Gavin engages with Sagar Vashishta, a veteran collector and author of the coffee table book The Art of Japanese Whisky to examine the structural shifts defining the spirits industry over the past decade. T

he discussion traces the market’s trajectory from an era of accessible, high-quality age-statement expressions to the current post-COVID climate characterized by aggressive corporate price increases, inventory saturation, and a proliferation of non-traditional distilleries looking to capitalize on the category’s prestige. 

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00:05.397 –> 00:23.187
[SPEAKER_01]: Welcome back everybody to another fun edition of the Rolex Whiskey Passion podcast and I got a gentleman on here today, man, like we were just saying, I feel like we’ve known each other for years, but I’m looking forward to kind of learning more about him.

00:23.504 –> 00:24.425
[SPEAKER_01]: So go on for Shia Shia.

00:24.485 –> 00:25.687
[SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to the show, my friend.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Introduce yourself.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Please to the audience.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.

00:29.471 –> 00:29.791
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.

00:29.851 –> 00:30.813
[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks for having me, Gavin.

00:31.073 –> 00:31.353
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.

00:31.914 –> 00:35.778
[SPEAKER_00]: I’m just a whiskey enthusiast, primarily Japanese whiskey guy.

00:35.818 –> 00:37.861
[SPEAKER_00]: And that start like yourself.

00:37.941 –> 00:41.825
[SPEAKER_00]: Started collecting whiskey before it kind of got got the critical mass.

00:41.925 –> 00:44.609
[SPEAKER_00]: And I’ve just been enjoying it for 10 plus years now.

00:44.869 –> 00:49.014
[SPEAKER_00]: Last year I published a book about Japanese whiskey, a coffee table book.

00:49.394 –> 00:52.718
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, that’s just been kind of my

00:52.698 –> 00:55.002
[SPEAKER_01]: I got that proudly sitting on my coffee table.

00:55.162 –> 00:56.324
[SPEAKER_01]: It was a great book.

00:56.344 –> 00:56.704
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, thank you.

00:56.744 –> 00:57.125
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.

00:57.145 –> 00:57.986
[SPEAKER_00]: Appreciate it.

00:58.126 –> 00:59.429
[SPEAKER_00]: That was a passion project.

00:59.689 –> 01:05.518
[SPEAKER_00]: We just decided, me and my best friend, who’s a food photographer, just decided to get together and see what we could cook up.

01:05.618 –> 01:09.444
[SPEAKER_01]: So, how long ago did you get on Instagram?

01:09.945 –> 01:11.507
[SPEAKER_01]: Same time as me, like 10 years ago?

01:11.948 –> 01:13.350
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it’s been like 10 years now.

01:13.450 –> 01:16.175
[SPEAKER_00]: There’s been a few of us I feel like that have been around.

01:16.195 –> 01:18.458
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like we lost a few, too, give you up.

01:18.538 –> 01:20.241
[SPEAKER_00]: A couple of life happens, right?

01:21.824 –> 01:24.567
[SPEAKER_00]: Some guys are still around, but they don’t, they’re not active or whatever.

01:24.788 –> 01:33.198
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, and it’s interesting, you know, because I had someone comment on something the other day, it’s like, oh, aren’t you worried about your investment with everything dropping?

01:33.218 –> 01:35.320
[SPEAKER_01]: I’m like, I didn’t buy mass produced bottles.

01:35.981 –> 01:36.181
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

01:36.762 –> 01:37.002
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

01:37.162 –> 01:42.509
[SPEAKER_01]: So like, no, yeah, it’s lighter than it was two years ago, but like I’m not selling right now, so I don’t really care.

01:42.549 –> 01:49.317
[SPEAKER_01]: And the stuff that I bought isn’t subject to all the silliness, like other shit that people buy.

01:49.904 –> 01:52.007
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I mean, you’ve always know what to buy.

01:52.067 –> 02:01.340
[SPEAKER_00]: I’ve seen that you’ve always been about the special releases, the limited releases, the kind of stuff that just really you can’t make again, and you’re never going to see again.

02:01.360 –> 02:03.022
[SPEAKER_01]: That was my theory also.

02:03.042 –> 02:09.531
[SPEAKER_01]: But when you and I first started 10 years ago, obviously, we’re not in denial, people were drinking a lot more.

02:09.732 –> 02:19.405
[SPEAKER_01]: So if there was a 250 bottle release, you pretty much could guarantee that 100 would be drank and only

02:19.385 –> 02:24.532
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, they do a 250 bottle release and there’s like 249 on the whiskey auction site the next day.

02:24.572 –> 02:25.514
[SPEAKER_01]: You’re like, hey, what?

02:26.195 –> 02:26.435
[SPEAKER_00]: Yep.

02:27.717 –> 02:27.817
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

02:27.837 –> 02:27.937
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

02:28.298 –> 02:31.022
[SPEAKER_00]: It’s not really buying anything for investment anymore.

02:31.102 –> 02:34.607
[SPEAKER_00]: I’m just like, I mean, in terms of the newer production releases, newer stuff.

02:34.707 –> 02:39.253
[SPEAKER_00]: Because it’s all, like you said, it’s just mass produced now and quality is not that good.

02:39.293 –> 02:40.075
[SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, it’s your point.

02:40.095 –> 02:48.767
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, when we were buying back in the day, you know, at the price that we got in about the people talking about the bottles of dropped 20% but for what we paid, it’s not really there.

02:48.983 –> 02:50.104
[SPEAKER_01]: Sorry, sorry.

02:50.144 –> 02:52.927
[SPEAKER_01]: Instead of being 300% up, I’m only 250% up.

02:52.947 –> 02:56.009
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I can feel freely pretty well with not on that.

02:56.270 –> 03:05.738
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah, I think it’s like mind-blowing that these bottles, the Yamazaki 18, used to be like 200 bucks, not even that long ago.

03:05.938 –> 03:07.620
[SPEAKER_00]: So, but yeah, it’s been crazy.

03:07.640 –> 03:13.745
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think, I think Stuntori has definitely been the most prominent of the pricing crisis.

03:13.805 –> 03:15.046
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think we’re seeing it.

03:15.087 –> 03:16.308
[SPEAKER_00]: They kind of hit critical mass.

03:16.368 –> 03:18.990
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like hit you a little bit.

03:18.970 –> 03:23.238
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, no one wants to pay for it anymore, you know, once the Yamatoa was hit the 150, 160 US.

03:23.358 –> 03:26.945
[SPEAKER_00]: It’s kind of sitting, even at Costco, they’re kind of sitting now.

03:26.985 –> 03:34.600
[SPEAKER_01]: So 100% sitting, but also like, you know, like I was saying a few minutes ago, it’s like people are drinking less, so the excitement isn’t there.

03:34.660 –> 03:37.004
[SPEAKER_01]: And also the shelves are confusing now.

03:37.044 –> 03:39.008
[SPEAKER_01]: They’re so much whiskey sitting there.

03:39.028 –> 03:41.232
[SPEAKER_01]: You just like, I don’t know what I want.

03:41.212 –> 03:42.576
[SPEAKER_01]: like this is like crazy.

03:42.616 –> 03:51.320
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, you know, you’re saying you haven’t brought anything like the only two things that I bought was the Hibiki 30 and the Biki 21, those artist releases last year.

03:51.521 –> 03:52.905
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, yeah, those things are beautiful.

03:53.025 –> 03:53.366
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

03:53.386 –> 03:55.773
[SPEAKER_01]: So I grabbed those, but like I can’t grab those in America.

03:55.793 –> 03:56.976
[SPEAKER_01]: I grabbed those in London.

03:56.956 –> 04:01.768
[SPEAKER_01]: Yep, you know, because they don’t have, it just, you know, over here, it’s just silly.

04:02.450 –> 04:05.077
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think that, yeah, Santori raised all the prices.

04:05.758 –> 04:08.104
[SPEAKER_01]: Everybody kind of jumped in and did the same thing.

04:08.185 –> 04:09.307
[SPEAKER_01]: And I don’t know.

04:09.327 –> 04:12.315
[SPEAKER_01]: I think the next five years could be really interesting, because

04:12.295 –> 04:20.427
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, in some of these stores, you start to see like red tags like, hey, we’re just going to get rid of it and you’re like, well, if they’re going to get rid of it, they’re not going to buy it again.

04:22.511 –> 04:40.378
[SPEAKER_01]: And and you’re seeing that in bourbon, you’re seeing that in Scotch, you’re seeing that in Japanese and I’m kind of like, it’s interesting, but the point that I’m missing the most is like 10 years ago, we had really good Japanese whiskey camaraderie, yeah, and I feel like that is gone.

04:40.679 –> 04:41.660
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I know what you mean.

04:41.880 –> 04:46.686
[SPEAKER_00]: It was like a little family because it was like even not just in the US, but like worldwide.

04:46.706 –> 04:50.471
[SPEAKER_00]: You kind of knew who all the all the collectors and all the infusias were.

04:50.491 –> 04:52.754
[SPEAKER_00]: And I know exactly what you’re talking about.

04:52.774 –> 04:54.696
[SPEAKER_00]: And that’s kind of dissipated a little bit.

04:54.716 –> 04:59.843
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, and from born in Japan a lot, I can tell you that, you know, like three or four years ago.

04:59.863 –> 05:01.985
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it used to be just all the big guys, right?

05:02.005 –> 05:04.668
[SPEAKER_00]: It’s San Tori and then Chechibu came a little later.

05:04.709 –> 05:05.910
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I’m here.

05:05.890 –> 05:21.618
[SPEAKER_00]: But since a few years ago there’s there’s a hundred distilleries now in in Japan You distilleries are trying to capitalize on the boom and it was a little bit like I started to like kind of raise my eyebrow a few years ago because you know They’re putting out this like two year whiskey sometimes not even two years.

05:21.638 –> 05:22.620
[SPEAKER_00]: It’s like new make, right?

05:22.640 –> 05:24.203
[SPEAKER_00]: And they’re just selling it out

05:24.183 –> 05:25.606
[SPEAKER_00]: And I’m like this can’t be right.

05:25.686 –> 05:26.948
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean something’s not right.

05:26.988 –> 05:30.996
[SPEAKER_00]: Like the demand is not that high that people are going and buying these new make tasks.

