Is The Image of Bourbon Changing?

[gillmang]

I see what you mean but I think people try different things and then settle on what they like best. The hardest thing for many people, even bourbon experts and even me on occasion, is to appraise without preconception a product in a plain bottle or with a reasonable or even low price. I have the confidence to do this now, so that e.g., when I read on a board that such and such product is middle shelf, that one is higher shelf because more "complex" (which can mean too woody), etc., going by price usually, I take that with a grain of salt.

In the case of vodka, the product itself is so similar bottle to bottle it was inevitable producers and marketers would go the luxury bottle route to distinguish their brand.

Some people would say the logic is the same for bourbon and these are people who claim there is little discernible difference between most bourbon brands. E. Frank Henriques, author of a well-known book on spirits and cocktails to whom I have referred before on the board, took this position. So, people selling bourbon who believe that may adopt a similar course to the vodka brand designers. (It is also true tastes differ and what strikes one person as unbalanced or overaged may appeal to another as rich and complex). Based on the test results of some blind bourbon tastings I've participated in with experienced tasters, they may be right.

Gary

[EllenJ]

Hard to say that no taste from Russia is different than no taste from Poland.

Hee.Hee.
Uh, Mike... would you say that was certainly a "tasteless" comment?

The Thedfords and McKendricks are prime examples of packaging a low quality product in an expensive looking package and charging a high price. Consumers took one taste and backed off. They then kept in their mind, "It looks good, but so did that mesquite crap". For bourbon to retain its improving image, it needs to keep in mind attractive packages had better include a good product.

Okay, here goes...
I want y'all to know, right up front, that I love you and I love bourbon whiskey.
Think of this as an exercise in "tough love".

I understand what you're trying to express, Mike, and I agree with you (and Chuck)... to an extent.

But I think you're taking an easy shot at products that our little group simply didn't happen to support (actually, it wasn't technically "our little group", but that's another story; many of us were involved there then, and we write the same way now, too).

The Goddess & I once spent a very pleasant afternoon visiting with Jim Razzino, the producer of both the brands you mentioned, in his Louisville home.
Jim's interest in American whiskey, like ours, centers around the history of whiskey in America. The idea behind Thedford "Colonial Style" whiskey, his first attempt, was less of a "me, too" move, relative to Brown-Foreman's Woodford Reserve, than a reaction to it. For all of it's highly-touted copper pot stills, Woodford Reserve (at least as bottled at that time) was no more an expression of "whiskey as it once was" than any other Kentucky bourbon. Especially any other Kentucky bourbon normally labeled "Old Forester". Jim wanted to create a more accurate example of the sort of whiskey Americans drank even before the Labrot & Graham (or Oscar Pepper) period, and his choice was a very young whiskey which he had bottled as Thedford Colonial Style.

It was wrong. He knew it was wrong (Razzino is an amateur historian similar to ourselves). Real colonial whiskey, if aged at all, would have been younger than what he could obtain, and wouldn't have been aged in new charred barrels. He could have used corn whiskey, but real colonial whiskey would have been rye, and that wasn't available to him. So he used the youngest bourbon whiskey he could find and hoped for the best. Thedford Colonial really isn't bad whiskey, other than being young. It's quite reminiscent of Bullett Frontier whiskey, made by Four Roses.

And that brings us to what Razzino REALLY wanted to do...

Jim is as fascinated with the American Cowboy as the Goddess and I are with pre-1990 American Whiskey. His house is decorated with paintings and photos of the Old West; his bookshelves and coffee tables are cluttered with cowboy books and memorabilia. He speaks of the Wild West the way we talk about copper pot stills and mashbills. His idea of marketing a brand of whiskey just like what cowboys might have drunk in the 1800s was not just marketing hype; it was an honest attempt to apply his career training (he was a salesman for, I believe, Brown-Forman before going independent) to his passion.

McKendricks was aimed at a niche market, and not without some logic. Razzino knew that the real "cowboy whiskey" wasn't twenty-year-old Stitzel-Weller or its 19th century equivalent. Oh there was plenty of that, all right, but you'd be more likely to find it in the fine saloons of Denver or San Francisco. What the great American cowboy found in a wooden shack at the end of the trail was young whiskey, aged in used barrels for about as long as it took to get to Kansas or Montana from Kentucky. The most commonly used method of "aging" was (and still is among craft-distillers) the addition of charred wood chips to the barrel. That was the sort of whiskey Razzino envisioned, but with one further step: America, and to an extent Japan & Europe, was on a "Southwestern" binge at the time. Everything was mesquite-this and chili-that. He took an existing successful marketing idea, that of emphasing the thick smokey taste of Islay whisky, and substitute mesquite smoke for the peat smoke.

