other whiskies)? Or are new drinkers going directly to single malts, skipping over blended whisky entirely? Are they seduced by the high prices or the connotation and mystique of the term "single malt"? Or are blends dropping in quality due to the demand for their most valued ingredient, malt whisky?

Whatever the cause, people (especially Americans) are spending a lot of money on single malt whisky. As blended whisky sales struggle and the Scotch export market barely keeps above the inflation rate, this continuing ascent of single malt sales has the been the key to Scotch's financial success in the past, present, and, possibly, the future.

Whisky 1000: Old Hermitage Reserve Rye, bottled early 1910s

Five years ago, I was introduced to someone as "the guy who's tried more than 200 whiskies." The gentleman with whom I was being acquainted responded with a skeptical, "How'd you do that?" With the moment catching me by surprise, my answer was, "I don't really know."

But I do know. I could have only done this because of you. Thank you. Thank you for checking in on my last latest rants, complaints, brilliant ideas, loves and general narcissism. A story doesn't exist without an audience. Something brought you here and keeps you here, and I'll do everything I can to inspire you to stick around for more. Thanks again for stopping by.

I'd also like to thank the following people for supplying the drugs: Aaron, Amy, Andrew S, Andy S, Brett, Chris, Cobo, Eric S, Florin, Jennifer, Joe, John, Jordan, Josh F, Josh H, Josh P, Josh S, Lee, Linda, Linh, M.A.O., Matt W, Michael R, Ryan O, Ryan S, Ryan S, Sjoerd, Sku, Teemu, Tetris, Tim and Vik. (There are others, I know, and I'm so sorry for missing your name here. Thank you too!) I'd also like to thank LASC, OCSC, SCWC and CSN for deepening the exploration and also making humans hang out with each other.

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And then there was 1000.

Four Decembers back, I spent a whisky evening with one Joshua Feldman, known to many as The Coopered Tot. Josh had always been very generous with his collection and knowledge, but on this night...holy moley...he announced we would be opening this:

Bottled by W. Bixby & Company in the early 1910s, this rye was distilled by W.A. Gaines & Co (one of the largest whiskey producers at the time) at The Hermitage Distillery in Frankfort, Kentucky. E.H. Taylor Jr was one of the company's early financiers, but he left in the 1870s. The distillery itself was built in 1868 and ran until it was turned into a chair factory during Prohibition.

W. Bixby started bottling Old Hermitage in 1909. Old Hermitage bottles had capsules on the top starting around 1915. This bottle did not have a capsule. That's how Josh got the 1909 to 1914 date range.

For more info on all of this stuff see Sjoerd's review and this great discussion between Cowdery and Veach, two bourbon history giants. Josh also referenced the bottle in this interview with Angus (who is himself a giant sponge of whisky insight).

Also, there's this:

The Old Hermitage is the sexiest bottle I ever had, I think. But sadly it's now empty. But I'll never forget the night I cracked it with you, @kravitz_hubris pic.twitter.com/HJwUZoPjTh

— Josh Feldman (@cooperedtot) March 17, 2018

In order to pry the cork cleanly from the bottle, The Coop utilized a rare form of Scottish acupuncture:

And it worked perfectly.

It looks like a cross between a shuttlecock and Sputnik.
Does that make it a Sputcock?
Discuss amongst yourselves.

For some zany reason we lined it up against full-powered Thomas H. Handy's 2012 release. And, by gum. It held its own. In fact, it was remarkable.

It all seems like a hazy crazy dream now, four years later. But to make sure this remained in the realm of reality, Josh sent me home with an excellent sample. What a mensch, jeezus.

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To make this the official 1000th whisky on The Big Whisk(e)y List I have to give it a score. And I'll do that now, because I feel the weight of the absurd on this number: 93

Okay, you can forget that number now. I'll continue.

---

So how exactly does one review a rye whiskey that was bottled 100 years ago? I don't know, but I thought I'd try it alongside three enjoyable contemporary ryes. It wasn't just that I wanted to compare the quality, but I also wanted to glean if there was any matching (metaphorical) DNA in their styles.

I'll cut right to it. These younglings got schooled. When compared to Old Hermitage...

(time to shift verb tenses)

...Wild Turkey 101's nose is nutty, loaded with caramel and wood shavings, while the palate is bitter and green.

...Pikesville 6yo has a lot of candy and vanilla in the nose, with grain and smoked nuts in the palate.

...Smooth Ambler Old Scout 7yo's nose is rife with pickles, pine and soil, and its palate is medicinal and briney.

I sincerely like all three of these ryes on their own, but there's a flatness and greenness to them when compared to Old Hermitage. The Pikesville is vaguely the closest in style on the nose, but none has a similar palate. The MGP Smooth Amber has the most distinct style of the three.

