Van Winkle 23 Year

[Karola]

Ahyes, the mythical 'Van Winkle" line, I'm sure you've heard the name. It's become the unicorn of the bourbon world, but just 8 years ago, you could've walked into ANY liquor store and snagged a bottle off the shelf at retail price. Not the case any more! What is the suggested retail price for Pappy today?Blake from Bourbonr.com has outlined the prices below:

So why did a bottle of Old Rip Van Winkle 10 Year cost $200 on the secondary market? The answer is simple: supply and demand; scarcity creates necessity. Blake explains it best in his Bourbonr.com article, the Economics of Pappy Van Winkle. It's an interesting read if you're curious why people are paying exorbitant prices for 750ml of barrel-aged corn alcohol. I could write about Pappy Van Winkle all day, but here are some quick facts instead:

Ok, on to the review! My buddy Grant (college friend / fraternity brother / co-bourbon enthusiast) recently sent me four samples of Old Rip Van Winkle Handmade Bourbon 10 Year Old 107 proof. Old Rip Van Winkle line is not considered "Pappy" -- it was created as a joint venture when Van Winkle and Buffalo Trace Distillery joined forces in June of 2002 -- but, it still has the Van Winkle touch.

Taste - Old Van Winkle Handmade 10 Year is not as smooth as I was expecting but it opened up a bit more with a few drops of water. There is a moderate sweetness when it initially hits the palate, which I assume is because it's a wheated bourbon. The finish was complex with notes of vanilla and caramel. Overall a great bourbon for sipping, but the price on the secondary market is steep and you can find a comparable bourbon for much less. Look for an upcoming post where I provide recommendations for low, medium, and high price points.

This very rare, limited edition bourbon takes generations of distilling know-how to produce. Only the most careful and expensive distilling method can be used to create a whiskey as special as this one. Each barrel ages for 23 years and is carefully selected from the heart of the warehouse. This whiskey should be enjoyed neat.

Early aromas of caramel and cream with soft notes of oak, nuts and leather. Features a sweet taste composed of vanilla, maple and honey joined by complimentary flavors of citrus and spice. Has a long lasting oaky finish, along with many of the early flavors.

Pappy, BTACs, WLW and so on. These names and abbreviations are overcrowding the whisky communities in the last years with the gouged market prices all over the US and now, the rest of the world. Van Winkle Special Reserve 12 Year Old Lot B is also one of those bottles. Even though the MSRP is at $79.99, the secondary market price over $1000 is easy to come across.

Of course, I am against this crazy overpricing attitude and never pay more than MSRP for these bottles. I want to thank my friend Whiskey Writes for supplying me with sufficient sample for this review.

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Nearly everyone in my generation is familiar with the story of Rip Van Winkle. This tale written by Washington Irving in 1819 describes a Dutch American named Rip who fell deeply asleep after drinking some magical liquor. He awoke 20 years later to a very changed world, having missed the American Revolution and other important developments.

Flooded with all this bad news, Rip felt a migraine coming on. But he remembered that he could always turn to sports news to numb his pain when world events became too upsetting. So he changed the subject, hoping to hear something more uplifting.

At this point, the 2023 Rip Van Winkle was so distressed that he wanted to take another 20-year nap. But then he realized that his beloved America might not survive if he slept for another 20 years.

The Van Winkle Family Reserve Rye has long been a 50/50 combination of Medley (Owensboro) and Cream of Kentucky (old Bernheim in Louisville) rye whiskey. The whiskey was all dumped into stainless steel tanks years ago. Each fall, some of it is withdrawn and bottled.

There's been a lot of discussion in another forum regarding the differences between the various bottlings of the VW products. My conclusion is that the 10/107 Frankfort bottling is incredible--maybe my favorite everyday pour. The Lawrenceburg/Old Commonwealth bottling was fantastic, and now very hard to get. What are you going to do? Not drink the Frankfort expression until you stumble upon that lost bottle of Old Commonwealth? That would be a mistake. Ultimately, what we have here is the evolution of a living, breathing bourbon (as they all are), which changes over time. I view the changes in the VW line as horizontal changes rather than vertical changes. That is, more diversity, but equally wonderful, IMHO.