05:31.497 –> 05:38.070
[SPEAKER_00]: So I feel like the writing was like a little bit on the wall, you know, since since then, and now we’re just really seeing it kind of come undone.

05:38.090 –> 05:44.723
[SPEAKER_00]: I think guys who board casts are FUCKED, but it’s like there.

05:44.703 –> 05:50.433
[SPEAKER_00]: And I’m alive, I was just screaming, buying a few at the time, and I’m proud of the luck.

05:50.453 –> 05:51.254
[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks.

05:51.274 –> 05:51.655
[SPEAKER_00]: I don’t know.

05:51.795 –> 05:56.102
[SPEAKER_00]: For me, the cast thing was always interesting because it’s a lottery, right?

05:56.142 –> 05:59.007
[SPEAKER_00]: You don’t know what you’re going to taste like, you know?

05:59.027 –> 06:00.730
[SPEAKER_00]: And I mean, I think you’re trusting.

06:00.990 –> 06:03.975
[SPEAKER_01]: And you’re trusting somebody else to store it and all the things.

06:04.035 –> 06:08.803
[SPEAKER_01]: It’s kind of like, Yeah, I did, I bought, hey, I’m buying this like prized cow.

06:09.144 –> 06:09.985
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, cool.

06:09.965 –> 06:12.248
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we’re putting it in the backyard, but you’re like, what do you mean?

06:12.269 –> 06:14.532
[SPEAKER_01]: It’s not like in the field running around Napa.

06:15.213 –> 06:17.577
[SPEAKER_01]: Like it’s in the backyard or like, shit.

06:18.117 –> 06:18.859
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, really.

06:18.899 –> 06:20.181
[SPEAKER_00]: You don’t know.

06:20.241 –> 06:23.105
[SPEAKER_00]: And we’re just like, what, you’ll reunite with the cow in 20 years.

06:23.205 –> 06:24.968
[SPEAKER_00]: And burn by that.

06:24.988 –> 06:26.370
[SPEAKER_00]: But you’re stuck with it.

06:26.570 –> 06:27.773
[SPEAKER_01]: You’re like, hey, where do you live?

06:27.933 –> 06:29.216
[SPEAKER_01]: Cause I gotta come see the cow.

06:29.316 –> 06:30.799
[SPEAKER_01]: I know that’s my possible.

06:31.059 –> 06:32.262
[SPEAKER_01]: But we’ll sum it all together.

06:32.282 –> 06:34.607
[SPEAKER_01]: We’ll send you a piece of paper in some documentation.

06:34.647 –> 06:37.352
[SPEAKER_01]: Show you the cow, the cow is yours.

06:37.372 –> 06:38.715
[SPEAKER_01]: And I’m just like, yeah, I don’t know.

06:38.815 –> 06:40.038
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, the game’s changed.

06:40.058 –> 06:44.327
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, for you, you know, when did your whiskey journey start?

06:44.648 –> 06:47.734
[SPEAKER_01]: And like, what made Japanese whiskey stand out so much?

06:47.984 –> 06:58.236
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, for me, it’s a generic story, but you know, the Lawson Translation movie got me got me curious about the Habiki brand, and I’m fortunate to travel to Japan for work.

06:58.737 –> 07:11.612
[SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, I thought, okay, I got to try to find a bottle of this stuff, and I went and I bought a 17, and it was like, you know, it wasn’t hard to find at the time, it was cheap, and I was like, man, this is a good whiskey, you know, and since then it’s just been one thing after another.

07:11.592 –> 07:14.962
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I still have prices on some of my B.C.

07:14.982 –> 07:18.452
[SPEAKER_01]: 17’s, and like I just saw one the other day, it was like $2900.

07:18.472 –> 07:20.818
[SPEAKER_00]: It was crazy, man.

07:20.878 –> 07:22.724
[SPEAKER_00]: Even a Costco in the U.S. there was a time.

07:22.764 –> 07:23.526
[SPEAKER_00]: It wasn’t a doubt.

07:23.626 –> 07:24.589
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I guess.

07:25.177 –> 07:26.319
[SPEAKER_00]: six to seven years ago.

07:26.479 –> 07:27.581
[SPEAKER_00]: I paid two eighty one.

07:27.661 –> 07:30.285
[SPEAKER_00]: I think for a B. G. twenty one at Costco.

07:30.305 –> 07:30.646
[SPEAKER_00]: Yep.

07:30.666 –> 07:50.458
[SPEAKER_00]: That’s what that’s I think the first one I got was like around two hundred bucks for the twenty one and it’s crazy and also the juice was way better than I mean I know I know it’s twenty Warren but the blends the blends appear to have kind of changed you know they they change the makeup and if you open a bottle that was just produced and side by side it with one of those ten years ago B. G. twenty one is it’s like night and day.

07:50.438 –> 07:58.577
[SPEAKER_01]: But I think that’s the whole whiskey industry, because like, you know, let’s just, let’s, let’s, we’ll use to be key to 21 as a example, 10 years ago, nobody wanted it.

07:59.179 –> 08:06.777
[SPEAKER_01]: So they’re like, we like, we got to make some fan of these girls barrels of aging out like we got to do something with this like nobody cares.

08:06.757 –> 08:26.707
[SPEAKER_01]: That’s just make a 21, it can have some 24-year-olds, some 28-year-old, like this is like, if the youngest is 21, that’s we got to call it DBK21, and so then, and they had all these barrels sitting around, now fast forward in a whopping, and you know, and I joke about this, a whopping 10 years, you know, it’s not like I’m saying, let’s go back to the wind dinosaurs roam the earth.

08:27.087 –> 08:30.552
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, all of a sudden they’re like, oh shit, people want this.

08:30.572 –> 08:33.497
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, well, let’s go, we don’t need to use 28-year-olds anymore.

08:33.517 –> 08:35.700
[SPEAKER_01]: Now we’ll just use 22-year-olds.

08:35.680 –> 08:40.426
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you know, it’s just different, you know, people don’t realize that what a barrel does with aging.

08:40.546 –> 08:41.347
[SPEAKER_01]: They just don’t, you know?

08:41.928 –> 08:42.488
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, yeah.

08:42.508 –> 08:50.438
[SPEAKER_00]: And, and it’s been really interesting to come back to your point about the people not drinking because I feel like it’s, it’s no one really talks about it.

08:50.458 –> 08:56.286
[SPEAKER_00]: So I’m really happy that you kind of touched on it, especially people that are like in the whiskey industry, like everyone can see it going on, right?

08:56.326 –> 08:57.968
[SPEAKER_00]: And it’s not just whiskey, it’s wine too.

08:57.988 –> 09:04.776
[SPEAKER_00]: I got friends in Napa and they said they’re they’re thrown away, you know, tons and tons of grapes because the demand is just like not there anymore.

09:04.756 –> 09:11.127
[SPEAKER_00]: I think it’s not only demand, there’s also like economic factors, the prices have gone up, you know, people just don’t want to pay that for booze.

09:11.668 –> 09:13.811
[SPEAKER_00]: You see, I’ll debunked your whole theory.

09:14.172 –> 09:25.431
[SPEAKER_01]: My theory is that this new generation, when we turn 21, you know, we’ll just say that’s the legal age, you know, some people start drinking earlier and now, we were so excited to drink.

09:25.411 –> 09:26.172
[SPEAKER_01]: them drink.

09:26.192 –> 09:31.743
[SPEAKER_01]: So you don’t have a starter, you’re missing a whole generation that’s not coming in.

09:32.264 –> 09:35.330
[SPEAKER_01]: So now you have, you have these 21 year olds, they’re not drinking.

09:35.550 –> 09:35.871
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.

09:36.192 –> 09:42.103
[SPEAKER_01]: So then you’ve got the last generation who are like 30 now and they’re drinking less.

09:42.083 –> 09:44.268
[SPEAKER_01]: So they’re not going to potential.

09:44.308 –> 09:47.275
[SPEAKER_01]: Then you go 40, 50, 60, they’re all drinking less.

09:47.636 –> 09:49.821
[SPEAKER_01]: And you’re like, wait, we don’t have the starter package.

09:50.182 –> 09:55.454
[SPEAKER_01]: Like that was a big influx of new energy, new drinkers that was going to last us.

09:55.855 –> 09:59.063
[SPEAKER_01]: So all you’re doing is losing drinkers every year.

09:59.604 –> 10:00.987
[SPEAKER_01]: Yep, in vocal you.

10:00.967 –> 10:26.772
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and it’s you know, I mean, I think alcohol has been around for so long that like there it’s you know, it’ll be it’ll come back eventually But yeah, it could be a long it could be a long route And you know, you actually touched on something interesting which was you know last year I and actually like pretty much all my friends in my whiskey circle and this is something that’s not really talked about And I know that you’re really big on on health, you know, I love I love your your whoops stories I love whoops man, you know, I need my sort of group is life

10:26.752 –> 10:27.894
[SPEAKER_00]: Bullshit.

10:27.934 –> 10:29.556
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, there’s a couple of sounds here.

10:29.596 –> 10:29.896
[SPEAKER_00]: It is.

10:30.156 –> 10:31.138
[SPEAKER_00]: Exactly what’s going on.

10:31.538 –> 10:36.245
[SPEAKER_00]: So last year, you know, I got some news from my doctors, you know, the liver numbers are like a little brown.

10:37.386 –> 10:38.187
[SPEAKER_00]: We got a little vegan.

10:38.207 –> 10:40.931
[SPEAKER_00]: It was like, oh, man, it wasn’t just me.

10:40.951 –> 10:42.032
[SPEAKER_00]: It was like, kind of my whole circle.

10:42.092 –> 10:45.697
[SPEAKER_00]: I guess we’re just like at that age, you know, or we’re like, oh, man, I just can’t drink anymore.

10:46.178 –> 10:49.502
[SPEAKER_00]: So thankfully, you know, the liver can repair itself if you take.

10:49.482 –> 10:53.007
[SPEAKER_00]: abstain from, you know, a few months, you can kind of get normal.

10:53.628 –> 10:58.275
[SPEAKER_00]: So I did that and I was feeling really good and I thought, okay, well, I’m, I’m like, I love whiskey.

