Ed Bley, founder of Rising Tide Spirits, shares his journey from managing barrel selections to creating his own bourbon brand with meticulous attention to both liquid quality and distinctive packaging design.
• Ed previously ran Cork & Bottle, selecting over 250 private barrels which helped define his palate and bourbon philosophy
• Old Swagger is a new 12-year bottled-in-bond low-rye bourbon designed to be soft, elegant and approachable
• Old Stubborn single barrels offer a contrasting experience with high-rye pot still bourbon at barrel strengths up to 142 proof
• The distinctive teardrop bottles feature 3D Rising Tide logos embedded in the glass base, requiring 14 minutes to hand-blow each bottle
• Ed prioritizes mouthfeel and viscosity in his whiskeys, wanting flavors to "hang around" long after tasting
• Rising Tide sources barrels well in advance, working on releases 2-3 years ahead to maintain quality control
• Packaging challenges, including custom tubes and label specifications, can significantly impact release timelines
• Ed plans to release each product line twice yearly, with the next release potentially arriving this winter
Find Rising Tide Spirits online at risingtidespirits.com and on social media platforms. Sign up for their newsletter to be notified about upcoming releases.
What happens when a seasoned barrel picker with over 250 selections under his belt decides to create his own bourbon brand? Ed Bley of Rising Tide Spirits joins the Scotchy Bourbon Boys to reveal the journey that led to his distinctive Old Swagger and Old Stubborn bourbons.
With roots deeply planted in bourbon enthusiasm before entering the industry, Blabe brings a connoisseur's perspective to every aspect of his craft. His experience climbing rickhouses with legends like Eddie Russell has shaped his discerning palate and unique approach to whiskey creation. During the podcast, he offers listeners a rare glimpse into the meticulous process of selecting and blending barrels, emphasizing how the marriage of whiskeys evolves over time.
The conversation dives deep into Rising Tide's striking packaging design, featuring hand-blown teardrop bottles with three-dimensional logos embedded in the glass base. "I wanted something unique, different than what you normally see," Bley explains, comparing bourbon to a complete pie where every element must work together—from the liquid to the story to the vessel containing it.
Most fascinating is how Bley deliberately created contrasting expressions to reach different palates. His Old Swagger 12-year bottled-in-bond offers an elegant, balanced drinking experience, while Old Stubborn single barrels deliver intense flavors with remarkably long finishes. "When you go to tastings, what's amazing is they're both excellent but completely different ends of the spectrum," he notes, emphasizing that quality whiskey can exist across diverse flavor profiles.
The discussion reveals the extensive behind-the-scenes work of building a bourbon brand, from navigating supply chains to planning releases years in advance. For whiskey enthusiasts curious about craft bourbon's future, this conversation provides invaluable insights from someone who's dedicated to creating exceptional drinking experiences.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Tiny here to tell you about Whiskey Thief Distilling
Company and their newly openedtasting room.
Whether you are up for afarm-to-glass distilling
experience on the Three BoysFarm in Frankfort, kentucky, or
an out-of-this-world tastingexperience in New Loo, you won't
be disappointed At bothlocations.
Their barrel picks all day,every day are like none other.
(00:24):
Each location features stationswith five barrels, each
featuring their pot distilledbourbons and ryes.
Once the barrels have beenthieved and tasted, you can make
a selection and thieve your ownbottle A day at Whiskey Thief,
with their friendly staff andownership, will ensure you many
good times with good friends andfamily.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Remember to always drink responsibly.
Never drink and drive and liveyour life uncut and unfiltered,
drinking birdies and sipping onsome scotch.
We get a little wild at a shortfun watch Because what we do,
we're drinking every brew andwe're a family of tall sons, but
we're telling the truth.
Yeah, we're the Scotchy BirdieBoys Raising the hill and making
(01:22):
some noise.
Yeah, we're the Scotchy BirdieBoys.
Boys raise your hands and makesome noise.
Yeah, we're the Scotch andBatty boys.
We're here to have fun and makeall of you enjoy.
We're here to have fun.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Yeah, all right, welcome back to another podcast
of the Scotchy Bourbon Boys.
Woo, all right, you guys, I gotgotta see what's going on there
.
I must have paused my all rightback to live, uh, so, uh, it's
(02:15):
a.
This is going to be a fantasticpodcast tonight.
We've got ct on tonight.
Welcome ct everybody.
And we's up everybody.
And we got Ed Blabe, one of thefounders of Rising Tide Spirits
, right, I got that right, Ijust like it should be in my
(02:36):
head and burned in my head.
But also his brand, oldStubborn.
And then this is actually thenew brand, right, the Old
Swagger, correct?
I mean, I was reading about itand everything, brand old,
stubborn.
And then this is actually thenew brand, right, the old
swagger, correct?
I mean I was reading about itand everything, and it's kind of
cool everything.
But I was like, well, it's cool, I won't have to read about it
tonight because I got got you ontonight to tell everybody about
(02:59):
it.
Welcome ed, thank you, it'sgood to be back.
It's good to be back.
It's great to be back, I meanlast time.
If anybody doesn't want to knowhow dedicated this man is to
bourbon, we could go over yourpast.
But just the fact that he livesin Michigan, about what?
Five hours away from me, right,right Five hours.
