The Scotchy Bourbon Boys
The Scotchy Bourbon Boys love Whiskey and every thing about the industry! Martin "Super Nash", Jeff "Tiny", Rachel "Roxy" Karl "Whisky" and Chris "CT" all make up The Scotchy Bourbon Boys! Join us in talking everything and anything Whiskey, with the innovators, and distillers around the globe. Go behind the scenes of making great whiskey and learn how some of the best in the whiskey industry make their product! Remember good whiskey means great friends and good times! Go out and Live Your Life Dangerously!
The Scotchy Bourbon Boys
Heritage Distilling: Bernie Lubbers on Heaven Hill's Evolution
Bernie Lubbers, Heaven Hill's bourbon ambassador, shares insider knowledge on the distillery's operations, history, and production scale while discussing their impressive portfolio of whiskeys.
• Heaven Hill produces 1,500 barrels daily, operates around 70 rickhouses, and maintains 2.1 million barrels in inventory
• The Shapira family has maintained ownership for nearly 90 years, with three generations actively running the business
• Time is the most expensive ingredient in bourbon production, requiring foresight and patience for investments that take decades to mature
• Heaven Hill has preserved historic bourbon brands like JTS Brown, JW Dant, and Rittenhouse Rye through strategic acquisitions
• The company produces numerous bottled-in-bond expressions, maintaining a tradition that represents American whiskey's gold standard
• Recent increased availability of some Heaven Hill products reflects production expansions made over a decade ago
• The team discusses their experience selecting an Elijah Craig barrel that yielded only 72 bottles with unique honey notes
• Heaven Hill's new Spring Hill distillery in Bardstown represents their first distilling operation in the town since the 1996 fire
• Their portfolio includes innovating with traditional American whiskey styles like corn whiskey and wheat whiskey
If you're interested in trying Heaven Hill products, consider picking up their Bottled-in-Bond expressions or visiting their visitor center in Bardstown for exclusives like the Five Brothers Small Batch.
Step into the world of bourbon legacy and craftsmanship as Bernie Lubbers, Heaven Hill's renowned Bourbon Ambassador, takes us behind the scenes of one of America's most important distilleries. With remarkable candidness and passion, Bernie shares how Heaven Hill has grown to maintain 2.1 million barrels in inventory—representing a staggering 20% of the world's bourbon supply.
What makes this conversation truly special is Bernie's insight into the family-owned operation that has survived when other major distilleries faltered. The Shapira family, now in its third generation of leadership, continues to oversee daily operations with the same dedication that began nearly 90 years ago. As Bernie aptly puts it, "Time is the most expensive ingredient in making whiskey and bourbon"—a philosophy that has guided Heaven Hill through decades of industry fluctuations.
Bernie reveals fascinating details about Heaven Hill's dedication to bottled-in-bond products, explaining how these expressions became cornerstones of their portfolio while other distilleries abandoned the category. We explore their strategic acquisition of historic brands like JTS Brown, JW Dant, and Rittenhouse Rye, preserving pieces of bourbon heritage that might otherwise have disappeared. The conversation also dives into Heaven Hill's newest innovations, from their recently opened distillery in Bardstown to special releases that showcase their mastery of traditional American whiskey styles.
For bourbon enthusiasts, collectors, and casual drinkers alike, this episode offers rare insights into the business decisions, production challenges, and long-term planning required to maintain quality and consistency in whiskey making. Whether you're familiar with Heaven Hill's extensive portfolio or just discovering these storied brands, Bernie's stories and expertise provide a deeper ap
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Tiny here to tell you about Whiskey Thief Distilling Company and their newly opened tasting room. Whether you are up for a farm-to-glass distilling experience on the Three Boys Farm in Frankfort, kentucky, or an out-of-this-world tasting experience in New Loop, you won't be disappointed. At both locations their barrel picks all day, every day, are like none other. Amazing. Their friendly staff and ownership will ensure you many good times with good friends and family. Remember to always drink responsibly, never drink and drive, and live your life uncut and unfiltered. We'll be right back.
Speaker 1:All right, welcome back to another podcast of the Scotchy Bourbon Boys Tiny. Here tonight we are full out in the house. It's amazing. This podcast is something that I've been looking forward to for a while now probably the last five years. But we have Bernie Lubbers. Mr Boblin Bond, heaven Hill, bourbon Ambassador. Welcome, bernie to the podcast.
Speaker 3:Thanks for having me. It's good to see you guys. I'd rather be in person, but it's good to see your faces on Zoom.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we definitely would rather be in person.
Speaker 4:This is the next best thing.
Speaker 1:Yes, for sure. Well, we can make it happen eventually, right, hopefully. And then we got CT on tonight. Hey, CT, hey everybody.
Speaker 5:How's it going?
Speaker 5:and we're excited, excited to be here. Uh, I think everybody knows that. Uh, you know it's, uh, it's been a lot for me to contain this, this podcast, for the last month and a half, to not like leak it to tell people about it. I wanted it to be a surprise because Bernie is that guy, like you know. I think that people in the industry know Bernie is that guy, but outside, you know, there's a lot of people that watch this that probably don't realize the impact that this guy has on it. So I'm super excited, super humble, to be here tonight. It's this is going to be fun, excellent, and we got to be fun.
Speaker 1:Excellent, and we got Super Nash in the house In the house, yeah.
Speaker 4:In my Heaven Hill shirt. Yes, yes.
Speaker 5:Just so we know, bernie, they bought these shirts together. They wanted me to buy one. I was unwilling to buy that same shirt, so I ended up with the Mellow Corn sweatshirt instead, because I just couldn't do it.
Speaker 3:You're all winners, you're all winners.
Speaker 1:Well, bernie might even remember, because we bought it before the barrel pick, that we went on with Bernie, we were both wearing it at the same time and he's probably like what is going on. Yeah, I wanted to be my twin that day.
Speaker 3:That's right it was a fun pick, it sure was.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, definitely it was. There was a lot. The whole experience was fantastic and to have you there we were honored for that and that was one time that we all were together. And then then you were. You were there too, and it was as you said. We were drinking some good bourbon barrel strength, elijah Craig that day, and the pick which, which we can get into in a little bit, but you basically have a bottle of it. Now I know that CT was able to get that. That barrel yielded only 72 bottles, so that was very unique, considering that I had sold 76. When they finally let me know how many bottles they were there. This was, in the end, this was my only bottle that I was able to, and I know CT had two, mine too. Yeah, so we all had to fulfill the needs of our club members over ours, because otherwise some people weren't going to get what they had asked for. So that was kind of.
Speaker 5:And I think, jeff, you're right, because I think this bottle that I have, that's almost gone, is the bottle that we use to sample from for people when they picked up their bottles. So that's how I ended up with it, uh, on top of the other ones. So, yeah, yes. So the other cool thing about that fun fact, fun fact, bernie knows this this was not the barrel that Bernie picked.
Speaker 3:Not my pick. They're not my picks. The Charles picks.
Speaker 5:But that's the beautiful thing about pick is Bernie. Bernie had another one that he liked a little better because I think he even said it kind of followed the profile of Elijah Craig a little more. But this one had a little fun and I think we even named it. That on the bottle was that this had a honey note. That was kind of unique and wild, and so we went with that.