10:58.395 –> 11:00.799
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to start drinking now, but I don’t want to drink garbage.

11:00.919 –> 11:04.224
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, if I can only drink a little bit, I want to drink, not only for quarters.

11:06.287 –> 11:08.210
[SPEAKER_00]: So that kind of changed my mentality a little bit.

11:08.230 –> 11:14.299
[SPEAKER_00]: Whereas like, if I’m going to buy a bottle, like, I’m not buying some mystery, but I want to buy something that I know is going to taste amazing.

11:14.359 –> 11:16.182
[SPEAKER_00]: Even if I got to pay a little bit more, you know?

11:16.786 –> 11:18.108
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, that’s my stupid joke.

11:18.128 –> 11:21.473
[SPEAKER_01]: Like if I’m drinking whiskey, it’s F. You whiskey, I’m just not drinking.

11:21.493 –> 11:23.536
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, like, I don’t need it.

11:23.616 –> 11:27.262
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, like, like, like, like in two weeks, I got him a Hess’s event, universal whiskey.

11:27.582 –> 11:29.705
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, yeah, he’s scoped out the super pores.

11:30.126 –> 11:36.376
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I already know what’s being poured at the legends dinner and I’m like, oh, there’s gonna be, there’s gonna be pores that I’m not gonna finish the glass.

11:36.756 –> 11:37.377
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, yeah.

11:37.357 –> 11:39.521
[SPEAKER_01]: Then I said, I take a sip and be like, all right, that’s cool.

11:39.602 –> 11:45.494
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, you know, like, I’m literally like, hey, I want to try stuff that is incredibly unique or like, I’m good.

11:45.534 –> 11:51.105
[SPEAKER_01]: And then like, you know, a month later, I got a Hong Kong whiskey festival where like, you get to choose what you’re drinking.

11:51.406 –> 11:51.686
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh yeah.

11:52.188 –> 11:55.955
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, like, so I’m like, last year was all Samarolees and Onus Caches.

11:56.296 –> 11:56.817
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh yeah.

11:56.965 –> 11:59.789
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, for Antonio and his cat, this is probably going to be the thing.

12:00.290 –> 12:07.640
[SPEAKER_00]: Yep, yeah, they got some crazy, I mean, Hong Kong has awesome crazy old bottles that they just been storing around for like decades.

12:08.481 –> 12:17.675
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, out of out of all the honey holes globally that I’ve been into, like they’re they’re up there as far as volume of bottles available.

12:18.195 –> 12:18.636
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh yeah.

12:19.240 –> 12:20.823
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, but it’s okay.

12:20.863 –> 12:21.745
[SPEAKER_01]: So you get into this thing.

12:21.765 –> 12:22.466
[SPEAKER_01]: You’re going to Japan.

12:22.486 –> 12:25.471
[SPEAKER_01]: You try to be 17 Japanese whiskey.

12:25.672 –> 12:27.555
[SPEAKER_01]: Did you drink any of the whiskey before that?

12:27.595 –> 12:29.458
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, we’re your Scotch guy or Birmingham guy.

12:29.478 –> 12:30.801
[SPEAKER_00]: You’re just like, no, no.

12:30.821 –> 12:33.165
[SPEAKER_00]: And I’m going to be honest, we still, I’m still not really a bourbon guy.

12:33.265 –> 12:38.034
[SPEAKER_00]: I know it’s, I know it’s blast for me to say in this, in this country, but let me start drinking at 10 years ago.

12:38.174 –> 12:42.582
[SPEAKER_01]: So I’m not like, you know, Beyonce, that’s not something I grew up with either.

12:42.562 –> 12:45.706
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I know, you came from the same route as me, right?

12:45.766 –> 12:48.069
[SPEAKER_00]: Which was the Japanese whiskey ginger pan.

12:48.250 –> 12:50.653
[SPEAKER_00]: The whiskey junkers don’t get like the locals.

12:51.094 –> 12:52.075
[SPEAKER_00]: They’re all Scotch lovers.

12:52.335 –> 12:56.681
[SPEAKER_00]: And the, you know, the IB Scotch scene, as I’m sure you know, is just crazy there.

12:56.701 –> 13:01.748
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, every week, the bottling, all kinds of, you know, old-clined lineage, and all these crazy single casts.

13:01.948 –> 13:03.610
[SPEAKER_00]: And it’s really, it’s a really acted scene.

13:03.630 –> 13:07.776
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it’s kind of slowing down too with people drinking less, but it’s still pretty active there.

13:07.756 –> 13:29.427
[SPEAKER_00]: But when I was living in Japan for six months for a work project and I would go to the whiskey bar and got to the point where I had tried everything Japanese, you know, I’m like, I literally tried everything when you’re shelf so but it was always these unique Scotchists to try, you know, or for Japan Scotchists, so then I kind of started diving a little bit more than that and you can still get, I mean, Scotch, I think you can still get some crazy values in terms of the

13:29.407 –> 13:34.113
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, did you see that yesterday or the other day like whatever was last week beginning of the week, I’d lose track.

13:34.193 –> 13:38.539
[SPEAKER_01]: I posted like, I’ve been buying all those Gordon McPhales from the 60s, 70s and 80s.

13:38.880 –> 13:41.703
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I mean, I think the most expensive one, 600 bucks.

13:42.364 –> 13:43.306
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it’s crazy.

13:43.426 –> 13:43.906
[SPEAKER_00]: It’s crazy.

13:44.047 –> 13:46.370
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I was in Tokyo last week.

13:46.410 –> 13:47.151
[SPEAKER_00]: I got a climb leash.

13:47.231 –> 13:50.335
[SPEAKER_00]: It was like a 27 year old single cast and it was 600 bucks.

13:50.315 –> 13:58.324
[SPEAKER_00]: And I got a little bit of, like, a little bit expensive, but then I thought, I’m not getting a 27-year-old young Zaki for 600 bucks, I know.

13:58.865 –> 13:59.806
[SPEAKER_00]: It’s like a crazy deal.

14:00.086 –> 14:04.311
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so, and I heard, you know, they’re struggling too, so it’ll be interesting.

14:04.351 –> 14:09.217
[SPEAKER_00]: It’ll be interesting few years to see, you know, how I think the problem is, like, here’s my theory.

14:09.537 –> 14:19.208
[SPEAKER_01]: If you’re a brand that basically said, maybe not directly,

14:20.487 –> 14:29.255
[SPEAKER_01]: You’re going to be, it’s going to be painful for many years because like you said, once you leave it on the shelf and you don’t buy it anymore, you rarely go back to buy it.

14:29.716 –> 14:41.647
[SPEAKER_01]: That’s a little, you know, like you price yourself out of the market that’s for new consumers and you’ve offended the long time people that were your core audience.

14:41.667 –> 14:47.693
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think a lot of brands of that, I think almost every single brand did that in the last five years since COVID.

14:47.740 –> 15:03.899
[SPEAKER_01]: absolutely absolutely every single I don’t I don’t know anyone that didn’t get and I’ll use this and any and any of my whiskey brands listening to this I’m sorry to use this work, but I don’t think I know many that didn’t get greedy and be like yeah We can tack an extra 30 points on there like nobody cares.

15:04.480 –> 15:12.229
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we’ll still get it and I blame the marketing department So whoever gave them that advice to do that they still took it

15:12.209 –> 15:22.776
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, but like it sucks because you guys now price everything outside of the market and that is going to be a challenge when you start to buy your market share back.

15:23.532 –> 15:33.221
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, because like you said it’s hard to roll back once you once you go there It’s not it’s rarely the thing where like you roll back the price that the consumers have already changed their mind about your product, right?

15:33.861 –> 15:35.643
[SPEAKER_00]: And so it’s really hard to get them to go back.

15:35.703 –> 15:37.645
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean the Yamazaki team’s a perfect example.

15:37.665 –> 15:40.247
[SPEAKER_00]: The first time ever I saw at Costco They’re sitting at Costco.

15:40.267 –> 15:44.791
[SPEAKER_00]: There was a case of them and it used to be that you know the case came in I would ever twice a year well in Rome.

15:45.131 –> 15:53.539
[SPEAKER_01]: I almost like broke a Costco locally because I was like I can’t where are they and then like we can’t find them

15:53.519 –> 15:56.443
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, they were what $189 back then.

15:56.643 –> 16:01.890
[SPEAKER_00]: It was crazy wondering they need to end up a little button and they were all trying to get over each other, step over each other, get the bottles.

16:01.990 –> 16:03.312
[SPEAKER_00]: And now the case is sitting there.

16:03.332 –> 16:05.875
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, oh my god, one guy, ball one.

16:06.356 –> 16:10.481
[SPEAKER_00]: And the case is sitting there and it’s like, I think there’s 700 bucks now at the Costco price.

16:10.521 –> 16:12.844
[SPEAKER_00]: Most of you are ever your Spatank, you’re at Costco.

16:12.824 –> 16:29.128
[SPEAKER_00]: it’s to your point like I wonder how that’s going to end because you know what even if they decrease the price like the consumers have already kind of changed their mind as that like moved on they moved on right they’re looking for your things now you know like like if anything unfortunately you’ve turned them off

16:29.108 –> 16:29.589
[SPEAKER_01]: Exactly.

16:29.629 –> 16:30.170
[SPEAKER_01]: Exactly.

16:30.190 –> 16:33.937
[SPEAKER_01]: So they’re kind of like, no, you’re like, you know, because here’s my other thing.

16:33.997 –> 16:40.950
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, you know, 10 years ago, if you could sell X X 18 year old, I won’t name any name.

16:41.131 –> 16:48.845
[SPEAKER_01]: If you could sell X 18 year old for 200 bucks, yeah, you got to figure that your cost of goods, bottle, liquid, et cetera.

16:49.026 –> 16:51.370
[SPEAKER_01]: I will say cost you 40 bucks, max.

16:52.227 –> 16:52.587
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.

16:53.248 –> 16:58.295
[SPEAKER_01]: I don’t think that in 10 years that cost went up very much.

16:59.016 –> 17:02.501
[SPEAKER_01]: I would say maybe it went up to 70 bucks.

17:02.521 –> 17:02.741
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

17:02.761 –> 17:06.907
[SPEAKER_01]: So how do you then go do the math and turn 200 into 600?