Unfortunately, "Southwestern" went just as quickly out of style. Oh sure, Mexican restuarants are still around, but how many of them are still Tex-Mex?.
Seen anyone putting in adobe tile on "Trading Spaces" or "Designed to Sell" lately?
Does anyone know where I can find Southwestern Mesquite Seasoning anymore?
Uh-Huh.

I think one could safely say that the product was not a resounding success. Certainly not among us bourbon lovers, who (while we constantly bemoan the lack of innovation in the industry) always categorically reject anything new or different, unless it strongly resembles the currently accepted profile. And (with a single exception -- and even that's likely to disappear along with the last of the Stitzel-Weller, despite the fact that his best stuff wasn't even from there), we refuse to grant legitimacy to anyone not currently associated with the eight recognized Kentucky straight whiskey companies.

Certainly not to such upstarts as Jim Razzino. Or Tom Bullett. Or Trey Zoeller. Or Peter Pogue. Or any of the new Michter's whiskeys from Chatham Imports. And (if it weren't for her participation in this forum) not for LeNell Smothers, either (remember, LeNell isn't marketing an existing brand with a "Bottled for LeNell's" sticker; that excellent rye whiskey bears her own label). After all, we call ourselves bourbon enthusiasts, but do I see any tasting notes or discussions about Hudson Bay Baby Bourbon? Anything not derogatory on Noah's Mill? Yet nothing but praise for Buffalo Trace's 90-proof Sazerac Rye or (somewhat reluctantly) Heaven Hill's Bernheim Original or Woodford's Four-Grain.

Come on, folks. Get your heads out of your (to use a name that I've always associated with just the OPPOSITE of what I'm describing) BUNGHOLES, and start picking up on products that don't taste like the ones we already know and like.

There. That's it.

I really hope I didn't offend anyone, 'cause I love y'all and I love trading American whiskey knowledge back and forth. But I just feel it's time for the group I'd like to think I'm part of (after all, under my original name I'm number 15 of 611 members here) to move on up to a higher level of American whiskey appreciation. Like many of you, I suspect, I've felt this way for some time. I just needed to wait for the discussion to get around to a new product whose flavor I personally consider poo-poo so I could use that as an example instead of touting some personal favorite. It happens that I don't care for the taste of McKendrick, nor of it's less-auspicious brother, Longhorn Creek. But then, I don't find it any more unpleasant than that of Ardbeg or Laphraighadijnf (or however you spell Leap Frog). I just think I'd rather spend time discussing, rather than dismissing, "the little guy" in the progression of American whiskey from what it was when I started drinking it to American whiskey as it's gonna be when my grandson Ryan starts drinking it in a couple of years. I believe that, unless we DO THAT, the progression is simply going to continue to go (perhaps rightfully) toward American vodka.

Except for us old geezers who still prefer that bourbon stuff.

Cheers!![/i]

[gillmang]

I think you make some good points John. I have expressed, not just my interest, but my excitement at the recent release of the first bourbon by a new company since Maker's Mark in the 1950's; and as you said, save for Joe Luka (and I salute him) on the other board there has been no review of same on this board as yet and no detailed discussion of the brand. The other board ditto (except again for Joe's note). Some friends of mine have expressed lack of interest in the release. I think they are thinking maybe it won't taste good, or can't be worth $100, and maybe that is true (although who knows) but in my view the release is very significant in and of itself. I would have thought even people who don't have any HBB (I don't) or don't plan to buy it would want to find out as much as they can about it. (I thought Isahia Morgan rye whiskey was superb and would love to own a bottle).

But again, different strokes for different folks. Some people have the historical interest, the "broad view", and some (most) don't. So they are entitled to their view.