Speaker 4:And another thing about that pick, too, was that we wound up everybody was like half and half on two barrels and then Bernie suggested that we blind it, and a lot of people, when we blinded it, wound up picking this one over than their original choice, which made it a unique way of picking the barrel.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's the only way you can do it is take everything, all your bias out, and do it in one.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I agree that was totally awesome the way we did that and it wound up perfect.
Speaker 1:Yeah, definitely Definitely. So just a few questions Lately. What have you been up to, bernie?
Speaker 3:Oh my gosh well, it's just been up to Bernie. Oh my gosh, Well, it's just been. You know, the end of our fiscal year was the end of April, so that's always a big thing. You know, we don't go on a calendar year at Heaven Hill, we go on a fiscal year, and so we closed out strong. And I'm telling you what Heaven Hill closed out strong we're outperforming the industry and it was a good year for us. And I'm just down in Florida for a week or so and you know, doing my gig, just traveling around and doing what I do.
Speaker 5:Hey, bernie, speaking of that because I don't know that everybody understands the sheer amount of volume that Heaven Hill does. How many barrels, would you say approximately, they're doing a day now?
Speaker 3:Well, we do 1,500 barrels a day, five days a week. We also fired up the new distillery Springs in Bardstown.
Speaker 3:That's really exciting for us that we have a, you know a brand new distillery that has opened up the first time we have distilled since 1996, in the tragic fire in November of 96. And so it's not going to full capacity. You know you don't want to do that with a brand new facility, you want to crawl before you walk. But yeah, we're doing 1,500 barrels a day, plus what we're making it spring. So we're cranking it out.
Speaker 1:Awesome, wow, that is great numbers too the the field that that when anybody who visits bardstown, uh, there is uh basically a field that when I first started visiting was a few, a couple rickhouses way in the back, and now, now the rickhouses are completely filled. You know, up almost to the street you can just see that you guys have been just building the rickhouses and, and you know, getting that that supply up. But that's just an amazing accomplishment, especially when you drive around the bardstown area. You have to admit it used to be a lot more open, correct?
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, you're talking about our Barrel Preserve and Hibbs Farm and those were. Yeah, there was shoot, that wasn't that long ago. There wasn't anything there and now there's pretty much a jam pack. So we have around 70 rickhouses now. We've decommissioned some. We have had to tear some down because you know, just like anything else, it gets age on it and you don't want buildings that hold tens of millions of pounds of stuff above your head. You don't want that to be unsafe. So sometimes you have to decommission. But right now we have about 2.1 million barrels in inventory. That's about 20% of the world's bourbon supply, and when you think about that, that's kind of staggering. And I think the one family owns it. You know we are still a lot of companies our size have had to go public or sell to someone you know, a conglomerate or something, and our family is very staunchly family-owned and operated, so owned by the Shapira family, the same family that started us 90 years ago coming up and that's the coolest aspect is being able to say that Amazing.
Speaker 5:And this market today and we're seeing it in the bourbon world, especially now, even in the spirits world that you know, companies are not as strong as maybe they thought they were, but the family that's owned it for 90 years is probably pretty stinking strong.
Speaker 3:And they run the company too. So you know they are Max Shapira, a second generation owner, and our executive chair. He goes into work six days a week, you know. Still, he says he's never worked a day in his life, although I know that's not true, but you know he says he has so much fun doing it. And his daughter and son-in-law, kate and Alan. You know they're our co-presidents and you know they are. They, they run the company, they, they. They aren't just like a figurehead and you know saying, oh, isn't this cool that we, you know, own a yacht and a mansion in the South of France and and uh, you know they live here in Kentucky.
Speaker 3:They drive to work. They show up every day, um they. It's a fun industry that that kind of energy and that excitement trickles down to us and we get excited about it too.
Speaker 4:That's true passion right there, when they can do and have the foresight and the knowledge that they do and to continue to run it as well as they do and have those staggering numbers that you just mentioned. That's just awesome.
Speaker 1:Well, I think you know there, I would say, after New Orleans Bourbon Festival last year, when we saw you, not this year but the year last year we basically noticed that everybody was talking about the industry slowing up and everything and whatnot.
Speaker 1:But I really noticed after probably the after January 1st this year, that the industry, especially a lot of the allocated stuff in the industry, has really started to pick back up. And, like you said, you finished you just finished that year and you finished it strong and I really think that that I just we've been able to notice a complete difference, even amongst the people that we go out and and follow the podcast, how they were all at one point, probably right before, like so last summer weren't buying as much. They all were saying, well, I've got, I'm putting in a patio or I'm doing this, and I noticed a lot of the people. But now that I would say, after just this first half of the or three, you know little this quarter. I notice a lot of the people, but now I would say, after just this first half of the or three, you know little this quarter. I mean, I just noticed it just start to pick up and it's pretty exciting again.
Speaker 3:Well, you'll notice too, like you might've noticed over the last six months of the year, that there's more Henry McKenna, 10 year old, single barrel out there. It's actually sitting on shell, and I've had some people ask me well, oh my gosh, I guess you know, is it? It's not as hard to get anymore, so maybe it's not as popular, or maybe people aren't buying it anymore. And I was like, well, that's not really the case but think about how come there's more and it's the funny thing about the whiskey business is nothing happens very fast.
Speaker 3:So I started at Heaven Hill in 2012. And less than a year after that we had our first expansion in our Bernheim distillery in downtown Louisville and we put in four new fermenters. And that is what you're seeing right now, with Henry McKenna and a couple other things.
Speaker 3:So it took 11, 12 years for that to kick in and that expansion to start showing up in the marketplace. So it has nothing to do with today's marketplace. It had to do with the decision 11, 12 years ago and that's the investment of millions and millions and millions of dollars to make the bet that this would continue over the next 10, 12 years and we can benefit from that. And that's what we're seeing right now. That's how long it takes. We're not making. You know, we sell a lot of vodka.
Speaker 3:We have vodka in our portfolio, but this is an age spirit, so there's advantages and disadvantages of producing every single spirit. One of the best things about clear spirits is you don't have to age spirit. So there's advantages and disadvantages of producing every single spirit. One of the best things about clear spirits is you don't have to age them, so there's a lot less cost. But with whiskey and bourbon and American whiskeys you've got. Time is the most expensive ingredient in making whiskey and bourbon. So sure, grain costs a lot, barrels cost a lot, rickhouses cost a lot, distilleries cost a lot, but nothing costs more than making it and waiting 10, 12 years.
Speaker 5:Bernie, you just said it, and if Jeff Crowe, who's watching, doesn't put that on a t-shirt in the gift shop, then I have failed. Time is the most expensive ingredient. It is absolutely. I've never heard anybody put it like that, but that is.
Speaker 3:Where I'd describe it is. Imagine a Marriott opens a $200 million hotel in downtown and on opening night, when they've got everything shined up and staffed up and ready to go on opening night, they lock the doors and don't sell the first hotel room for 10 years.
Speaker 4:Exactly. Wow, yes, yes, couldn't imagine it well.
Speaker 1:also, what's amazing is when you think of mckenna, the brand, uh, you probably were on track based off of your marketing. Uh, when you started in 2000, when you, when you increased those fermenters and you started producing a little bit, you know, pushing the volume a little more, and you kind of build up to what you built up to, but at the same time, you weren't counting on being the bourbon, you know, the Jim Murray's bourbon of the year, where all of a sudden, it made every single bottle of McKenna disappear off the shelf all of a sudden, it made every single bottle of McKenna disappear off the shelf.