17:06.927 –> 17:07.047
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

17:07.748 –> 17:18.623
[SPEAKER_01]: Like you you purely went like, oh, we’re going to fucking take profits now or we’re going to invest so much in advertising and marketing that’s got to be tacked on to the pricing.

17:18.704 –> 17:28.097
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and I’m curious from your perspective, how much do you feel that is, is that because, you know, there was a time, right, where the retail is 200, but they’re like on auction, right?

17:28.157 –> 17:32.864
[SPEAKER_00]: They’re like, oh, people are willing to pay up to 5, 6, 700.

17:33.385 –> 17:37.911
[SPEAKER_00]: So I wonder how much of it was like, this is how much we can get for our ball.

17:37.891 –> 17:44.428
[SPEAKER_01]: as me when you had I mean you’d have to be an idiot working for the company not to see that and be like, huh, what are we doing?

17:44.468 –> 17:45.812
[SPEAKER_01]: Why are we leaving money on the table?

17:45.972 –> 17:46.454
[SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.

17:46.654 –> 17:47.095
[SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.

17:47.156 –> 17:53.031
[SPEAKER_00]: So some of them went and did the math, but they didn’t think that like, oh, you know, the big question is this sustainable?

17:53.247 –> 17:59.661
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, it’s interesting because I was, you know, years ago, I was at Buffalo Trace, which obviously is Pappies, B-Tax, all that stuff.

18:00.303 –> 18:09.062
[SPEAKER_01]: And I was sitting with Harlan and we were tasting the B-Tax, and I said to them, how come they’re still only SRP of $179?

18:09.920 –> 18:14.649
[SPEAKER_01]: when like they go for 800 to 1600 depending on the release.

18:14.930 –> 18:17.054
[SPEAKER_01]: I think I feel like they went up a little bit, right?

18:17.074 –> 18:18.617
[SPEAKER_01]: But they’re still, yeah, they were.

18:18.637 –> 18:22.143
[SPEAKER_01]: And he said, and he said to me, it’s because of the distribution.

18:22.724 –> 18:29.397
[SPEAKER_01]: He’s like, if we want these bottles and we want to sell out of the items, we can’t mess with the pricing.

18:29.377 –> 18:38.018
[SPEAKER_01]: too much because the distributor has to buy it and the liquor stores and everything else has to buy it and we still need to offer it.

18:38.038 –> 18:42.869
[SPEAKER_01]: The secondary is not in our control and I was like well why wouldn’t you just put it up like 200 bucks?

18:42.910 –> 18:45.175
[SPEAKER_01]: Make them like 379.

18:45.155 –> 18:50.661
[SPEAKER_01]: And he said to me, oh my god, you should talk to the Mark, because he got it, he’s like dude, like we’re leaving money on the table.

18:51.141 –> 18:55.245
[SPEAKER_01]: And out of all of them, yes, they mass produced liquid like nobody’s business.

18:55.586 –> 18:58.669
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, and now you can find anything anywhere anytime.

18:59.289 –> 19:00.450
[SPEAKER_01]: But you never find them.

19:00.871 –> 19:03.333
[SPEAKER_01]: You know that the SRP is still 179.

19:03.694 –> 19:07.297
[SPEAKER_01]: And then you have all these other people that the SRP needs to be low.

19:07.317 –> 19:09.600
[SPEAKER_01]: And they’re like, no, we’re gonna make it like 4x now.

19:09.900 –> 19:10.561
[SPEAKER_01]: Yep.

19:10.601 –> 19:12.883
[SPEAKER_01]: But that changes everything.

19:12.863 –> 19:14.164
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

19:14.184 –> 19:20.810
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, they’ve been, I feel like they’ve been the best about just keeping their core products and, and those are the most in-demand bourbons even still today, right?

19:20.870 –> 19:22.792
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, the, the old weather.

19:23.092 –> 19:24.354
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, it’s a guaranteed.

19:24.514 –> 19:30.439
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, but it’s funny, like, you know, I board a whole bunch of them last year, you know, out of Bevmo, but I had to do like all these packs.

19:30.459 –> 19:40.769
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I was like, cool, I give me like six balls of dom to get a, you know, a weller and give me, you know, five bottles of crystal, you know, to get a stack and something else.

19:40.889 –> 19:42.330
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean,

19:42.310 –> 19:47.280
[SPEAKER_01]: Yamazaki, 18, Mizunara, just to be able to buy two bottles of bourbon.

19:47.340 –> 19:51.648
[SPEAKER_01]: I was like, it’s very like thousands of dollars to merely buy $200 bourbons.

19:51.788 –> 19:54.894
[SPEAKER_01]: But I know that in the, you know, I know what those are worth.

19:54.914 –> 19:55.235
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

19:55.255 –> 19:56.517
[SPEAKER_01]: So for me, it’s like, okay, cool.

19:56.537 –> 20:01.146
[SPEAKER_01]: But I mean, you know, like, as much shit as they get given for,

20:01.126 –> 20:03.430
[SPEAKER_01]: what they do in the market and how hard it is to get.

20:03.530 –> 20:05.833
[SPEAKER_01]: It’s really like they didn’t do that.

20:05.954 –> 20:16.370
[SPEAKER_01]: The SRP is still low, whereas other guys are like, once again, just speaking facts, like how, you know, I own almost all the McCallan distilled your earths.

20:16.851 –> 20:18.573
[SPEAKER_01]: And those were like hot commodity.

20:18.693 –> 20:19.675
[SPEAKER_01]: They’re no longer.

20:20.431 –> 20:25.255
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I was actually in, I was traveling in London and they’re like, do you want the latest distillery earth?

20:25.275 –> 20:30.500
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, well, I was like, you can just buy those now because I remember when people were chasing them like crazy.

20:30.640 –> 20:33.743
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, in New York, they were like 30 grand at one point.

20:33.763 –> 20:34.744
[SPEAKER_00]: Crazy, yeah, I remember.

20:34.804 –> 20:35.925
[SPEAKER_01]: The first, that was the first one, right?

20:36.005 –> 20:37.406
[SPEAKER_01]: Was it New York or London?

20:37.426 –> 20:41.330
[SPEAKER_01]: London was the first one, the original red one and then what then again and then New York.

20:41.390 –> 20:46.735
[SPEAKER_01]: And I remember I was in New York and I saw this guy and he was like, it’s 30 grand.

20:46.795 –> 20:47.736
[SPEAKER_01]: He paid 30 grand.

20:47.756 –> 20:50.438
[SPEAKER_01]: He’s like, oh, I got them down in like 27 grand

20:50.418 –> 21:17.978
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

21:18.346 –> 21:28.008
[SPEAKER_00]: I’ll be honest with you, it was a little bit of a hype too, because I went back to my local shop, Cano lines, and which you might know, and I saw, okay, this, you know, I got back to the States.

21:28.028 –> 21:28.830
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought this was a good stuff.

21:28.850 –> 21:30.113
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to go pick up a bottle from my house.

21:30.193 –> 21:32.779
[SPEAKER_00]: I got the 12th, and it was like 99 bucks or something.

21:33.240 –> 21:35.325
[SPEAKER_00]: I bought it, and I came home, I drank it.

21:35.345 –> 21:36.347
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought that’s really good stuff.

21:36.407 –> 21:37.570
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to get it back up.

21:37.550 –> 21:44.859
[SPEAKER_00]: So keep in mind, I’m not like a huge whiskey, I don’t really know anything else about whiskey.

21:45.320 –> 21:49.165
[SPEAKER_00]: So I went back a week later and I said, I knew I knew I had another bottle of the 12th.

21:49.185 –> 21:50.487
[SPEAKER_00]: They said, no, it’s done.

21:50.627 –> 21:51.308
[SPEAKER_00]: It’s discontinued.

21:51.528 –> 21:52.369
[SPEAKER_00]: Like never coming back.

21:52.389 –> 21:52.990
[SPEAKER_00]: I said, what do you mean?

21:53.050 –> 21:54.351
[SPEAKER_00]: I just bought a bottle last.

21:54.892 –> 21:58.297
[SPEAKER_00]: I knew like, that was the last bottle that you’re probably ever going to be able to buy.

21:58.477 –> 22:06.527
[SPEAKER_00]: So, and then of course, like mentally in my head, I’m like, well,

22:06.625 –> 22:10.851
[SPEAKER_00]: This seems to be interesting so that I mean, just one thing kind of took over after the other then, right?

22:10.871 –> 22:14.957
[SPEAKER_00]: So then I’m like, I had a 12 and I had a 10th team on like, why need I need a 21 now, right?

22:15.658 –> 22:28.317
[SPEAKER_00]: And yeah, just coming and going over the years, it’s been it’s been interesting, but yeah, that’s just kind of I guess one thing led to another and then you get you didn’t on Instagram and you know, if I can speak candidly, you know, it’s a little bit of a peer pressure too, right?

22:28.337 –> 22:29.258
[SPEAKER_00]: You see everyone else?

22:29.238 –> 22:32.745
[SPEAKER_00]: you’re like, oh, wait, I need that one and we’re all kind of influenced things each other.

22:32.785 –> 22:38.196
[SPEAKER_01]: That could be like, like, I look at some of those, you know, like, for me, it’s like, all right, you know, like, he’d be key.

22:38.216 –> 22:40.140
[SPEAKER_01]: I got to try to grow as many of them as I can.

22:40.461 –> 22:44.850
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I got fucking not quite like a hundred plus of them, like, all different stuff.

22:44.870 –> 22:45.812
[SPEAKER_01]: But I was just like,

22:45.792 –> 22:52.004
[SPEAKER_01]: But people don’t realize, like, I’m not saying the money wasn’t crazy, but it really wasn’t crazy.

22:52.465 –> 22:58.196
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, the fact that I was able to buy that Hibiki 30 Kacha from Nareta Airport for like $2,200.

22:58.216 –> 23:00.260
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it’s crazy.

23:00.280 –> 23:04.087
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, like, like that Yama 25, the Haka shoes.

23:04.368 –> 23:07.193
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, like those were all under 2500 bucks.

23:07.240 –> 23:08.602
[SPEAKER_00]: Under toy and it’s funny.

23:08.902 –> 23:09.863
[SPEAKER_00]: They’re 10 grand now.