It is also true, John, that these "alternative" products will have to stand on their own. People will buy them if they taste good to enough people anyway. Maybe (trends apart) whisky flavored with unusual kinds of wood doesn't appeal to that many, I don't know. But people are always open to something new and good. Look at Bailey's Irish Cream Liqueur, which was the result of specific research and a marketing plan, probably not that different from what you were describing was done for some whiskies recently in the States. It took off steadily from the outset (1970's) and is still a huge seller. You never know which new product may end up in that category and it could be one of the whiskeys you mentioned (I haven't tried them) or another kind of whiskey, craft made or other. We just don't know.

But we are talking here about two different things, if you see what I mean.

Gary

[EllenJ]

I fear, Gary, that folks like us have more of an influence than we think.
People look to sources such as Malt Advocate (which has been seminal in providing this sort of support), Whiskey Magazine (which will agree to support anything that's already proven itself to be popular) and the members of Epinion.com, Straightbourbon.com and Bourbonenthusiast.com to support (or provide) their beliefs. If that support is not forthcoming, they tend to dismiss the product as beneath their consideration.

[gillmang]

Well, you may be right. I do hope we'll see some ardent discussion of HBB, it is still early days. Possibly, too, the release will reach other spheres of influence (the food and wine mags or blogs, maybe the NYT, etc; we'll see).

Gary

[cowdery]

I don't have a problem with anything you wrote, John. On the subject of how one appraises a new American whiskey brand, I tend (my prejudice, I admit) to ask first if it's from a distiller or not, and my interest goes down if it's a non-distiller. Then I look to see if the producer has something meaningful to say or a bunch of fabricated junk (your buddy's creative writing efforts on Thedford were pretty outrageous). Then I look at the price. If what I see is overpriced, non-distiller and spouting BS, I tend to have a very low interest level and it's possible I might miss a very nice pour as a result, but more often than that I'm probably sparing myself from wasting money on a big nothing.

As for vodka, I would add that despite what actual in-the-bottle product differences might exist, either actually or theoretically, the fact is that the mass of vodka consumers aren't buying them, they're buying gimmicks. (See "Effen Vodka.")

Actually, new EU member Poland has been lobbying for an EU rule that vodka can only come from Poland or Russia and can only be made from grain. I don't think they've made much progress.

[gillmang]

I don't think vodka deserves protection as a distinctive product of a region or even that to deserve the name vodka it should be made from grain only. Neutral spirits (the heart of all vodka, flavored or no) famously all taste alike or almost alike as a result of a prolonged rectification process. Therefore, how can someone say it is a distinctive product like, say, Bourbon or Scots malt whisky? I think too it is too late in the day to ask for such protection; the drink has gone around the world and is made everywhere (like pilsener beer, which has a distinctive taste - the original does - yet does not have that kind of protection either).

I would say any spirits distilled to 190 proof or over from any materials deserves to be called vodka if the final product is without distinctive taste or odor and is unaged.

Gary

[bourbonv]

John,
I understand what you are saying but I think you are slightly off base. I understand that youn like Jim Razzino and I am sure he is a nice guy, but I don't think he did the industry a service with his products. Here are my point.

If he had been a producer and actually made the products, I would be more than willing to cut him some slack and say, fine, maybe the next time he will do better. I am not one to be saying Brown-Forman's Four Grain is a sin against whiskey as I have heard others describe it. It is not a flavor I am fond of but I think they deserve credit for trying something different. I also heard many people talking the same way about Old Portrero when it first came out, but I was willing to cut them some slack and give them some time. Razzino made up the history, made upo the packaging and then did what he did to the whiskey on purpose and it simply was not good. I will cut him some slack in that maybe it tasted better in the small lab samples than it did in quantity, but somehow, I don't think so. If they are going to make something different, at least make it taste good (think Alabama whiskey - it may be overly sweet and buttery, but at least it doesn't taste like battery acid).

I think Razzino jumped on the band wagon of bourbon's popularity and thought he could make some money with a poor quality product, quickly. The product evidently did not go over with anybody. The last I heard you could buy the brands with all rights and remaining stocks on ebay. This is not helping the image of bourbon at all.

I would love to try the Hudson Baby Bourbon, but I don't think it will make it to the Louisville market anytime soon and it may be a while before i get to upper state New York to get some. I think it is exciting that a microdistillery is making a bourbon and I would buy a bottle just to support their efforts. I just wish something like this was happening here in Kentucky.