Speaker 3:That and won the best whiskey of the world in the San Francisco Spirits competition in 2018 or whenever it was, and let's not forget that at the same time when I started in 2012, and that's just when I started at Heaven Hill. I've been in the industry since 2005, when there were, by the way, only 10 distilleries in Kentucky and four outside of Kentucky.
Speaker 3:So imagine that Now there's 100 in Kentucky and there's 2,600 outside of Kentucky. So that's mind boggling. But when I started, remember that Elijah Craig was a 12-year-old, age-stated product and it was starting to pick up and get some momentum and we had to make the decision are we going to keep this a 12-year-old product and keep the sales where they were, or are we going to grow the product? So if you keep the sales where they are and it becomes more hard to get we already saw that what happened with competition and other 12 year old products you're going to have to double the price and or it's going to have to go way up because you've handcuffed yourself with that a statement. But we decided to kind of have our whiskey and drink it too. We. We made the barrel proof, the 12 year old product, and we made the small batch a mingle of years eight to 12 years and now we've been able to grow that brand to where it's now overtaking the sales of Knob Creek and is the number two selling small batch bourbon in the world.
Speaker 1:There you go. I mean there's so much that goes, like you said, that goes into it and you know and you covered that fact that now I mean that is the goal I I sometimes wonder. It kind of makes me a little nervous as the distilleries, like yourself and buffalo trace and are all meeting the demand because they have been upping production and then they're also, you know, expanding. But, like you, with the new distillery, it it's like you said, it's just just opened up and this this past year and you're ready, that stuff is going into the Rick house but won't be ready for you know, the certain amount of years.
Speaker 1:But my whole thing is is that there's a certain aspect of this market that that we all run around and we're from the generation, myself and yourself, of we want what we can't have. So it kind of scares me that if McKenna's on the shelf and we can all get it, that that might be somewhat of a marketing deterrent. But from the standpoint of sales of McKenna then you know, there's a lot of times when I talk to people about, like the small batch, eliza Craig, or the number one, jack Daniels or whatever, people that are collecting and are into the allocated really don't look at the standard Jack Daniels or whatever. They don't look at the standard product, but those products. Like you said, the Eliza Craig small batch is now the number two small batch in the world and it's just selling way more than an allocated whatever sale, right?
Speaker 3:I'm not going to speak for our marketing department or ownership, but I've noticed we don't like to have allocated products. You know, we're in the business of selling and it's great that some of them are hard to get. And we have found out how, when we find that we only have 30 barrels of something, what to do with it. Now that we have, like the you Do, Bourbon experience, we can put some of that in there. We can use that for William Heaven Hills, which are around 30 barrels, and that's it. That's not enough to get, even in the state of Kentucky. So what do you do with 30 barrels? Well, 20 years ago we didn't have the option of selling it at the visitor center.
Speaker 1:Now, we have an option of doing that.
Speaker 3:We would rather sell everything and have things on the shelf. So, yeah, it might be that people are hunting, but you've also got to remember that people in whiskey societies and nerds like we all are, we're only one segment of the drinking population and the consumers. There's other people that want it on the shelf all the time. So we have to look at it as producers. We're trying to. I've said the line many times. We are in the bourbon business, not the bourbon charity, right, so we have to make decisions like do we take an age statement off? Do we put an age statement on? Do we make something bottom bond? We make something barrel proof, but we want to sell it all.
Speaker 3:Then we don't want it hard to get um and but now that we, when we find some barrels we only have 20 or 30 or 40 or 100 or 200 we kind of know better what to do with those because we have a, we have a pipeline for all of those.
Speaker 5:Now we're before, we didn't I, I think that, uh, you hit it on that people want to find something that they know is good. They whether they've been referred to it or they've had it and experienced it. And during COVID there probably was no bottle that was more perfect for that than the Evan Williams Bottled and Bond. I mean, people started drinking this during that point and they just found out, oh my God, this is $20, $25, whatever it was in your area, and they really started to just gravitate. Whatever it was in your area, and they really started to just gravitate. It almost lured them into the brands with Evan Williams and Heaven Hill because it was so good but it was so inexpensive. And then now it's funny because I'm seeing people like wait a minute, we didn't know about JTS Brown, we didn't know about JW Advanced and some of these other low-lying price point bottles, and now they're coming around to those as well.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, there's all kinds of drinking. I've also made the I don't know if you all have noticed this traveling around but I think the trend for barrel proof in the everyday consumer is less than it was and I think people are looking for more of that 90 to 110, and that bottle and bond is right there in the middle of that and I think that is something that's. That's, um, that's really cool and you know I love barrel proof. I know you all love barrel proof, everybody's barrel proof, but you got to look at the entire whiskey segment right yeah, yeah and on
Speaker 5:that note. I'm going to go ahead and pour some of this and, yeah, have a little bit of this, of this bottled in bond. Does anybody else have it?
Speaker 1:Well, I don't have that, but I have this, so I'm going to pour a little bit of this bottled in bond.
Speaker 5:There you go. Yours is almost empty. I've been savoring mine.
Speaker 1:This is actually the 16th, so talk about savoring it.
Speaker 5:I picked this up probably in 2021 oh yours is 60 minus the 13 from last year but on this 16.
Speaker 1:So I that's one thing I want. I I asked a lot of people about this, bernie, but on the 16, when I first opened it, uh it's a 13 year old.
Speaker 3:I'll join you on the 13th. Let's wait for that one.
Speaker 1:No, I'm not ready for it, okay, so on this, on this 16 my question what, and a bunch of the others.
Speaker 1:So we, we. We got it at the gift. We were able to get it at the visitor center. It was a release. I was very happy there's a 14 right there. And what the last and one of the things was on this particular bottle. When I opened it it was a little oaky, for there was a little bit of some of the wood canyons of sometimes that I don't get excited about when it's over right right you're gonna get some wood.
Speaker 1:but my question, I don't mind, you know, sometimes I there's a, there's a level, but I this is now been sitting in the bottle and you can see we're down a little bit and it's probably, you know, every six months maybe I I've hit it since and this has been 2021, I believe. So my is is it has evolved in the bottle and now the wood tannins have backed off and there's way more caramel. So do you believe, just like on, when you get into some of these older bourbons and some of the bourbons that sit in the bottle, that, although they're not aging in a barrel, picking up more flavor, but they continue to age throughout the process as you go? You know, when you open it, sometimes you get air in there, but also you know you taste the dusty from the 70s and it's almost like they all have that extra flavor to it.
Speaker 3:A lot of that's not aging in the bottle. But you're right, it's either oxidation it is. It's also the closure. You know, I would rather have a plastic closure every single day than a cork. I would totally. You know, when you look at old dusties like this 1977 gts brown, it has a plastic cap on it and when I open this I don't have to worry about the cork is disintegrated and now it's going to be so flat because all that air has gotten in there.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:So you can make fun of plastic caps and I even like it better than metal caps, because metal caps look better and that's why we do them. Consumers when it's a higher end product, consumers see a cork and they take that as a. They take that as a higher-end product.