23:10.064 –> 23:11.766
[SPEAKER_00]: They just they had one of them in stock.

23:11.786 –> 23:13.828
[SPEAKER_00]: Now Was that nori now?

23:13.908 –> 23:16.712
[SPEAKER_01]: Are they doing it in the in the paper and all the stuff that I have?

23:17.493 –> 23:18.474
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah, yeah, the same worry.

23:18.494 –> 23:19.115
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it’s crazy.

23:19.175 –> 23:20.817
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, the Scotchio.

23:20.837 –> 23:27.666
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that’s the retail the retail price now is is tempel can $1000 yeah, and I saw I told her because she was like you want one.

23:27.686 –> 23:31.511
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like well I was like are you I actually bought a few when they were two grand.

23:31.551 –> 23:32.472
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah

23:33.582 –> 23:36.269
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it’s crazy, man, but that’s just a case and point, right?

23:36.309 –> 23:36.690
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, what?

23:36.890 –> 23:38.735
[SPEAKER_00]: Nothing justifies the 5x increase.

23:39.056 –> 23:41.461
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, your production costs definitely didn’t go up some hold.

23:41.482 –> 23:44.810
[SPEAKER_01]: The glass, the costume, the glass, I mean, it’s all got to do with marketing.

23:44.850 –> 23:47.316
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, like, I’ve got to imagine, like, that’s where the money is.

23:47.456 –> 23:49.802
[SPEAKER_01]: So it just doesn’t make sense otherwise.

23:49.782 –> 24:01.745
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and those who be keep bottles, I mean, they’ve always been, you know, I went down the road of collecting the painted ones for a while and Yeah, eventually I realized I’m just never gonna drink these and I’m pretty too much work to collect them all spike.

24:02.126 –> 24:10.902
[SPEAKER_00]: I kind of stopped, but they are I mean, they make it really Enticing even though great example is that the the ones we get in America, you know, the the real sui and and those ones.

24:11.043 –> 24:11.824
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, yeah

24:11.804 –> 24:20.935
[SPEAKER_00]: They really get people hyped up, even known whiskey people will kind of get getting a little bit into the trying to get them at Costco and stuff when they come out every few years that the $100 US version.

24:21.555 –> 24:22.576
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

24:22.596 –> 24:24.879
[SPEAKER_01]: No, I mean, look at the 100 year anniversary.

24:25.300 –> 24:31.687
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I’m the only idiot that bought the 21 year old for the full ticket price from Costco for five grand.

24:31.927 –> 24:34.971
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, the shit was on auction the next day for $3,500 on like, way, what?

24:36.493 –> 24:36.753
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

24:36.773 –> 24:39.516
[SPEAKER_00]: I think Errol was confused about the MSRP of that one.

24:39.496 –> 24:48.107
[SPEAKER_01]: But it was interesting because when I spent time with Santori like they told me what was in there I’m like, can you put that out publicly in the ads in a regular it’s not regular juice?

24:48.187 –> 24:50.070
[SPEAKER_01]: I don’t know I’m based it gas 21 year old.

24:50.130 –> 24:59.582
[SPEAKER_01]: I go like you know what he knows that like I look like I bought basic at 21 year old and like I just paid like 10x for no reason You know like a suck yo that I feel good.

25:00.243 –> 25:04.288
[SPEAKER_01]: I feel okay because I know what the liquid is but fuck it would help

25:04.268 –> 25:09.376
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I actually, so tomorrow we’re hosting an event and what we’re doing I have a big 40 tasting.

25:10.077 –> 25:13.322
[SPEAKER_00]: I know you know you’re one of the few people in the world who have already tried it.

25:13.843 –> 25:19.551
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, we’re creating a couple of a couple of die hard kind of an enthusiast here and we’re going to be cracking it and drinking it.

25:19.611 –> 25:23.357
[SPEAKER_00]: So you get it through a restaurant and you want it to pay enough.

25:23.337 –> 25:25.402
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I got it from Centauri in Japan.

25:25.422 –> 25:34.203
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like kind of on the fence, but the price was just so good that it was like way cheaper than the US MSRP Well, yeah, everything so I was like I got I’m never gonna get off with this again.

25:34.223 –> 25:41.481
[SPEAKER_00]: I got to do it So yeah, I bought it and we’re just kind of doing like a little group share, so it should be fun, but yeah, I’m curious you know the

25:41.461 –> 26:00.634
[SPEAKER_00]: in my head like I’m not sitting there thinking always this worth them like I know it’s not worth the price right that the ticket price all right but i’m kind of not lip at ruin the experience of like i’m sure it’s still a really special with it’s honestly like the when i did the tasting he did all the components of it yeah yeah right it’s insane what’s in there

26:00.614 –> 26:30.402
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, okay, like like like each piece of it is mind-blowing and together it’s head explosion like the fact that you can get a grain over 40 years old like a grain whiskey like that one like when you just poured that component of it I was like holy shit that was the cheetah the cheetah aspect yeah yeah yeah yeah and I was just like huh like this is crazy like obviously I expect the sherry and I expect them is like oh

26:30.382 –> 26:57.452
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it’s a sleep like that and it’s interesting because when I was I forget where I was I was at one of the Centauri offices and we and and I was tasting some of the vintage Cheetah stuff and some of the Sherry Cheetah stuff and I’m like what the hell Yeah, there’s a just do everything better and no disrespect again to anyone like the story just does it better than anybody else out there

26:57.550 –> 26:58.291
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, agreed.

26:58.531 –> 26:58.752
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

26:58.772 –> 27:06.702
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, the story has always been the number one for me, and yeah, even still, some of those older juices, those obscure bottles, man, it’s like 90s.

27:06.762 –> 27:10.827
[SPEAKER_00]: I think I had an owners cast the other day, and it was from the 90s, and I was like, I do.

27:10.928 –> 27:22.663
[SPEAKER_00]: This was just like peak, you know, like so, so good, and the person who owned the cast told me that the bottles at that time cost $8,000, so like $60 per bottle for the, from the y’all.

27:22.643 –> 27:31.097
[SPEAKER_01]: I think I think of my eldest cast, the cheapest one I paid was like $550 in the most expensive like $1200.

27:31.678 –> 27:35.985
[SPEAKER_01]: And every now and again, I have like a bug up my ass that I should go buy more.

27:36.365 –> 27:36.846
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, damn.

27:37.347 –> 27:40.652
[SPEAKER_01]: It’s sad to say I’m just not really that excited to buy anything right now.

27:40.632 –> 27:41.473
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

27:41.493 –> 27:44.898
[SPEAKER_01]: I’m more excited to go drink stuff that I own that I’m never going to open.

27:45.639 –> 27:53.729
[SPEAKER_01]: Then I am to buy new stuff unless I’m really like, oh shit, I can guarantee that this is going to be an experience financially later on.

27:54.210 –> 27:54.751
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

27:54.771 –> 27:55.391
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

27:55.411 –> 27:56.152
[SPEAKER_00]: No, I’m the same way.

27:56.313 –> 28:04.864
[SPEAKER_00]: I’m like, if I’m, you know, if I know it’s like a 94 pointer and I’m going to drink it and enjoy it or it’s like something special or, you know, there’s still a few where you’re like, oh, I collect this one.

28:04.924 –> 28:06.847
[SPEAKER_00]: I was flying on the A&A and they had the Cheechi Boo.

28:06.867 –> 28:08.749
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, I got to get these, you know, so

28:08.729 –> 28:18.860
[SPEAKER_01]: Listen, I mean, Cheechibu, I’ve probably got another 75 bottles, because Cheechibu, to me, and this is going to be a really weird ass statement, Cheechibu to me are like Burbran single casks.

28:19.641 –> 28:22.183
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I ABV, everyone’s unique.

28:22.604 –> 28:32.715
[SPEAKER_01]: Yep, they’re not like Scotch’s, they’re not like Centauri, like to me, like they drink like really good, independent, bottled Burbran vindages.

28:33.436 –> 28:33.876
[SPEAKER_00]: Yep.

28:34.109 –> 28:43.179
[SPEAKER_01]: And they’re so collectible with the, you know, the labels and the series and they’re all, you know, are they any more like, I don’t even know, like I don’t see them transacting for way more than what people paid for them.

28:43.219 –> 28:46.102
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, like they were, there was like a brief little moment.

28:46.122 –> 28:52.650
[SPEAKER_01]: Like I remember like seven years ago, I’m going to grab every black box and I forget the guy.

28:52.670 –> 29:02.901
[SPEAKER_01]: The guy who’s based down here in LA that has like a million of them, he’s like,

29:02.881 –> 29:03.462
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

29:03.482 –> 29:07.368
[SPEAKER_01]: He’s like, that’s not even going to be achievable by any stretch of your imagination.

29:07.388 –> 29:08.430
[SPEAKER_01]: And they’re like, you know what?

29:08.450 –> 29:09.451
[SPEAKER_01]: You just talked in the out of it.

29:09.671 –> 29:15.160
[SPEAKER_01]: And then I even like, so I didn’t buy and then like a year later, I’m like, motherfucker, you just wanted to keep me out of buying.

29:16.061 –> 29:19.527
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, and then when I saw him, I saw him at the Hibiki 40.

29:19.907 –> 29:22.731
[SPEAKER_01]: He didn’t get to taste the 40, but he came out afterwards.

29:22.772 –> 29:23.913
[SPEAKER_01]: And he’s like, what did you just do?

29:23.933 –> 29:24.795
[SPEAKER_01]: Or do you just drink the 40?

29:24.855 –> 29:26.998
[SPEAKER_01]: He’s like, I hate you.

29:26.978 –> 29:35.166
[SPEAKER_01]: But he really, I mean, talk about like, I mean, yeah, I think he is the largest single holder of Chichibu in the world.

29:35.652 –> 29:56.005
[SPEAKER_00]: I think so and you know Patrick’s a good friend of mine and and again from the early Instagram day I think he was like the first whiskey account because you know him and you I feel like we’re the OG’s right his account is a cast on a Instagram and and so you and him I feel like have been around since the beginning so we got to chatting real early And yeah, he was always the cheat you boo guy and to your point.