---

And the Old Hermitage Reserve?

The nose is loaded with fruits: clementines, lemons and baked peaches. Then there's shoe leather and anise. Toasted rye bread and almond brittle. It grows dessertier with time, loaded with custards and sugars. Not even a whiff of old bottle funk.

It may be the most drinkable rye I've ever had. The palate has a moderate warmth, close to the 99-101 proof babies, but it doesn't scorch the senses. Add in an excellent balance of characteristics and a silky texture and...oh does it drink. About that balance; think sea salt, brown sugar, citrus juices, mint, toasted barley and earth. No blatant oak, no obvious vanilla. There's something almost alien about that after drinking so many modern whiskies.

The citrus comes on strong in the finish, almost like a single malt. Hints of salt, soil and coal smoke. Something floral joins the gentle sweetness.

Though I'm filled with elation and wonder, a quiet sadness lies beneath, like I've lost something that was okay to lose. It's not the alcohol talking, nor the customary chemical imbalances. Time has passed. Memories gone, distilled down into obstacles and momentum. Maybe that's why this blog is here. A thousand photographs of things mistakenly thought to be distractions. It's just whisky, but that doesn't mean it can't be beautiful. This was a good rye.

Edradour and Ballechin twins! Same bottler, same year, same cask type.

First, Hazelburn and Longrow. Now, Edradour and Ballechin. My original intro was five paragraphs long, let me just outlineify it here:

1. Edradour distillery produces unpeated single malt (Edradour) and heavily peated malt (Ballechin)
2. Edradour distillery is owned by the independent bottling company, Signatory.
3. van Wees, a Dutch indie bottler (allegedly) draws its single barrels from Signatory's warehouses.
4. van Wees releases a few Edradour and Ballechin single casks each year.
1. Usually ex-sherry casks for Edradours
2. Usually ex-bourbon casks for Ballechins

As soon as I spied a sherry cask Ballechin, I swooped in and got semi-matching samples: Ballechin and Edradour, both distilled in 2008, matured in sherry butts and released by van Wees in their The Ultimate series.

Check the photo for the stats. Note the very similar ABV. Also the butts had very similar outturns: 696 and 694.

To the tasting!

NEAT

--NOSES
Edradour (8yrs 1day) - It starts off with oranges, cinnamon and dried apricots. Then raspberry jam, fudge, cardamom, nutmeg and a whiff of butterscotch. And, yes, plenty of alcohol.
Ballechin (9yrs 178days) - Smoked fish, eucalyptus and clementines. Dried cranberries, ocean air, ham and charred peat. With time in the glass it picks up baked pears with cinnamon and sugar.

--PALATES
Edradour - Dried fruit, especially cherries and golden raisins. Very salty. Tart lemons and raspberry jam. Sweet and heat. Thick mouthfeel.
Ballechin - Massive mossy peat. Charred veg and not-charred dried fruit. Lightly sweet, lots o' heat. Cinnamon and Tabasco sauce. Develops some bitterness with time.

--FINISHES
Edradour - Sweet. Berries, fresh and dried. Tart lemons and a hint of woody bitterness. But its the ethyl heat that lingers longest.
Ballechin - More of that huge peat. Chili oil. Very little sweetness. Similar heat and bitterness to the Edradour.

DILUTED TO ~46%abv, or <2tsp water per 30mL whisky

--NOSES
Edradour - Fudge and flower blossoms. Lime peel, prunes and raisins. Very big even at this ABV.
Ballechin - Ledaig, is that you? Seaside, peaches, cinnamon, peat and citronella.

--PALATES
Edradour - Plum wine, tart berries, ginger ale and cream soda. It's very peppery and drags along some woody bitterness.

Ballechin - Somehow the peat feels even bigger and darker. Quite a tar note. Well beneath the peat is a balance of sweetness (brown sugar), salt, savory and moderate bitterness.

--FINISHES

Edradour - A mix of cayenne pepper, grape jam, bananas and bitterness.

Ballechin - Char, dark chocolate and salty ham.

DILUTED TO ~40%abv, or ~1Tbsp water per 30mL whisky

--NOSES

Edradour - Very manageable. Mint leaves, ginger, anise, blackberry jam and Macallan 12.

Ballechin - Just char, mint and brine.

--PALATES
Edradour - It has become creamier, with fresher fruits (think plums and pears). Ginger powder.

Ballechin - Still plenty of punch to it. Peat and pepper and salt. Tart citrus and oak spices.

--FINISHES

Edradour - Pepper, berries and bitterness.

Ballechin - Identical to the palate.

WORDS WORDS WORDS

You may read quotes from "experts" that the cask is 2/3s or 3/4s or 70% responsible for a whisky's final character. Well, the Edradour is 100% cask. It is at times a very good cask. At other times it's too aggressive, held only in check by the high alcohol content. It seems to be doing its best Orphan Barrel Bourbon imitation with all that woody bitterness. But it gets better the more it's diluted.