Speaker 1:I would, I would rather have a plastic cap every single time would you say that's courtesy of the wine industry, because for a long time science is what it's no, no, I'm saying the corks, the reason why I, like you said the plastic, that's why a lot of cork.
Speaker 4:That's why a lot of wines went to screwtops here's another one of your products that people have been asking about too Five Brothers Small.
Speaker 5:Batch, Did you see the message from Tim on here? Tim Dan asks how's it going, Tim?
Speaker 4:Nash, are you asking that?
Speaker 5:question.
Speaker 4:Yeah, he says. What about your special release, five Brothers Small Batch? Did you produce a limited number of those?
Speaker 3:Five Brothers is available only in the Visitor Center. So, yes, but it's our HH RAG, which is what goes into Elijah Craig, Evan Williams, JTS Brown, JW Dant and all that. It's just a different mingle of ages and we bottle it by demand and orders. It's only available at the gift shop.
Speaker 4:I always pick up a couple of bottles every time I hit the town.
Speaker 3:It's got a good flavor profile.
Speaker 4:It does it has a very unique flavor profile that I like.
Speaker 1:What's really nice is that one, the Five Brothers, and then it seems like the Heaven Hill Grain to glass. Those are not allocated, like. You can walk into the gift shop almost any time and if they're, if that, if they've been distributed, you don't have to wait in line, you know in a big line to get them. And I really think that this, this, this one, when I taste it, when I picked, I picked up an allocated and I picked this one up and I think now this is my fourth bottle. It's a great bottle for drinking and sharing with friends. There's no doubt about it.
Speaker 3:And the price is pretty good on that yeah.
Speaker 5:Speaking of good price, Jeff, that 16-year, you don't seem to like it as much as the Oak. I was wondering if we could do a trade.
Speaker 1:I said when I opened it initially but now that it's been around it's just pure caramel. I'm willing to trade. That's not happening.
Speaker 4:Get that away from me. Our good friend Greg Snyder said that he totally concurs with you on the closure of the bottles and what you said about it, Absolutely Now, although you know the decanter bottle is just a gorgeous bottle, it's a diamond crystal decanter from 1955.
Speaker 3:Here, did anybody know who that person is? In the middle of the text strip on the top of the?
Speaker 1:bottle I can't even see. Is that the agent? The text Is that.
Speaker 3:Fitz agent. The text.
Speaker 1:Is that Fitzgerald?
Speaker 3:No, that is John Carlyle, who was the Secretary of Treasury of the United States in 1897 when the bottom line was passed. There you go From Cuttington, kentucky, and his grave site is right there in Cuttington. I visited it and I had my GTS brown T-shirt on and took a selfie at his gravesite. It's a very simple little gravesite. He was not someone who had such a grandiose ego. He had a very simple gravesite and here he was as Secretary of Treasury of the United States.
Speaker 4:That's just cool. That is a cool homage to him. Did you all put that on top of those that?
Speaker 3:tax rip was always. His picture was on every Bon Bon tax strip forever, ever since they used tax strips, so that the red strips did not have his picture, but the old Bon Bon's, and that's the old ones, the ones that were stopped. In 1980, in the early 80s Everybody had to have this tax strip on it. Now it's optional, you don't have to have it, but you don't have to have it.
Speaker 5:But Head Hill still carries that texture, even through. Henry McKenna has it very clearly that's marketing's interpretation. Yeah, but it is kind of neat that it still has it.
Speaker 3:It does, and on the old Fitzgerald it has the spring and the fall seasons that are on there too, and that's what the old tax tricks used to be Always had the seasons it was here. I've got a bottle here. I'll show you. It was barreled in 1917 and bottled in 1932. In the post, yeah. Wow. Always had the spring or the fall.
Speaker 1:Nice, very nice, very cool. So you obviously have a super bourbon collection.
Speaker 3:I have one bottle of a lot of things, but I wouldn't say I have a collection. I have a lot of bourbon. I have a really nice bar, but I wouldn't say I'm a collector. Whatever I have here is pretty much what I have. I have some backups of the GDS Browns and all that kind of stuff and I've got a few old Heaven Hills Dream Labels and six-year-old bottle of bonds. But other than that I'm IQO. I've got to go buy it and you don't get free. I just can't say, hey, max, I'm going to take out a 13-year-old sample. You know, 13 year old sample, you know that's not the way it works.
Speaker 1:Right, you're not, you're not taking away the stuff that's being released. But be well, I mean what the question was that I was going to ask, being you and people would obviously want to share pores, that that has to be consistent thing that happens.
Speaker 3:So yeah, I have every every month or two, and I've got a new teammate that just joined our company and we've done work with him, um, when he worked at goose island and um, and now he was with our company lucky to have him, but I'm gonna have him over and I'll invite a bunch of industry people. I'll have connor odris or master distiller. I'll have edward, who's new on my team. Uh, here in town. Uh, mark carter usually gets a call and comes over and mark's awesome.
Speaker 3:You know John Cecil from over at Bardstown, danny Danny from Bardstown Beer Company, and you know we have such great people that live you know, live and work in New Zealand. Alex and John Waddle from Peerless come over and it's fun. People bring bottles. I share my bottles. You know, it's just the way it works. It's just. I mean, we ask each other what's going on, what do you see out there, what trends? Sometimes you bitch and complain a little bit. We have the best jobs in the world, so we don't want to bitch too and complain too. We don't want any reason to. Sometimes you've got to bitch and complain to people who are friends of yours, who only can understand what you go through when you're out on the road. Awesome.
Speaker 5:Bernie. To go back to a point about the brand, why does Heaven Hill focus so much on the bottled in bond, other than you being there, which obviously is a big part of it but why is that so important to them to carry so many bottled in bonds on so many brands? They only have one, they don't have any. Why is? That a big. Thing.
Speaker 3:Well, they had a lot of bottled in bonds before I started with them. That's one reason I was excited to come over to Heaven Hill when I came over from Jim Beam and Jim Beam had, you know, several bottom bonds but nothing like Heaven Hill. So I don't think it was anything that was planned after talking to Max and the family. But you know, here's an interesting story that nobody knows. So after Prohibition, heaven.
Speaker 1:Hill gets into business.
Speaker 3:You know we make our first barrel December 13th 1935. The goal was to make bottom bond because that's what was the industry standard of quality before Prohibition and carried through Prohibition. In these medicinal bottles it said bottom bond and it was the only ones that were packaged that wasn't from Scotland or Canada, that was being bootlegged in the United States. It was the only bottle that was sold legally through a doctor's prescription. So in a consumer's mind you had, hey, ba-bomb-bomb. I remember telling my dad, hey, I found this great new bourbon I had from Ohio, in Parma, ohio, when I was doing a stand-up comedy. And he goes what?
Speaker 1:is it? I said oh, granddaddy.
Speaker 3:He goes oh, granddad, he said the ballon bon is yeah, it's good stuff, son, you know. And when your dad, who drinks a lot of bourbon, says that's the good stuff, it sticks in your mind, right. So ballon bon is what people had in their mind was good stuff. So after probation you kind of want to make ballon bon. So that means you've got to make it again. There's the most expensive ingredient time time. So you got to wait four years. So over that, that four years, vo from Canada, canadian Club from Canada. Johnny Walker, kenny Sark, j&b Faze, grouse, doers, they clean our cocks, right, because we can't tell you that we're aging it. We can make some blended whiskeys and bring it out quicker. So that's when you know you have your Seagram 7s and your.