29:56.045 –> 30:02.976
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, there was a time again Where the you know the single casts were like they’re going for a lot of money way too much really

30:02.956 –> 30:19.806
[SPEAKER_01]: You know that comment way too much like the price of people the price at a bottle gets is what someone’s willing to pay for it Yeah, you’re right Some people were paying it like Willie nilly and I was like, you know all those ghost cast and stuff I’m like this isn’t insane whiskey I’m not doubting that any minute and I know Pat got a lot of really good deals.

30:20.227 –> 30:21.589
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, you know, and I was just like

30:21.569 –> 30:25.600
[SPEAKER_01]: Man, because that was like, wow, you buy something for like 150, but it’s worth a thousand.

30:25.620 –> 30:26.703
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, I love that idea.

30:26.784 –> 30:27.826
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, it’s a great idea.

30:28.248 –> 30:32.479
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, and now that thousand is only down to 600, which is still 4x.

30:32.499 –> 30:33.201
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, who cares?

30:33.603 –> 30:34.144
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

30:34.259 –> 30:34.559
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

30:35.340 –> 30:40.345
[SPEAKER_00]: But the problem is, you know, it’s, it’s, there’s so many of them, right?

30:40.465 –> 30:46.871
[SPEAKER_00]: Like there’s like a new one every week and it’s, it’s just so much effort and like, you know, even Patrick, I can tell you.

30:46.891 –> 30:52.937
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I mean, you know, I love Patrick, but he, he had to go to some crazy depths to get some of these bottles, right?

30:53.017 –> 30:56.700
[SPEAKER_00]: And it’s like, once you’re in it, like, I’m sure you know, like you got four out of five of the collection.

30:57.001 –> 30:58.782
[SPEAKER_00]: And you need that last one, right?

30:58.942 –> 31:02.646
[SPEAKER_00]: But like, only one guy and like New Zealand as it,

31:02.626 –> 31:09.528
[SPEAKER_00]: you’ve got to go convince him to trade it to you or something so you know it can get pretty deep and intense sometimes.

31:10.030 –> 31:13.581
[SPEAKER_00]: Well the the other problem is also get.

31:13.747 –> 31:21.377
[SPEAKER_01]: At the time when you go to sell these things, whenever that is in your life, you’re dealing with a very small fish pond of buyers.

31:21.658 –> 31:25.603
[SPEAKER_01]: You want to go sell a Pappy 23, you can sell that in like seconds.

31:26.444 –> 31:30.930
[SPEAKER_01]: You want to go sell a Hibiki 21, it’s going to take you like maybe 10 minutes.

31:31.311 –> 31:35.957
[SPEAKER_01]: You want to go sell a Chichibu’s going to take you like days.

31:35.937 –> 32:00.342
[SPEAKER_01]: find the guy like it’s right and that that was the other thing like when I was really you know figuring out my collection and what I wanted to do I was really trying to just make sure that I had stuff that no matter what I could go figure out how to do get like it could get rid if I needed to get rid of it it was literally liquid like there were people it would not only wasn’t liquid could whiskey but like it was liquid cash like yeah it would like people would just buy this in a heartbeat

32:00.322 –> 32:01.624
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and the two point.

32:01.644 –> 32:12.184
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, there’s there’s a few die-hardchitchie-boot-click, but they’re all they’re scattered all over Asia and, you know, and you’re up and, you know, it’s just not like what like you said the demand is not there for like a hard-hardcore.

32:12.665 –> 32:23.545
[SPEAKER_01]: But then, but then like I look at like you got a Hong Kong whiskey festival and the Asian festival obviously I’ve only been to that one, but like people can go and open their bottle and pour it and charge by the poor.

32:23.525 –> 32:28.574
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I’m like shit, if we could do it in America and like you meet Patrick roll up, we each have a table.

32:28.594 –> 32:32.099
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I would gladly like deplete my collection in a heartbeat.

32:32.660 –> 32:33.422
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, the right price.

32:34.103 –> 32:45.061
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that’s one of the worst things is the liquor laws are so strict and you know, thank God we have unicorn now because for a while, if there wasn’t even a way to sell your bottles really, you had to take him across the pond or whatever.

32:45.322 –> 32:45.482
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

32:45.462 –> 32:58.824
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, with a secondary group, so, you know, the fact that we even bought that, I mean, it’s a step in the right direction, but yeah, the opening and the liquor laws, it’s just way more lacks in Asia, really everywhere, I feel like in the world, we have the strictest when it comes to liquor law.

32:58.844 –> 33:07.458
[SPEAKER_01]: Which I mean, like, we have the craziest like three tier system, but with strict, because you can go to a liquor show and sell bottles by the poor, but you can give them away.

33:07.498 –> 33:10.943
[SPEAKER_01]: And I’m like, why don’t we just charge everyone $5,000 to get in?

33:11.524 –> 33:11.925
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

33:11.905 –> 33:13.088
[SPEAKER_01]: And then they can drink.

33:13.610 –> 33:17.400
[SPEAKER_01]: Hey, you know what you get you you for $5,000 you get 10 pours.

33:17.661 –> 33:18.644
[SPEAKER_01]: That’s your ticket price.

33:19.005 –> 33:22.354
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we don’t charge you anything at the table, but every pour is 500 bucks.

33:23.482 –> 33:26.967
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, hey, we should, we should, we should set it up, it’s a bad idea.

33:27.047 –> 33:31.213
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, I’ll put it that bad idea.

33:31.233 –> 33:35.739
[SPEAKER_01]: You’re like, hey, you know what, like, every ticket’s five grand and you can buy multiple tickets.

33:36.020 –> 33:44.612
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and you’re only going to be drinking premium whiskey and, and, and when you buy that ticket, they give you a little voucher that says good for 10 pours.

33:44.795 –> 33:45.856
[SPEAKER_01]: Yep, yep.

33:46.136 –> 33:47.418
[SPEAKER_01]: No, I telling you, this is something crazy.

33:47.438 –> 33:48.900
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, this is the whole game has changed.

33:48.940 –> 34:03.676
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, the fact that we still push hard on Instagram and still are enthusiastic, I think the best part for me is watching, it’s kind of stupid, six statement is today, but like how many fucking fake asses just have faded away?

34:04.317 –> 34:06.199
[SPEAKER_01]: Who were just fake in the phone can pretending?

34:06.239 –> 34:09.963
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, like, and I’m like, oh, I good, you didn’t actually step out.

34:09.983 –> 34:13.587
[SPEAKER_01]: I, you know, I would have these people, oh, I’m a whiskey investor, what are you on?

34:13.567 –> 34:14.168
[SPEAKER_01]: What are you on?

34:14.588 –> 34:18.414
[SPEAKER_01]: You’re writing articles for Forbes magazine about whiskey investing in your own three bottles.

34:19.155 –> 34:20.898
[SPEAKER_01]: You’re like, oh, I know everything about whiskey.

34:20.918 –> 34:21.559
[SPEAKER_01]: What do you have?

34:21.619 –> 34:22.420
[SPEAKER_01]: What if you drank?

34:23.101 –> 34:24.783
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I think.

34:24.803 –> 34:25.184
[SPEAKER_01]: OK, cool.

34:25.204 –> 34:28.649
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, you’re basically as fake as shit and you’re Instagram profile.

34:28.669 –> 34:31.373
[SPEAKER_01]: And I’m like, now I feel like those are all gone.

34:31.353 –> 34:32.035
[SPEAKER_00]: They’re all gone.

34:32.075 –> 34:41.741
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and I said, there’s a quote in our book from a bartender who kind of predicted it that, you know, though, you know, I feel like everyone’s just going to disappear when the hype goes away and the real ones are going to be left.

34:41.761 –> 34:43.706
[SPEAKER_00]: And I feel like that’s where we’re kind of at that now, right?

34:43.726 –> 34:48.298
[SPEAKER_00]: The people that are still posting and it was like, dude, we just we just love whiskey.

34:48.278 –> 34:51.564
[SPEAKER_01]: We’re, I, I, I, I, I, I, I geek out on that stuff, man.

34:51.584 –> 34:54.890
[SPEAKER_01]: All like Japanese whiskey changed my life changed my palate.

34:55.190 –> 34:55.711
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

34:55.731 –> 35:00.279
[SPEAKER_01]: So for me, it’s like, I had never, I’d never tasted a, a big word here.

35:00.420 –> 35:01.141
[SPEAKER_01]: Perfection.

35:01.562 –> 35:01.742
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

35:01.762 –> 35:04.026
[SPEAKER_01]: Like I tasted when I, when I drink Centauri.

35:04.367 –> 35:05.629
[SPEAKER_01]: Just never had it.

35:05.609 –> 35:07.693
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I drank a lot of great stuff and don’t get me wrong.

35:07.733 –> 35:21.576
[SPEAKER_01]: I drank a lot of stuff that pretty close, you know, if we’re going to go on your 94 point, you know, like I drank a lot of stuff in the night, then we’re like, he there were 99s now since where he was 99 everything else was 94.

35:21.556 –> 35:22.257
[SPEAKER_02]: Yep, yep.

35:22.477 –> 35:23.098
[SPEAKER_01]: Which is great.

35:23.498 –> 35:25.841
[SPEAKER_01]: He’s looking, I mean, whiskey, yeah.

35:26.202 –> 35:32.389
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh yeah, and to your point too, I also think that, you know, for me, one of the things that’s been enriching is just the social aspect of it.

35:32.409 –> 35:45.404
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, just meeting people like yourself, you know, well bartenders all over in Japan that have like really kind of become my friends and also just getting other people into whiskey, you know, has really been enriching for me as part of the experience as well.

35:45.425 –> 35:50.871
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I feel like we took the torch of education that nobody gave to us, but we ran with it.

35:50.969 –> 35:51.371
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, yeah.

35:51.954 –> 35:54.889
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, yeah, we don’t want to know much about career getting to this shit, right?

35:54.910 –> 35:57.503
[SPEAKER_00]: No one knew what they were doing or what they were falling.

35:58.597 –> 36:01.321
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I want to global whiskey to be global whiskey.

36:01.341 –> 36:07.470
[SPEAKER_01]: I wanted Rolex whiskey to be a global education system where people anywhere in the world be like, oh, shit, what’s that?

36:07.490 –> 36:08.311
[SPEAKER_01]: I’ve never heard of that.