Some of the Frankforts are SW too as I recall. Anything bottled since last summer in Frankfort is Bernheim. There's probably some lot number info available which would help distinguish Frankfort bottled SW and Frankfort bottled Bernheim. As Julian has said, they are different enough in taste to identify.....but both are very good bourbons.

And each bourbon can serve for a different purpose. I happened at Sampler to take a shot of ORVW 12 year old Lot B after one of the desserts there, not a bourbon ball but some kind of pie (like a derby pie). It was the best possible combination one could imagine.

My first premium bourbon was ORVW 10 yo, 107. I thought is was pretty good. After buying the ORVQ 15yo, 107, I prefer much more than the 10 yo, even at the much higher price. I even like it over the 20 yo VW Family Reserve. In my opinion, a close second to the ORVW 15 yo is the 12 yo (Van Winkle).

PS: they had a few bottles of 16year Hirsh for $66 each, too much for my wallet, I wanted it bad though. George T, Stagg is hard to get if not impossible in my store, but they carry all the Van Winkles, except have the 20 yr on order, and a wide assortment of great bourbons.

Actually, that would be an excellent price today, especially for the wax-top version(s). Around here, even the seemingly lesser gold-foil -- the current and last bottling -- runs around $75 before tax. The gold-wax version is still a rare find, at about the same price.

I live in Oregon and we have state controlled Liquor stores. I called around and found this one store only in Downtown Portland called "Uptown LiQuor". They sell to the premium downtown restaurants and stock a lot of high end bourbons, including the 16 year Hirsh and they have some George T. Stagg on order. They had the old squat bottles on the shelf. So I found the Old Rip Van Winkles and reached to the back of the stack and checked on the labels until I found the Lawrenceburg bottling. I found a 10 and a 15 year old and bought both. They had a few more left, but my wallet was drained. I heard that they were rare, now I know why. They taste so darn good.

This 13-year breaks the mold as it is one of the oldest rye whiskeys available today. The maturity it has achieved while aging is quite obvious when you take the first sip. A soft nose of chestnuts, spice, vanilla and fruit. Features flavors of cocoa, vanilla, spice, and white pepper. A long, warm and complex finish with caramel and spice combined with dry oak.

Disclaimer: The resale of alcohol is illegal, without proper license, and I am in no way encouraging it. I also have no problems with the current market, buyers, sellers or prices. This article is just an observation of a free market at work which I find fascinating.

The secondary market was born out of the increased demand and shortage in supply of bourbon. Bourbon collectors and drinkers have organized in multiple ways to exchange bottles. First, eBay was a substantial marketplace for collectors until alcohol sales were shut down. Next, there was an active group on Facebook called the Bourbon Exchange. This has also since been shut down. There still remain several groups on Facebook for buying, selling, and trading bourbon bottles. Craigslist is another popular option. However, in my opinion, craigslist is still synonymous with scams. The best option seems to be Bottle-spot.com. This site has verified emails and other safe guards in place to ensure quality trading. No matter the outlet the secondary market is thriving.

Two parties that have exploited the secondary market are the retail gougers and scalpers. Retailers are hiking the price of Pappy because of the volumes of calls received about its release. They then see what the bottles are selling for online and follow suit. Scalpers in turn grab every bottle they can within a 500 mile radius. They then resell that same bottle at a much higher price on the secondary market. A third group that should also be mentioned is the opportunist. This is a consumer who grabs an extra bottle when he can because why not cover your bourbon habit by selling a spare bottle? The amazing thing about these three parties is they have stepped in and stabilized the bourbon market where the retail market could not.

In most markets the answer is simple, increase the supply. When your product takes 10-23 years to make this is not a viable short-term solution. Buffalo Trace (and most distilleries) has increased their production but most of this bourbon is only 4-6 years old. The way I see it is there is only two short-term solutions. One, the distilleries and brands increase the retail price to cut out the scalper. This solution benefits the distilleries but hurts the consumer and cuts out the margin of the scalper. (Hypothetically, who knows? Maybe the secondary prices will rise congruent with retail pricing). Two, do nothing and wait until the hype machine runs out of steam and demand dies down. Number two is more of a risk because there is no telling when demand may die down. We can only speculate as to what will come of this massive demand we have created.

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