Speaker 3:Kesslers and Philadelphia and different blended whiskeys. But to make straight whiskey and bottle and bun it takes four years. So for bottle and bun, so just think about that. So then after prohibition gets going, the little bitty distilleries that were successful, that only made American whiskey, was basically bourbon. We're a little company like Heaven Hill. Where Heaven Hill?
Speaker 3:old Heaven Hill bottle and bun became the number one selling bourbon in the state of Kentucky, you know, in 1939, 1940, 1941. So but we're little, we're just really in the state of Kentucky in a couple letters, dean, they're bigger but they're still not that big. Right, brown Fun, not that big, you know, not that big. You got these little companies. Then you got the big four, so they call these companies the big four. They became the big powerhouse spirits companies in the United States. So I had the Big Three Outmakers but it was the Big Four and this is what the Big Four companies were.
Speaker 1:Oh, what was it? The National Distilling that had to be.
Speaker 3:National Distillers was one. They made Old Crow, Old Granddad, Old Old Row, right All the olds. Basically they had that. So that's one company, you had another company called.
Speaker 5:Shenley.
Speaker 3:Yes, shenley had Old Rippy and Old Stag and Ancient Age and Old Carter and all these other brands and all that kind of stuff. Then you had two Canadian companies, sears and Iron Walker. So they're the big four. Of course they're selling and importing all these satches and all these other spirits. These are spirits companies. So spirits companies are going and these are big companies. Right, they're big. So when bourbon Ryan and Eric Missy really don't catch up and catch on by the 50s and 60s and 70s, you've got companies like Stisselweiler that sells out and Happy's.
Speaker 3:Company in the early 70s sells out, right. If you're only making bourbon American whiskey, you're kind of in trouble. So what happens is you've got company closings, selling out and with the cocktail-driven Moscow Mule the vodka becomes big where it was never big before. You have the Daisy and Margarita making tequila shine. You got Cuba Libre making rum really go right. And so Clear's and Gin's a big monster. Three martini lunch, you know. And so that's the trend. What are they for you? They love their bourbon bands, right. So that's when heaven hill and other companies say, hey, you're gonna get, you know, we'll buy these brands, or maybe we're offered to them or whatever you know. So that's how heaven hill has always been acquirers. That's how we got dts brown and jw mann metal corn ice will ride.
Speaker 3:Written house life we got like craig neil, it had never been produced on the market. There was was a label that said somebody threw me on a deal right Because there's a bunch of things right and when they sell brands it's not the. Can you be somebody's solo fixture? I mean, you just fathom that.
Speaker 1:But you don't just get a label, you get the barrels and inventory sitting in rickhouses.
Speaker 3:That's the money.
Speaker 1:That's the worth. That is the equity of a brand it's ready to go so near heaven and hell.
Speaker 3:when you buy BTS brand. You get thousands of barrels in the morning. Well, even if the brand doesn't, that's money right. It is really interesting how Max and his father acquired these brands like JWT and Dance Listening. I mean, we got those brands and these are crown jewels of the burn industry, mm-hmm.
Speaker 3:And then what happens when we do the hard lifting and push the cart up the hill? I mean one reason we call Heaven Hill a legacy story. Some people call them heritage stories, like the word legacy stories. There's only six of us, those 10 stories in 2005 when I started, only owned by six companies. They were little companies, basically right. They were the only ones to survive from audition to today. And then what happens? When we, the six companies, start seeing this uptake in 2008 and 2009,. And then, of course, we really start doing 10, 11, 12, 13,. We're really noticing. Then the largest tennis companies in the world start getting back into it, because that's worth it.
Speaker 3:So it's cool that Heaven Hills and the other five legacy stores never have taken their eye off the ball, and I think that needs to be celebrated. When I walk into a bar or restaurant and they don't have the M&Ms on their app, I don't get it. Where do I see the story? It wouldn't be any of these 50 grand behind your bar. They haven't done it in nine years and they didn't outlast the Big Four right. We outlasted the Big Four right. Yes you did.
Speaker 3:Not the Big Four. They're still around. High Walker is still around, in capacity, but it's owned by somebody else. So we're here, right, and now we're the one. So that's why these old beautiful brands they just happen to be Boba and Heaven Hill had them. And you know what brand they just happen to be Boba and Heaven Hill had them.
Speaker 3:And you know what Matt and I said Well, just don't change anything. You know, it's not what it's sold. Last year Maybe it increased a little bit because we can only count on these sales. So there's no need to market this brand right now. You know this is a placeholder, right? So Evan Williams, Boba Bond, has seen incredible growth in the last 10 years. So we can't grow this brand at the same rate because it's the same mash bill, it's the same whisk in the barrels, it's a different flavor profile, but it's the same. So we have to wait until our past is going to get higher and then we can take this brand around the country. So it's a very patient industry and you have to be so willing to do nothing for a long time and then the right time. It's like, you know, my crap table and the ice get hot and the ice are getting hot. That's new.
Speaker 1:Well, you just said it. It's just like that's what the whiskey industry has been all along. That's why it's historical, because, yes, there's been upticks and these labels have been around for a long time and there's upturns and downturns. But it's kind of like when the industry is in this downturn that's when everybody has to kind of dig in and really, you know, say the course, because then there's gonna be a market when it starts its upturn. I mean it just that's just the way it goes.
Speaker 1:But we're dealing in centuries, not not decades. That's, and you have that perspective and that's what this industry really has to have from a marketing standpoint. It has to be decades. You know you're talking before some of this stuff even comes to the market. But when you're talking about a brand, you're talking about centuries. It's like and as hell they started? They started in the 30s. They haven't been around since the 1700s. But if I purchased these brands and now they've made themselves that in 200 years or you know when, when people are talking about it, that they'll be part of what whiskey. They have their own brands and it's great to see the Five Brother brand. It's also great to see the Heaven Hill marketing brands. I mean, you know Heaven Hill Bottled and Bond when I first came. You know the Heaven Hill on some of the brands. Heaven Hill wasn't really the promotion, it was just the label. There's a lot of difference. But now it's actually home brand base right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean when it started it was the flagship brand of the company, but I took the brand like children. You know which one's going to be successful on their own, which ones are going to need to help their entire life right? Great analogy. Heaven Hill became more of a value brand, just to say the exact thing. Heaven Leaves became a national star seller and it's still our flagship number one selling brand.
Speaker 3:I wanted to give Heaven Hill a distance it's the name of the company and Craig has become a great man. We wanted to give Heaven Hill a distance it's the name of the company and so we took a lot of time and years to get those value of Heaven Hill products, which had a lot of vodka and rum and things like that, and then in the busy days they were wonderful had a negative reputation inside our home market. So we wanted to bring that to something we were proud of and we'll be proud of, and that's when we came out with this special heaven hill album and that, that of having an 80 year old in front of you and that 27 year old and the 17 year old, that's becoming a series.
