I keep getting offers to buy a single cask of young whisky, and wait until I feel like bottling it. Has anybody done this, and how well does it work?
Yes. It’s a lot more work than you think, and there are a lot of decisions to be made, but can be quite rewarding.
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Also what is your purpose? Depending on type of whiskey, loss, and proof at bottling you could end up anywhere between 180-240 750ml bottles.
Retailers do it to have an ‘exclusive’ product to market to their clients that people would pay up for vs. a ‘standard’ bottling of the same brand name spirit. Or its something totally unique that people would pay up for. I’ve seen retailers sell through a barrel pick in a matter of hours or days, and others could linger on the shelves for a year or more.
With the price of whiskey on the uptick and no regression in sight, it could prove to be a good move if you have an endgame for it.
My friends and I have purchased and bottled eight casks of single malt whisky (Ardbeg, Brora, Springbank, Laphroaig, Port Ellen, Benriach) over the years, but we haven’t in 6+ years because the casks available from the customary sources are garbage. 10-20 years ago, private purchasers had access to good casks, especially if you had relationships with distilleries and independent bottlers. By far, most casks available are from independent bottlers and blenders and not directly from distilleries. Most of what they have available for sale have been picked over by merchants and groups like ours over the years. Importing and distributing in the US comes with the usual brain damage; the paperwork is endless and particular. The easiest path is to partner with a US spirits merchant that imports and sells at retail and have them do all of the paperwork for a fee or a portion of the cask. We’ve split casks with or paid cash to The Whisky Shop, Murray McDavid, and Binny’s, for example, all with whom we had existing relationships, and they’ve handled the import and distribution through their existing channels.
One big caveat: one doesn’t always receive whisky from the casks from which tasting samples are drawn… beware!