I like experimental products and applaud the companies making the experiments, just as long as they continue to make the fine products that I actually drink. Maybe one day one of these experiments will also be one of the products available at a reasonable price and people will be drinking it on a regular basis. I hope so, and I would be just as happy if it was a product from New York, West Virginia or California as I would be if it was from one of the big boys here in Kentucky.

[bunghole]

Does anyone care to answer the original question - "Has The Image Of Bourbon Changed"?

Lord knows there's a whole lotta fat to be chewed here, but can't you guys focus for a freakin' second?????

Must we go 'round and 'round, and 'round - just to end up nowhere????

Didn't you used have to write term papers?

Didn't you have to come to some kind of conclusion?

Didn't you at one time actually have to answer a question fully, and defend your answer?

Have you forgotten everything you were to supposed to have learned, or did you just roll up your sheepskin and smoke it?

It's not like you fine gentlemen don't have brains, but is there some reason you can't use them?

Don't make yourselves the laughing stock of the internet. Arrive at well thought out and well defended conclusions that will stand up on their own merits.

This has been a public service announcement by ima d. bunghole

- A>K>A Linn

[EllenJ]

Linn,

The problem is that all (or nearly all) of the currently active marketers of Kentucky bourbon consider it to be a conflict of interest.
Every single beverage spirit they produce (and they are all full-range producers) costs them less than bourbon whiskey. Why on earth would they actively promote such a product. I'm an investor, now. Do you think I'd hold shares of a company that promoted a costly product like bourbon when it could get the same wholesale price for a less-expensive variation on gasahol?

That's the reality of the business today, unfortunately.

Where we are lucky is that the folks actually MAKING the whiskey really LIKE American whiskey. And they can sometimes sneak improvements (perhaps disguised as market research) in from time to time. More important products, such as vodka, need to be corporately scrutinized and consensually approved by everyone from the brand manager to the bottle design team.

Why can't we just "Tell it like it is", is that there's no way to comment upon the lies, the made-up marketing stories, and the marketing of standard (or below) products in fancy packages at double price (all of which Chuck very accurately pointed out), without bursting our collective fantasies about American whiskey (as seen in Mike's comments), or appearing to condemn some of our common idols. Doing that (as both you and I have done on occasion) only brings on the wrath of those who either want to demonstrate their loyalty or who refuse to accept that all freaking whiskey makers (like all freaking fishermen, hunters, or used car salespersons... or network administrators, for that matter) are pathelogical liars and have always been.

To which I say, So What?

Nevertheless, as you and I certainly know from previous experience, they'll still never get it. And, to answer your question, No, the image has not changed, despite all the opportunities that have presented themselves. And that's because those who control the product don't WANT it to change. In fact, to tell the truth, those of us who ENJOY it don't want it to change. We really don't WANT young men with flourescent green spiked Mohawk hair and wall-to-wall tatoos to be the image of modern bourbon. We want folks from OUR era! And we want the assurance from those who choose bourbon as their favorite pour to be stating their allegiance to OUR values and images.

Remember when you were twenty-two?
What did you think about folks who were the age we are today?
Well... we're them, now.

[bourbonv]

Linn,
I would say the image has become a little more upscale, but it is the same image. The image does appeal more to more mature people (i.e. older middle aged men for the most part) but that increased appeal to the more affluent people will attract the young republican types that wish to appear successfull.

In other words - the image is the same, but the meaning of that image is slowly evolving.

[bunghole]

Linn,

... to answer your question, No, the image has not changed, despite all the opportunities that have presented themselves. And that's because those who control the product don't WANT it to change. In fact, to tell the truth, those of us who ENJOY it don't want it to change. We really don't WANT young men with flourescent green spiked Mohawk hair and wall-to-wall tatoos to be the image of modern bourbon. We want folks from OUR era! And we want the assurance from those who choose bourbon as their favorite pour to be stating their allegiance to OUR values and images.

Remember when you were twenty-two?
What did you think about folks who were the age we are today?
Well... we're them, now.

Good point John, and well taken!

[bunghole]

Linn,
I would say the image has become a little more upscale, but it is the same image. The image does appeal more to more mature people (i.e. older middle aged men for the most part) but that increased appeal to the more affluent people will attract the young republican types that wish to appear successfull.

In other words - the image is the same, but the meaning of that image is slowly evolving.

HUZZAH! Now we're getting somewhere.

[Bourbon HQ]

Now Now, let's keep politics off this website.

[bunghole]

Hey John! You mean this guy???