Speaker 3:The cop spring and we have a 20 year corn and uh, and so that's we've been. That appears in years and years of trying to. You know, love that band, that's. That's a dedication, and a dedication and the passion that it takes of people like me to face the brands and Mr Soder you know, if Mr Soder didn't make whiskey he can't travel. I know best right now. I saw the people on my team Jack showed out West and Adam and myself and Len Haswell around and we were the first band in the marketplace. So it takes a whole team and you just know that. I mean, it's really fun to see Heaven Hill.
Speaker 1:So one thing, Chris Talk about the Mellow Corn. That's the one brand that.
Speaker 5:So Mellow Corn and obviously.
Speaker 1:I posted it in the paper and.
Speaker 5:I saw it and I took a look at the bottle and I said I wonder if he likes corn.
Speaker 1:What an amazing product it is.
Speaker 5:But what I really love and I'm sure everybody watching everybody listening has true knowledge of what this bottle has now become with the handle brand, because you just find that what happens when we age this a little longer? What happens when we age it 20 years? So talk about that and what this started as and oh, let's see what it comes.
Speaker 3:Well, before I was asking uh, how'd you have your heart more and max, being just a guy and just didn't go away.
Speaker 3:It was has had a laser beam on he's. Isn't the woman, another jelly or another customer? And at last minute they said, hey, do you this morn, what's that? And I went. So there's a story of how the little corn came to be, and I think Max is just genius. He's a sharpist. There's not many people in the East Coast for 50 years he can tell you the yield of a four-year-old girl on the fourth floor, you know, and he just knows what you're at first, and then you can use a barrel second time for a little bit.
Speaker 2:It's like you, wait right, get another hit on the barrel, I'll be black man, so it's my that kind of shit going in, you know so.
Speaker 3:But what I'm glad he did, because you know, that's first of all. And then I asked Max too hey, this is a small little bit, I'm a you know 96-8 corn whiskey, but I can destroy your evening, I suppose. So, dude, but it was Bernie. How many rye whiskeys on the shelf was he? You know what? Five? Yeah, how many are there now? He said 100. He said what kind of whiskey is the next one? We're ready. He's that disfavorite fan company and one that owns stuff they have so exciting. He's eating wheat and can speculate in the things that are main competitors, which are the worst spirits in the world. How you compete with them, we're going to do what they don't do.
Speaker 3:We'll make more what study rooms of? Our spirit world don't make a whiskey that can only produce in a six-month period. That's a finite number of errors, One of millions of cases. They don't sell this thing, but we do right. So that's the difference between any old company and there's nothing wrong with big clinkers. I mean, keep the entry on. But how do you navigate and find where you can compete and compete better than the other companies? But I call the real bad at the disorders, the biggest disorder in the world.
Speaker 1:So that's how we do it. That's our story. I said to Heaven his house was on a story.
Speaker 3:He put in the barrel a little longer, a lot longer than he earned money. He was an 18-year-old man. Right, he makes a seven-year-old, but then we put in the bottle. So you know if Evan Evans is.
Speaker 1:Well, I can tell you that the wheat whiskeys and the corn whiskeys, honestly, and the mellow corn has a screw cap.
Speaker 4:So maybe you had something to do with that one. Hey, I got a question for you. I can ask how many? Different age credits do you? Have on the market.
Speaker 3:Oh, it's just a couple of dozen. I mean, we used to have a lot that went only export, but we turned those down a bit. We're trying to make the core interest now. There was a time where you could walk in to an industry or you would send it to Italy or Japan or whatever and you'd get a label like Octane or Daniel Stewart or Rich Bourbon or something like that.
Speaker 1:But those days are gone. Our value is we need to sell that and buy that, and a lot of that is for bourbon.
Speaker 3:We can do that in the United States. You know, that's kind of a big phenomenon. So you know brands like the National or Old Share, elijah Craig, heaven, wings, hennekena, ar, and then we have the regional brands like ATS, jbs, wl and that and those are, you know, and that's just in a whole lot of blue. So, yeah, maybe we can turn on the dance for the fans. We might be able to get a JBS around the floor.
Speaker 1:One more. Hey, craig, your camera seems to be frozen. Does it seem that you got it or something and it probably froze it up? You should check that out, but I think he does have that Elijah Craig there. So we should open up our pick. We should finish this pick. I was so the short barrel that we picked. I was wondering how it was so short, but I was going for today the short that I had put out. There you are and the shorts that I put out. And when we were thieving the circular barrel that we picked, I noticed that to fill the sample, the glass that you guys have, which is a long, it was more like a cocktail mixing glass that took it took a decent amount of thieving to get for the samples. So you know, and I'm like, well, that would, that would make sense. That's why it was a little bit low, low down, but the flavor of this was fantastic.
Speaker 3:Did you say what floral is from?
Speaker 1:I've been here a hundred years yeah that's where it was.
Speaker 3:I mean, you can see it. It's been a leak. That makes it more significant. It's a natural product. Anything can happen. That makes it cool. That's what we have. If it's four or five gallons more, make that little shot the actual.
Speaker 1:I was extremely happy with this pick it did into the. It's something I'm not sure what it's going to do between barrel to bottle, but this held its own going from barrel to the bottle. There was no doubt about it. Particular, yeah, but it's by far. You, like you said, some of the eliza craigs will be a little bit more peppery. Lessness on just it's crazy where you got the? Maybe honey, a honeycomb cereal? That would be a little bit more peppery. Let's see, this sounds just crazy. Maybe honey, a honeycomb cereal? That would be a good one for you. Cd, you'd have to hit my bottle right.
Speaker 3:Think of it as solid color paint. So you're going to you're a big poet, you're gonna make a painting. They're gonna put out sub-colors of paint but make its own individual color and mix those colors together. That's pretty small bitch, but if you keep the colors separate, that's singular.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and they're just so unique. This just has a deep hue. One thing I always found that one, even just from when I started really getting into and people towards bourbon was still a little bit towards um, consistency and very um. Tech of bourbon was you know what uh bottled in. You know that bourbons in 2018 were at some point, a little bit frowned upon and over in just the time now they become it's hunting. The whole industry loves the. What would you say? The? The can see the love the, the changes and the different uh finishes and they just like variety in drinking and we have the close years, I think, pleasing that too yeah, we have those fish that were the first had.
Speaker 3:Uh, this is my reason. And there's, there's there and feed it to some. Uh, ember the spark, but that come well up first never. And so they're today and we're not getting over nine years old, he's gonna do these bears and feed it to Ember the ex-marketer. But that caught well with the leopards and never canceled their orca day. And the bird who liked getting over nine years old he's going to do these bear scoured orc barrels and decided they were going to fish them. And then came the hevel. Parker was also with the and we've done a lot of finishes, parts, part. We've pulled down a lot. We're a whiskey company the part of it.
Speaker 3:But when you see the Trenton-Berry toasted barrel, posted for him in our article as well.
Speaker 4:Yeah, but you that Liza Craig toasted barrel is really good. It's awesome. Where I see it, it's still as off this lot.
Speaker 5:I actually think that toasted high is one of the biggest in the world and there is for three months, there's still a brainer.
Speaker 3:It's not a glee, it's not a shibboleth, it's not a cagron. We are more straight with company. So we know that, you know it's going to be true to that. It's Lincoln, henderson, healy, thafish and Zendy. But you know that's a deal. A lot of us, you know we all were saying to them we're what we all and we all know, kind of our lanes don't know your lanes. You fit out as the world's different right now. There are a lot of companies that are not the last.