36:08.331 –> 36:09.552
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh my God, I’d love to try that.

36:10.053 –> 36:12.236
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, shit, I’ve never heard of this company before.

36:12.557 –> 36:12.997
[SPEAKER_01]: That’s great.

36:13.057 –> 36:14.960
[SPEAKER_01]: With no money, I don’t take money from anybody.

36:15.281 –> 36:22.371
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, like for me, it was always like, wow, I could actually tell people so when they went and had a drinking experience, it was gonna be good.

36:22.851 –> 36:23.372
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

36:23.352 –> 36:29.238
[SPEAKER_00]: Exactly and I’m sure you have the same issue where you know you get your friends know you’re into Japanese whiskey and they go to Costco.

36:29.619 –> 36:37.107
[SPEAKER_00]: They take a photo of all the bottles and they’re like which one of these should I buy right and you got to tell them you got to tell them don’t buy any of those myths.

36:37.167 –> 36:47.959
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean I I remember being in Costco and this kid was about to buy one of those like fake Japanese 18 year olds that was in a black box with gold writing

36:47.939 –> 36:53.752
[SPEAKER_01]: And he was like standing in the end like two, I’m like, yeah, he had like two of them and his basket and I’m like, do you know what that is?

36:54.132 –> 36:55.515
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, my friend said this is really good.

36:55.535 –> 36:56.157
[SPEAKER_01]: I’m like, what?

36:56.518 –> 36:56.858
[SPEAKER_01]: Really?

36:57.700 –> 37:02.871
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, I just know that’s basically like the basically like that’s like water down piss water.

37:03.232 –> 37:03.653
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

37:03.633 –> 37:04.475
[SPEAKER_01]: And he’s like, What?

37:04.615 –> 37:05.977
[SPEAKER_01]: I’m like, That is not good whiskey.

37:05.997 –> 37:06.719
[SPEAKER_01]: Do not buy that.

37:06.739 –> 37:07.961
[SPEAKER_01]: That’s not what you think it is.

37:07.981 –> 37:11.728
[SPEAKER_01]: They made it look like what you think it should be, but it’s not what it is.

37:12.329 –> 37:14.293
[SPEAKER_01]: And he’s like, Oh my god, I’m so glad I saw you.

37:14.653 –> 37:19.262
[SPEAKER_01]: I was about to spend $180 on the per bottle and like, yeah, now do not buy these.

37:19.242 –> 37:32.082
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, yeah, you did a good deed that day, but also like, you know, once again, Costco was like, hey, people love Japanese whiskey if you just have Japanese writing on it, we’re buying it, these people don’t know what the fuck they’re doing.

37:32.442 –> 37:41.436
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah, some of that was was to do with like, Japanese laws as well or like way more loose, they’re they’re tightening that up a little bit now where there’s actually like a standard.

37:42.007 –> 37:43.029
[SPEAKER_00]: But it was out of control, man.

37:43.089 –> 37:47.278
[SPEAKER_00]: It was at the point where they were just, I’m sure you know that they were just bottling, scotch in Japan.

37:47.318 –> 37:52.549
[SPEAKER_00]: And the fact that it was bottled in Japan and used to be that if it was bottled in Japan, it could be called Japanese whiskey.

37:52.569 –> 37:53.751
[SPEAKER_00]: It didn’t matter what you were bottling.

37:54.212 –> 37:58.200
[SPEAKER_00]: So they would import all these funky crap spirits that were bottled in Japan.

37:58.240 –> 38:01.467
[SPEAKER_00]: They would put a Japanese conge on it and then they’d ship it to America.

38:02.240 –> 38:06.752
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and then like, you suckers will buy a Costco take 27 million trowelets of it.

38:06.952 –> 38:07.333
[SPEAKER_01]: Exactly.

38:07.374 –> 38:09.299
[SPEAKER_01]: Just goes to the place that they’re like, they’ll buy anything, right?

38:09.319 –> 38:18.122
[SPEAKER_01]: They’ll be like, well, I mean, I was somewhere like two years ago and, you know, I don’t know why people want to do this, but like, I’m not the guy you want to try to one up.

38:18.102 –> 38:34.921
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, oh yeah, I know definitely don’t fucking like like don’t do that like it’s embarrassing for you So anyway, like I’m meet this guy and I’m and he’s like, oh, yeah, you know boom boom boom And oh, yeah, I know I learn a lot about Japanese whiskey and I’m like cool like I don’t want talking anything I’m just like I didn’t even like want the conversation.

38:35.261 –> 38:46.253
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you’re like me like right Well, I don’t I’m like I don’t tell people anymore I don’t find that I want no part of it like hey and like you live you do you man I want no part of it and he’s like you got to try this

38:46.992 –> 38:51.438
[SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, ugh, I saw the bottle and I was like, ugh.

38:51.458 –> 38:53.862
[SPEAKER_01]: But I was like, I wouldn’t look at it say the name.

38:53.882 –> 38:54.523
[SPEAKER_01]: I don’t remember.

38:54.563 –> 38:58.849
[SPEAKER_01]: Something like hot, something like Tahaka or some shit like that.

38:58.869 –> 39:04.337
[SPEAKER_01]: Come on, I was just like, and then so I was smoking a cigar.

39:04.457 –> 39:08.022
[SPEAKER_01]: I had like one sip and he poured a big pour and then I just like left it.

39:08.170 –> 39:10.292
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, he’s like, oh, you’re not going to finish it.

39:10.312 –> 39:13.495
[SPEAKER_01]: I was like, yeah, I’m not drinking a lot lately, so yeah.

39:13.515 –> 39:14.416
[SPEAKER_01]: They he’s like, oh, okay.

39:14.436 –> 39:18.420
[SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, this poor guy paid $400 for this bottle of shit.

39:19.121 –> 39:22.224
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, and he’s like, literally trying to tell me, like, this is good stuff.

39:22.244 –> 39:24.907
[SPEAKER_01]: And I’m like, hey, and they’re doing it by price.

39:25.147 –> 39:27.069
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, they’re like, oh, 400 mean that’s good.

39:27.109 –> 39:29.552
[SPEAKER_01]: And I’m like, no, 400 means you’re stupid.

39:30.292 –> 39:31.153
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah.

39:31.173 –> 39:34.937
[SPEAKER_00]: And you know, if there’s one thing that I’ve learned, like the price and the quality, there’s no correlation.

39:36.655 –> 39:52.337
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, they’re seeing that, and that’s a coolest thing like when you’re in Asia and you realize wait There really is no correlation like they there’s nothing here connecting it because like I remember like when I was in London last year I got a papi 23 was 40 quid.

39:52.738 –> 40:02.612
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah I’m almost that’s what the guy took is 179 divided it by seven and he was like that’s what we’re charging for poor We’re gonna get 20 pores out of the bottle

40:03.065 –> 40:03.906
[SPEAKER_00]: love it, I love it.

40:04.006 –> 40:05.909
[SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, oh, okay, that’s what this were.

40:05.929 –> 40:12.880
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, like when I’m now at Hong Kong Whiskey Fest, like drinking these crazy whiskey and I’m like, these are like 60, 70 bucks a pour.

40:13.280 –> 40:13.440
[SPEAKER_01]: Yep.

40:14.121 –> 40:15.503
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you know, like this is wild.

40:15.744 –> 40:17.306
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, we crushed 40 minutes.

40:17.366 –> 40:18.748
[SPEAKER_01]: I got to ask you one big question.

40:18.768 –> 40:20.010
[SPEAKER_01]: That was way too quick.

40:20.030 –> 40:20.210
[SPEAKER_01]: Sure.

40:21.392 –> 40:23.215
[SPEAKER_01]: You’ve had some pretty crazy experiences.

40:23.696 –> 40:27.541
[SPEAKER_01]: Are there any like pinch me moments where you’re like, holy shit, I can’t believe I’m doing this.

40:27.601 –> 40:30.726
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, the books got to be a pretty big one, but I’ll let you tell me.

40:30.757 –> 40:32.340
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, the book was a cool one for sure.

40:32.360 –> 40:44.527
[SPEAKER_00]: When we were making the book, we were actually in Cheechibu shooting, you know, these bars and there was this one bar that we had kind of taken over and it’s it’s a pretty well known fact that each hero has been known to kind of hang out at the local bars in Cheechibu.

40:44.567 –> 40:49.197
[SPEAKER_00]: So he actually walked into this bar to have a drink and we were like shooting, right?

40:49.337 –> 40:49.778
[SPEAKER_00]: And, uh, I

40:49.758 –> 40:52.684
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, oh my god, there’s each hero, like, I gotta go talk to him.

40:52.724 –> 40:56.172
[SPEAKER_00]: I gotta tell him what we’re doing and, you know, I’m basically having like a fanboy moment.

40:56.593 –> 41:04.830
[SPEAKER_00]: I’m so I’m trying to gather myself, I’m like, listen, like, you know what, wiping the sweat off my face and he comes up to us and he goes, hey, he goes, I heard you’re making a book about Japanese whiskey.

41:04.810 –> 41:08.376
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, oh my god, like, this guy knows who we are and what we’re doing.

41:08.557 –> 41:13.024
[SPEAKER_00]: And I guess one of the previous bars that we had been to had like told him about us, you know, it’s kind of a small town.

41:13.485 –> 41:17.292
[SPEAKER_00]: So we’re definitely quickly, and the photographer had no clue who this guy was.

41:17.452 –> 41:20.016
[SPEAKER_00]: You didn’t know he was, you know, legend of the Japanese whiskey game.

41:20.036 –> 41:24.945
[SPEAKER_00]: So he goes, you know, he says, hey, you want your photo taken, you know, we’ll do it for 20 bucks.

41:25.499 –> 41:31.515
[SPEAKER_00]: He says that to each year, and it was one of those moments where I was just, you know, it was just hilarious.

41:31.535 –> 41:32.358
[SPEAKER_00]: We were laughing about it.

41:32.378 –> 41:36.389
[SPEAKER_00]: The fact that my friend didn’t know who he was and then he approached us about the book.

41:36.489 –> 41:37.973
[SPEAKER_00]: It was just awesome.