The Ballechin is all Andrew WK. With peat levels that would embarrass southern Islay, heat levels that rival Stagg Jr and sherry levels comparable to, well, the Edradour, this 9 year old Ballechin is a whole lot of too much. Which works. If you're into that sort of thing. If it could shed the bitterness, I'd love to see it arm wrestle one the many murderous SMWS Port Charlottes.

At full strength, Ballechin's outrageousness wins. Yet as the whiskies are diluted, the Edradour reveals more stamina and complexity......even though it's all cask. But, in the end, it's all combustion.

EDRADOUR 8yo 2008 van Wees, cask 118
Availability - continental Europe
Pricing - €50-€60 w/o VAT
Rating - 85 (with water)

BALLECHIN 9yo 2008 van Wees, cask 189
Availability - continental Europe
Pricing - €50-€60 w/o VAT
Rating - 84 (neat)

Mission: Mars. Two weeks of Shinshu whisky!

Plenty of digital ink has been spilt over Suntory's and Nikka's whiskies on this blog and others. Chichibu's single malt has garnered raves from everyone who can afford a bottle of the magical baby whisky. And then there are the Japanese whiskies that are actually sorta kinda Scotch whiskies that have left plenty of people a grumpy shade of nonplussed.

All that noise covers up the fact that there are other functioning Japanese whisky distilleries. Some of which produce quality products. One of these active facilities is Shinshu distillery.

Photo by whiskymizuwari

Hombo Spirits, who also produce shochu and plum wine, have taken a few swings at whisky production:

• Yamanashi Distillery: opened 1960, closed 1969
• Kagoshima Distillery: opened 1978, closed 1984
• Shinshu Distillery: opened 1985, closed 1992
• Shinshu Distillery: opened 2011
• Tsunuki Distillery: opened 2016

While you may not have heard these names before, the Hombo distilleries' whisky brand name might just be familiar — Mars.

Located in the Japanese Alps, Shinshu is the highest distillery in Japan, a full 400 feet up from its neighbor, Hakushu. Shinshu produces four distillates, with peat levels of 0ppm, 3.5ppm, 20ppm and 50ppm.

Photo by Spirits Business

Hombo opened Tsunuki distillery (Japan's southernmost whisky facility) in 2016 and intends to have a single malt ready for Tokyo's 2020 Summer Olympics. Though the Tsunuki produces the same four distillates as Shinshu, it (and its warehouses) are near sea level and experience warmer weather.

Thanks to a set of samples sold by Whiskybase Shop, I'll be taking a little tour of Mars. I'll start with a few sips from Shinshu's first era, then gradually proceed to more current offerings. My Martian experience is limited, so this is a great Opportunity to satisfy my Curiosity about whether there is life on Mars.

Ben Nevis Distillery: An Introduction and History

INTRO

It's Ben Nevis month here at Diving for Pearls!

What does that mean exactly? Unless a cold knocks out my palate — the odds of which are favorable in this household — I will be reviewing TWELVE Ben Nevis single malts, four per week, and then opening up one of my bottles of Ben Nevis for a thirteenth review. That whisky will probably be a bit different than the dozen that precede it and should add to the overall experience.

There will still be a Killing Whisky History on Friday, which will be something which is most certainly NOT Ben Nevis. And maybe I'll throw in a review of something else fun at the end of the month.

Don't be surprised if there are additional distillery and brand explorations in the future...

HISTORY

source

Ben Nevis Distillery was founded by Long John McDonald (among other investors) in 1825, on the very Fort William acreage on which it operates today. Such was Ben Nevis's early success that a second facility, Nevis Distillery, was built nearby in 1878. But when the whisky market busted, the newer distillery closed in 1908. The original Ben Nevis site continued production and remained in the McDonald family until 1941, when it was sold to Joseph Hobbs, a Canadian millionaire who made his fortune bootlegging Teacher's Highland Cream into America during Prohibition.

Hobbs kept very busy in Scotland during the war years, helping National Distillers of America get their hooks into the Bruichladdich, North Esk, Glenury Royal, Fettercairn, Strathdee, Glenlochy and Benromach distilleries. He also had a brewery rebuilt into Lochside distillery. But Ben Nevis was his, and he immediately shut it down. For fourteen years. When he reopened it in 1955, it now had a Coffey Still and concrete washbacks. Both grain and malt were produced on site, and blends of the two were barreled at birth.

The distillery closed again in 1978, and the distillery was sold back to the McDonald family in 1981. It was reopened in 1984, with the Coffey Still removed. The distillery closed again in 1986. In 1989 it was sold to Nikka Whisky Distilling Company (now part of Asahi Group Holdings). Nikka opened the distillery in 1989, having replaced the concrete washbacks with steel and wooden ones.