Speaker 3:How this was think this is long ago years ago there was only 10 delorean cookie and four out of cookie and four sides on one of them were smith, the three and each j, which of course you're not going to throw, but it's pretty obvious.
Speaker 3:Just think about that and how far we've come. But a lot of these kids were jumping on a NWM and hope all of us just know that, not all immigrants. But the easy is easy and it will come with my stress and the Uber, but it's because I don't have the teeth of Shapira in a year to know. Oh, I know.
Speaker 1:Well, it's the whole thing. It's marketing, it's me, it's developing, no way to go the deep. The aspect of bourbon is very.
Speaker 1:You can make the greatest bourbon ever. But if nobody drinks it, what the what the man? It's all part of it. You know, I've always known it, um, but said there's some companies, um, I coattails of the great market, but as soon as the marks we've seen it, even justin slough a bunch of companies go by the wayside and the brands or whatever, trying to do someone's side, but not the main distillers. We're not. We're talking more about the, the non-distilled producer. It's harder for some also to get through it, but it seems like they've gotten through it. So let's just hope. But at one point you know you were talking about there was a lot of whiskey being made, leading and then prohibition really took down. We're not even at the point of how much we made. It was a less people in the united at the time of how much we made, and there was way less people in the United States at the time, as the spin goes, that's for sure.
Speaker 3:I've got a. I think in 19-time Heaven Hill had $1.8 million in inventory, anyway 2.1. So think of that. That's how 1990 was a time for Bernie. I'm talking Heaven Hill. That's how Heaven Hill is. It's a lot less right. There weren't any other bunnies around and they forgot roots and I knew about this. I was there for 108 hours.
Speaker 1:What the cuss. And when you were up to 180 minutes, what did you do? I mean, you're doing that beat that I talked about earlier.
Speaker 3:I mean that was just like amazing what happened. Yeah, well, I have our building, more roses and pretty good enough, because we grew. Hey, it was 1987. One million bears in the town, 1987. Hell, and it plummets to 289 thousand bears which we, the bottom of the ski world, have, and in 2008, two million.
Speaker 1:And growing, because you just put it in another distillery.
Speaker 4:Let's touch on this one question. The uh new tillery in bardstown is that distillery?
Speaker 3:right now to show up as an opponent. It'd be very well out. You don't bother the player, you don't have to worry. You can still have an interest and take a show. That's awesome, patrick. Thank you. I hope you're tips. It's all out in very quick time. Absolutely. You want to think, oh, the bird is gone. No, then it just defeats the entire festival A thousand.
Speaker 5:We've sold out everything.
Speaker 1:I was telling Randy beforehand because we had Randy Press on about a week before, and afterwards I was telling him I'm like it's different. I said we have a bus tour, bernie, that we do on the Wednesday 4. And last year it was hard for me to sell a group. Every year we had one bus so it was hard for us to sell six more tickets for the bus tour. But this year we sold two tickets and I didn't even have time, I didn't even wait if anybody drops off. So I was saying to Randyandy it's the club, our fans. We're just on the junction you probably have about we were talking to a hundred people that were taking so the the he sold out. And then that really expensive ip sold out within minutes you're talking about I. I was like telling I said to randy, do I have to tell my people to get tickets today for sure, like we sell out today? So I actually did it. Two hunts. I think it sold out after the first two days For two hunts. It was crazy.
Speaker 4:I had close to a hundred texts and all in mail, asking if I could get any. After it sucked. Some people were on there trying to buy. I'm just a podcast and you'll be there, but I have no access to any more tickets.
Speaker 3:So think about it. Town 23, the Tideslip Association, 20 minutes on the cover 2004, the 1927.
Speaker 1:This year's busy too, so we're going to be down. I'm down there, we will see you there the Saturday before all the way through Sunday of the Bourbon Festival, and this year year I'm actually staying, I'm gonna drive on. The question is, is there any time that leading up that week? I mean, you're a busy guy, I know that, and you're traveling are you just gonna be at the festival or is there?
Speaker 1:any time the week, that's a the time you're saying yeah well, yeah, you, you, you and you and Stephen Fonte, I mean you guys are like so spectacular for bourbon. I really think everything that's you. You've played an intricate part of the. You know bringing the people to our town. Reading the word out, you know your personality, your individual aspect to it and it's the word out.
Speaker 3:you know that your personality is individual affect to it and it's, I know he's just one of the business. Uh, there's joke that steve. Uh, see the baptizing birds. You know the heart just hang out. And I hold a justin and I eat a bourbon and he also. He spit it all out, which was very, and we went and then he goes.
Speaker 1:I advise you he's at the right place which is a song.
Speaker 5:There's a song. I hope you get it, it's called John's Bourbon.
Speaker 4:Yeah, yeah, rich, it's a herny. He just tell you.
Speaker 1:What's brandy? And then John Ritt though this will be the last question, we're getting long, but the Heaven Hill Grain to Glass, he's really. He's like new to bourbon. He wants the concept of what this was compared to all the other stuff that you guys have been doing, because it's a little different.
Speaker 3:So we got together with Best Cakes, the third-best farm of our generation, the third-best generation. We did corn pie and we did this pie. We used my and we used my. But the corn pie was different. It got air content and what we did was do something out of our own. So notice that there was a scene from our reconsideration. I did two of that, some of it there. Yeah, I see, and I see, but we used it because it's like T2, then burn. So I'm up there. Yeah, let's see, let's see.
Speaker 1:Well that is neat in our mesh bill.
Speaker 3:Yep. So to the IOs. Let the solar angle jump to the area up to 35. Right, that's a high-rise burn. It should high-rise inside of the high-rise. One of my guys is a hyper-server and if I run away, whereas Joe Leary with Arnie's how high. C3 is high. So that's high. That says 30% of rum, that's 2% more. But I don't conform to Bill Arnold.
Speaker 1:And 30% malt is high.
Speaker 3:I mean, there's a 12% usually, but 4% of that thing, that's different. So you're really still spraying your seed or rye or barley in parties. He's reminded of when you malt. People think it's right, but no, Reza still brings that biscuit body.
Speaker 1:Mally, you know so the scotch aspects of it. It puts up that thing that people talk about. It's like one or two taps of some fud that brings it in. I did not get to know Parkas. I think he's very badass, such a spectacular time when he did what he was doing.
Speaker 3:He's made references to the whiskey festival.
Speaker 1:Such a spectacular time when he knew what he was doing yeah, you go to the coast and you can find out different stuff that you never knew, that's for sure. I will say that also at 120,. I believe this is I just looked it's 121 proof. These are not what would you say. These are serious, serious ways that are being well thought out right. Absolutely.
Speaker 3:Now this, at least as a result it's things and the weight of the barrels that really matter. It's learning we're you know, we still do it.
Speaker 1:So it's different. Like the Bernheim, this at 50 per cup of wheat. You know the wheat's picks. It's a sweet from more and complements that wheat. The wheat flavor, the wheat flavor of a wheat whiskey is there, but then there's that sweetness of the corn. Makes that really desperate. One, two, one.
Speaker 3:So it's anything. You did the first year, like we normally do. We did all of one. The second year, we begin to think a little about what can make this even better and more. For example, I've done some grass processing. There are some old bare proof of it, but you never see one.