41:38.358 –> 41:53.275
[SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, there’s been a few, and then, you know, there’s also been a couple of of tastings, you know, where we go to go to these, like exactly where you’re saying before, you just go and taste all these premium whiskeys with friends, and, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s really memorable, but I feel like most of them, it’s just about, it’s been about the people, right?

41:53.415 –> 41:55.199
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, you’re a social guy too.

41:55.260 –> 41:56.162
[SPEAKER_00]: I’m a social guy.

41:56.182 –> 41:56.282
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

41:56.262 –> 42:09.865
[SPEAKER_00]: I feed off that energy so like most of those memorable events for me are just you know going to the whiskey fast and you know you just talked to people and meeting people and you know bonding over this like really kind of obscure hobby You know that’s that’s been the best part for me.

42:10.025 –> 42:14.693
[SPEAKER_00]: I think but yeah in terms of pitching me moments I think it was you know the each-year-old one comes to mind for sure

42:14.808 –> 42:24.061
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, it was crazy because like Paris festival two years ago, I went to his seminar and it was like, wow, like we were drinking like just such fun stuff.

42:24.261 –> 42:29.008
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, he had all these like handwritten bottles that we were drinking, you know, for the master class.

42:29.609 –> 42:37.660
[SPEAKER_01]: And then like three hours later, I did one with Nika and then again, he, you know, their guy was there and he also had like all these handwritten bottles and I’m like,

42:37.640 –> 42:58.180
[SPEAKER_01]: holy shit like can i just come drink hand ridden bottles with you guys like i don’t want anything that’s core i don’t want any bullshit like i want stuff that’s like literally ridden on a pan on a sticker yeah it’s like they just dumped it from the distillery before getting on the floor it’s like hey well you know we haven’t got there yet like you know like when i got at least centauria offices they have these blending rooms yeah and there’s just like all kinds of shit

42:58.160 –> 43:09.859
[SPEAKER_01]: like everywhere, like all the components, like when I was with Raff and London, like we just did a song, we did the the new Mizunaras, the 25 and the 18 year old, we did all the components.

43:10.200 –> 43:11.001
[SPEAKER_01]: Yep.

43:11.021 –> 43:14.667
[SPEAKER_01]: And then I’m like, hey, do you have any like just straight cherry?

43:14.647 –> 43:24.201
[SPEAKER_01]: And he like pulled out I shit you not like a gallon milk jar milk thing full of sherry and he’s like, oh, yeah, this is how it comes to us like like this, you know, for I said taste off it.

43:24.261 –> 43:25.363
[SPEAKER_01]: I’m like, and we just said anything.

43:25.383 –> 43:26.324
[SPEAKER_01]: I’m like, whoa.

43:26.785 –> 43:27.326
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh my god.

43:27.386 –> 43:31.592
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that’s like hawkishew straight sherry.

43:31.792 –> 43:32.774
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, that was the fireman.

43:32.814 –> 43:33.815
[SPEAKER_00]: That was the best one for me.

43:33.835 –> 43:34.877
[SPEAKER_00]: It was the always.

43:35.117 –> 43:48.919
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, people always go ask like in this crazy like that 2014 bottle that I finished and it’s like, I want to still cry about because like I’m next line to I would buy another one of those in a second man though that was that was such a good whiskey.

43:48.939 –> 43:54.087
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, the the Sherry and the hockey shoe malt just worked so well together.

43:54.320 –> 44:00.570
[SPEAKER_01]: And honestly, I felt that the 100 year anniversary 18 was pretty darn good, too, from the Hakushu.

44:01.271 –> 44:07.500
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it was a little bit of extra pee to it, but yeah, which still was not a super pee to you, right?

44:07.581 –> 44:11.106
[SPEAKER_01]: And it’s, and it’s wild just watching how that price wise just shit the bed.

44:11.126 –> 44:15.653
[SPEAKER_01]: It went from 2,000 to 1,200 to like, what are they getting in our auction now, like 600 goes?

44:15.633 –> 44:16.735
[SPEAKER_00]: It started at like four.

44:16.876 –> 44:18.820
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean it was even worse and now it’s a little retail.

44:18.880 –> 44:21.566
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean it’s crazy Yeah, the hot tissue and even the Yamazaki.

44:21.586 –> 44:28.542
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like that was like the case study of like Japanese whiskey hitting critical man We go wrong.

44:28.923 –> 44:30.807
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, oh yeah wrong exactly

44:30.787 –> 44:33.731
[SPEAKER_00]: I just didn’t think anybody knew how much they actually pumped out, right?

44:33.851 –> 44:35.733
[SPEAKER_00]: Everyone thought it was a limited release when it came out.

44:36.033 –> 44:38.717
[SPEAKER_00]: This is my chance if I don’t buy it like I’m missing the boat.

44:38.737 –> 44:42.661
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I’m sure you remember the 2017 where it was a thousand bottles, right?

44:42.762 –> 44:44.464
[SPEAKER_00]: And we knew that it was a thousand bottles.

44:44.524 –> 44:47.067
[SPEAKER_00]: So if you saw it and like you were buying it, right?

44:47.087 –> 44:52.033
[SPEAKER_01]: Because you were like, I mean, I bought two of them and I paid a thousand bucks and I paid 800.

44:52.053 –> 44:55.377
[SPEAKER_01]: What does SRP like, 495 back then?

44:55.357 –> 45:14.867
[SPEAKER_01]: As their views a thousand actually I think yeah all gay up this thousand and I and I’m Russell also a little bit I think a little below uh thousand yeah I got one of Cots going to got the other one and I was like I remember like the other one was some this dude flew into town from San Diego and he’s like and I had oh my god what’s the bourbon that comes in the yellow sleeves?

45:14.847 –> 45:19.732
[SPEAKER_01]: Anyway, I had two of these bourbons and he’s like, I’m flying in, I’m playing poory pines golf.

45:20.132 –> 45:27.460
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and I’ll trade you those two for the, for the 18-miz 2017, and I met him at Tori Pines.

45:27.780 –> 45:30.924
[SPEAKER_01]: I remember taking like my daughter with me and she was like three at the time.

45:31.444 –> 45:33.206
[SPEAKER_01]: And I’m like, I don’t know what the fuck this guy looks like.

45:33.226 –> 45:33.626
[SPEAKER_01]: I have no idea.

45:33.646 –> 45:35.728
[SPEAKER_01]: And he showed up with like a Pelican suit case.

45:36.149 –> 45:37.550
[SPEAKER_01]: Because he went, oh, he aged sailors.

45:37.710 –> 45:39.853
[SPEAKER_01]: I had two aged sailors that he wanted.

45:39.873 –> 45:42.475
[SPEAKER_01]: That I paid like $99 each for.

45:42.776 –> 45:43.116
[SPEAKER_01]: Yep.

45:43.720 –> 45:44.663
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that’s what I got.

45:44.703 –> 45:52.870
[SPEAKER_01]: I’ve got a relicus from a 99 bucks and this guy brought me and I traded him those two my cost 200 for a for a miss at Tori Pines.

45:54.217 –> 45:55.559
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that’s like surreal.

45:55.619 –> 45:58.804
[SPEAKER_01]: I was like, oh, I mean, I could always wonder, like, who are these people that you’re meeting up with?

45:59.225 –> 45:59.986
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, it’s just weird.

46:00.386 –> 46:01.128
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, it’s weird.

46:01.148 –> 46:02.349
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and I’ve met, definitely.

46:02.369 –> 46:06.396
[SPEAKER_00]: I’ve met some people to, if it is actually a reason like to do trades like all over the world.

46:06.656 –> 46:07.237
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, that’s it.

46:07.397 –> 46:10.642
[SPEAKER_00]: There’s always a little bit of like, okay, like, this is not normal.

46:11.163 –> 46:12.725
[SPEAKER_00]: I’m, I want just large crowds.

46:12.805 –> 46:13.947
[SPEAKER_01]: Large crowds are on.

46:13.927 –> 46:14.228
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

46:14.428 –> 46:14.628
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.

46:15.210 –> 46:15.430
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.

46:15.450 –> 46:15.911
[SPEAKER_01]: We crushed.

46:15.971 –> 46:16.652
[SPEAKER_01]: We crushed this.

46:16.993 –> 46:18.115
[SPEAKER_01]: I appreciate you being man.

46:18.236 –> 46:19.859
[SPEAKER_01]: I so glad we finally got to talk.

46:20.160 –> 46:23.707
[SPEAKER_01]: Hopefully I hang out with you at some point and and have even more fun.

46:23.747 –> 46:24.769
[SPEAKER_01]: We definitely need to do that.

46:25.230 –> 46:30.400
[SPEAKER_01]: Can you tell the listeners what your social is and and you know how to get all of you or watch you and stuff like that?

46:30.380 –> 46:31.161
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, absolutely.

46:31.181 –> 46:35.629
[SPEAKER_00]: So on on me, Paul Whiskey on Instagram and my book is I Japan Whiskey book.com.

46:35.689 –> 46:37.131
[SPEAKER_00]: It’s called The Art of Japanese Whiskey.

46:37.311 –> 46:40.617
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, please check it out if you get a chance and yeah, really these guys.

46:40.677 –> 46:42.440
[SPEAKER_01]: You got them at the great book.

46:42.660 –> 46:46.567
[SPEAKER_01]: Seriously, it’s like it’s just it’s just a great book like grab it.

46:46.867 –> 46:48.430
[SPEAKER_01]: I can’t thank everyone enough for listening.

46:49.011 –> 46:52.877
[SPEAKER_01]: As I told you, we’ll always have people that are passionate about Whiskey on that’s hot.

46:52.857 –> 46:55.962
[SPEAKER_01]: We’ll be here, no matter what it’s up, and we’re just having fun.

46:56.002 –> 46:57.004
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you all for listening.

46:57.044 –> 46:58.767
[SPEAKER_01]: Thanks everyone for rating the shows.

46:59.208 –> 47:02.133
[SPEAKER_01]: I appreciate each one of you that we’re definitely going to hang out.

47:02.454 –> 47:04.597
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, thank you, thank you for taking the time to come on.

47:05.259 –> 47:08.144
[SPEAKER_01]: Everybody, I appreciate you until next time.

47:08.264 –> 47:08.925
[SPEAKER_01]: That’s a wrap.