STATS

Today, Ben Nevis has the capacity to distill 2,000,000 liters. Out of this total, it tends to produce about 50,000 liters of heavily peated (30-35ppm) spirit. It's one of the last (if not the last) scotch distilleries to use Brewer's Yeast. Fermentation used to be 48 hours in the steel washbacks and 96 hours in the wooden washbacks, but as of 2014 it's now 48 hours in all of them. Ben Nevis new make weighs in at 70%abv, and is barreled at 63.4%abv. Those barrels go into one of five dunnages or the racked warehouse. Or...

According to Malt Whisky Yearbook 2018, 75% of the distillery's output is transported to Japan for Nikka's blends, including Black Nikka. (On an editorial note, I have to say that sounds spectacularly inefficient, but I'd love to see how those tankers go from the West Highlands to the Chiba Prefecture.) That's up from the 50% amount reported two years earlier. Apparently the Japanese are thirsty.

THE WHISKY

Now that I've plumped your brains with useful nerdery, I shall dazzle your eyes with Ben Nevis single malt reviews starting next Monday. In the meantime, sit tight and stay warm.

*   *   *   *   *

Sources:

--MacLean, Charles. Whiskypedia. A Compendium of Scotch Whisky. New York, NY: Skyhorse Publishing, 2010.

--MacLean, Charles. Scotch Whisky, A Liquid History. London, UK: Cassell Illustrated, 2005.

--Ronde, Ingvar (Ed.). Malt Whisky Yearbook 2018. Shropshire, UK: MagDig Media. 2017.

--www.scotchwhisky.com

What is Japanese whisky? And does it matter?

another brilliant D4P photo masterwork, feel free to steal it!

In August, a respected online whisky writer went on a multi-day run complaining about the fractured state of Japanese whisky. He unleashed an interesting subject, but unfortunately — because rumor, hearsay and anecdotes are more available than facts — I was left feeling more perplexed about the entire picture than I was beforehand. Fortunately, other bloggers have since dug deeper into individual Japanese whisky products, helping bring some focus to a blurry subject.

Now I'm going to try to simplify the situation via an outline.

Here are the current types of Japanese whisky producers and their products:

1. Japanese non-distiller producers (NDPs), similar to American NDPs, bottling whisky that was distilled in Japan by another company.
2. Japanese NDPs bottling whisky that is a combination of Japanese and Scotch whisky, or entirely Scotch whisky, and
1. labelling it "Japanese Whisky", or
2. not labelling it "Japanese Whisky".
3. Young distilleries
1. bottling their own distillate
2. bottling their distillate blended with Scotch whisky,
1. labelling it "Japanese Whisky", or
2. not labelling it "Japanese Whisky".
4. Well-established distilleries
1. bottling their own distillate
2. bottling their distillate blended with Scotch whisky,
1. labelling it "Japanese Whisky", or      ← conjecture?
2. not labelling it "Japanese Whisky".

So. There are Japanese companies bottling blends of Japanese-distilled whisky and Scotch, as well as only Scotch whisky, and calling it "Japanese Whisky". Then there are some Japanese companies who are bottling the same, but not calling it "Japanese Whisky". And, apparently, there are still distilleries bottling their own stuff.

Though the Scotch Whisky Association can be a complete pain in the ass, and occasionally suspect in its intentions, it has attempted to iron out what Scotch whisky is through strict regulations. Because Japan doesn't have a similar organization, chaos can break out when their industry goes through a major transitional period, as it is doing now.

Keep in mind, much of the information regarding who does what in the Japanese whisky industry is based on the aforementioned rumor, hearsay and anecdotes. But if half of it is true, one begins to wonder, "What is Japanese Whisky?" If the rumors are mostly true, then how can we know if the long-established distilleries really are bottling 100% Japanese-distilled whisky? How do we know that Suntory's Hakushu isn't being boosted by the company's Laphroaig/Ardmore/Bowmore assets? What are we drinking?

Should this piss you off? That's up to you. In my opinion, there is nothing wrong with mixing whiskies from around the world. In fact, I think it's a great idea, and an undiscovered country for whisky blenders. BUT, I do think it's crooked for a company to call its whisky "Japanese" when the stuff in the bottle is less than 100% Japanese-distilled. Said producers are banking on the idea of "Japanese" and are willing to hide the truth in order to do so. I hope companies instead promote the fact that there's Scotch in their whisky, because people still love Scotch. A lot. For real. Worldwide.

This week I'll be reviewing three whiskies from Nikka that may or may not have Scotch whisky in them. But none of these products have the word "Japanese" on their label, in kanji or English.