Speaker 1:It's on what floor and what thing. Right, you're right. So, yeah, I mean it's like that's gotta be for so much. It's really cool that you brought the and being on and you guys and connor, just like you know real big glasses.
Speaker 3:He's a sure dodge. He did this project, so it's a day to go c2 he's needed. So that's the dedication and this and this was his idea and so it went the the end of the handmares that win. You know, I didn't like he think we just rfi, just do on those tactics. He was listening and he's not wrong. Uh, turns out I'll eat her like that. That's the little is he says to do on those textbooks. He was listening on the internet. He's not drunk. Uh, turns out I'm a leader like that. That's the level of CCC that says you can do this Right and there's no. Yeah, that was about that. So that's, it's a. You need presence of cops, Except for just writers and doctors say, screen to glass pro pro program is looking yeah, yeah, no that's, that's amazing.
Speaker 1:I mean you know, like anything, as you get your two gig you lose your. You know you lose you to every. You know dict and you know allocate who does what and hire the right people and the brits the last control you have. So it's really kind of cool that you know, for if you said 10 years, I mean conor O'Driscoll was not there 10 years ago.
Speaker 3:I read an article. I try to explain the difference between we and I. As you know, in 1986, people do think there's good trends. We are going to be in the hundreds.
Speaker 1:I try to explain the difference between we and I. I mean, you had all the cure-alls and some of it was just a quip. I mean standing coughs and colds and everything. What people use is sterilization. There was no doubt about it and people drink it. That is not aged in a barrel and there is no filtration of those. You can eat them and you have the process right to do clear spirits. But putting it in a barrel and aging it for centuries, that nature's wit is nominal. There's a mint. It's better for you.
Speaker 4:Hey, we had one question that was mentioned at the very end before what movies would you recommend?
Speaker 1:no-transcript. There you go, ct. I really have to. After that reference, I gotta drink way more. It's yes, I'm to personalize Limply.
Speaker 5:There you do, thanks, thanks.
Speaker 1:Steve.
Speaker 4:I love history.
Speaker 5:The business is quite close. I stay there. I want to work, to cheer for you, listen let's do pick.
Speaker 3:Oh you boss me Listen. Let's do J-Dan.
Speaker 4:Hopefully everybody.
Speaker 1:J-Dan.
Speaker 4:I do J-Dan.
Speaker 1:Oh, I do too. You can use old J-W-Dan too.
Speaker 3:That's not their profile, but the same source.
Speaker 1:The same one does. Oh yeah, there you go, oh cool.
Speaker 5:Decanter.
Speaker 3:Decanter is. That's where our old whiskey actually went over to say, oh, we got them in two decanters. Some of those decanters have wisdom because they can't do the wisdom.
Speaker 1:And look at the look, how clear that is just after Okay, nice to meet you.
Speaker 5:I saw Bob in touch and I don't even remember what it was. It always says I don't know why.
Speaker 3:I don't know why? Because they had to sit down right there they were running evidence, but but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but but but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but but but yes. Who's going to lead the?
Speaker 4:toast I want you in. This was so much fun. Just the stories that come right and they just thank you again.
Speaker 3:Look social media Bernie Long and folks. So if all the boys, the grandest plan is my grand.
Speaker 4:So hang on. I'm friends with token what you do. Thanks for coming on.
Speaker 3:Thank you, that's a damn good burger.
Speaker 5:The cherry on that Nash is just on that, oh man All right, what's the name of this little red-headed dollars people that go so far, don't they walk up on things? No, it's a good one.
Speaker 4:I recommend them all to my last second and you're fine. So people getting into it and most of them they were too random Burst to $20. Wait a second here. That's a little cheap.
Speaker 3:What the hell the people want to look like they just are slicing the balls up here or here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's what makes it all good, and when you think about it for the price, and it's a button bond, and that just right there tells you I and the first I got was at the party source at the time I just picked it up and I liked it uh, and eventually I think I wound up a couple bottles and used it to make a ribbon ball thing. I gotta get you some. The next time I see you I'll use all different, uh, just all the brands, but I'll just uh. The next we know some coking and heddle or, um, hell, neither ones, or uh, elijah craig and I'll you guys have great bourbon balls in the hello corn one of our one of our tourings.
Speaker 3:We got back, so did stand-up comedy.
Speaker 1:He's more this bourbon ball tennis my question is is do you still do any stand-up every now and then, or is it just pretty much our band do any stand-up every once in a while?
Speaker 3:still. I still do stand-up, but I'm not there's no.
Speaker 1:When we saw you in New Orleans and you do your yeah, there's no DC. When we saw you in New Orleans and you do your bottled and bond position, you do a good. I mean, you bring something new to the bend here's something by people for this.
Speaker 3:You know there's a thing called Halley's in Borough Rock. There's a relation Probably. A bottle of wine you totally drink from one of the seas. You're only 100. You must be distilling Cider and it has to be a warrior, so undoubtedly bottling bonds be steamed for extra health. So their melon and gin is around $100 for a center of heaven or a number. My mom are interested. In Canada they want to take the money. Centuries in the United States except everybody's horrible. So even if these wilderness tribes have more for having a ham, let's say, take any centuries in the United States or on Except everybody's horrible. So even if he's wilderness trod, they have more for having him. Let's say I need 10,000 available artists to own round-robin loans, Helpers of 10. So so near the rest and rest of us on the Earth. Now do you want to really, really thin it? How many of them are over years?
Speaker 4:old, that's less than five. You guess what? You know, you know, Gerald, you know, you know, Gerald, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know you know, you know, you know, you know you know, you know this is a 3D and a 3D that cost is 44.
Speaker 3:That's money to get this restricted planet.
Speaker 1:And that's a step that you would consider that on. But don't make women 8. Even when you're, if you're slow that age statement, you don't commit that brand. It's like like just let's just say, a tailor which is probably six, seven years old. They don't commit to the age to be born based off of what they want to produce, because they don't have time with that.
Speaker 3:They find a number of six-month periods, so they're probably going to keep for three days.
Speaker 1:No, they're not duping you, but Because that's how restricted Lombardi is Right, but it's a commitment.
Speaker 3:There's no doubt it.
Speaker 1:Let's see, there's a reason for that, because it's hot.
Speaker 5:So, Rittenhouse. Fried, just the biggest deal is something. Yeah, that's a lot.
Speaker 3:It looks like it was Rittenhouse Square. That's Rittenhouse Square, well well, there you go.
Speaker 1:That's. That's a podcast. Uh, we'll all go to philadelphia and drink some in rittenhouse square. Absolutely, that's a good good. There you go, right. So, uh, thank you, bernie for coming. I appreciate it. Thank, I appreciate you having me See you. Next time We'll be down there for Kentucky Bourbon Festival, so hopefully we'll see you at the festival and then we'll be down there a lot more.
Speaker 3:before that we had a secret up in Columbus a few weeks ago.
Speaker 1:Definitely so, all right. So wwwscotchiebourbonboyscom for all things Scotchie Bourbon Boys. Remember it's in all major pod formats. No matter how you watch us or listen to us, make sure you come and look back, remember good bourbon times and good friends, cheers, guys. And remember drink responsibly, don't drink and drive and live your life uncut, uncut and under, and so we'll take us out under and under.