(03:25):
And he drove down for an 8 30podcast, which meant that
whatever, but after the podcastwe ended about 10, finished up
about 10, 10, 30 ish he hoppedback in his car and drove home.
So that was pretty amazing.
But what we did on that podcastwas something that I always I
(03:46):
found very, very special wasthat we blended.
He had all the the barrelsamples from his next batch that
he was going to do.
He had first done a weeded andthen he wanted to do a rye
bourbon and he had brought allthe barrel samples and he
(04:07):
blended.
We blended together and that'ssomething that I've never done
before and it really gave us aninsight into what somebody goes
through when they're blendingand all the tools that you have.
Correct.
Speaker 4 (04:23):
Wow, that's definitely the reason I don't
have hair right now.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
But now the release that you just had.
You released the old stubbornsingle barrels, which was cool,
and then you released a 12-, 12barrel batch of old swagger a 12
year Now.
Talk about, were those singlebarrels going through as you
(04:57):
were making your batches, youknow, leading up to this?
Were those the single barrelsthat you were putting off to the
side that were like man, thosewill be really good single
barrels.
Or was this another separatepurchase kind of thing?
Speaker 4 (05:14):
I wouldn't say it's a separate purchase, but it was
just some additional barrelsthat we had first two releases.
I only put out 24 barrels, so Ihad, uh, still have other
inventory as well.
So I was working through andjust seeing what I found.
I found some very unique ones.
I without 24 barrel barrels, soI still have other inventory as
well, so I was working throughit and just seeing what I found.
I found some very unique ones.
I thought would be awesome and,since we've done marriages on
the first two single barrels,would be nice to try something a
(05:34):
little different and give youan idea of the barrels that I'm
working with when I am doing themarriages for these ones.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
That is a great thing , people.
Now let's get to your, yourpast, what led you to this, this
place, and then people canunderstand why I'm very excited
to taste this single barrel, andall in as many single barrels
as I can.
That, ed, is releasing because,honestly, where you come from,
(06:04):
you understand.
Single barrels is releasingbecause, honestly, where you
come from you understand singlebarrels, I've done a few of them
?
Speaker 4 (06:11):
Yeah, just a few.
I used to run Cork and Bottleback in the day and when I did
that obviously I did all theirbarrel selections.
So I've done well over 250private barrel selections and so
you get an opportunity toreally climb around some
rickhouses and have some neatexperiences.
But you also have a chance toreally define your palate at the
(06:32):
same time and the things thatyou look for in barrels and
things that separate the barrelsyou pick from what everybody
else does.
It's amazing the experiencesthat I did while I was there
that were just mind-blowing.
Just picking barrels on my 40thand 41st birthday with me and
Eddie Russell was justphenomenal.
(06:54):
I climbed around the bricks fora minute with him.
We trailed so many barrels thatday.
I think we were both walkingsideways out that might answer
Ann Demick's question.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
She wants to know where did you find those barrels
?
Which ones?
I'm guessing the ones that youfound with Jimmy, since that's
Ann's hot spot.
Speaker 4 (07:20):
I'm going to tell you what I have picked barrels.
I was sitting there the otherday thinking about this.
I done b, um, e, g, h, k, m, o,t, I think, and I know I'm
probably missing a couple otherricks I picked barrels from well
(07:41):
and also said.
Speaker 3 (07:42):
She said and also, where is he storing them?
Speaker 4 (07:45):
tell us more about starting up a brand, bottling,
etc it's hard, I'm gonna tellyou, in this market especially,
it's a nightmare.
It's yeah, it's polluted.
Right now there's so muchwhiskey out there it's hard to
separate yourself.
But the truth is is that I Ihave some great partners down in
stanford, kentucky, that areholding for me.
They're're fantastic.
They're actually going intotheir own distillery now working
(08:07):
on building that.
Whenever they get ready to talkabout that, I'll have them
contact me.
They're fantastic people downthere.
They've been over backwards toput out quality products and do
the things I need them to do toget our brand up and ready to go
.
Finding barrels is difficulttoo.
There's a lot of barrels outthere, but it doesn't mean
(08:28):
there's a lot of good barrelsout there.
It's very difficult.
Speaker 3 (08:33):
He's yelling at me through text now.
No, so many O's I can't evenput in here.
Where did he find the swaggerbarrels?
There must be a joke to this.
I don't know, but she must knowsomething.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
There you go Ann, Are you happy?
Speaker 4 (08:57):
Ann's putting my feet to fire here.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
I mean if Ann wanted to be this involved.
She could have just got on.
I'm saying she's got her intothe Zoom, Come on, Ann could
have just got on.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
I'm saying we could have just got her into the.
Speaker 4 (09:09):
Zoom.
Come on, ann.
She's so fun.
I love Ann, she's so nice.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
Yes, definitely, ann, is fantastic.
Well, the swagger barrels comefrom MGP.
I mean, it says it right thereand that's something at this
point that's fairly that's newto you, right, because before
that you were working with WestVirginia.
(09:31):
Pot still barrels, do you havewith them?
And how do you get 12-year?
Is 12-year just the youngestand you had 13 and 14 before, or
(09:57):
were they all 12?
Speaker 4 (10:01):
In this case.
I have multiple sources forwhiskey.
This came from a differentsource, but in this case it
ended up being bottled andbonded.
We obviously have fulldisclosure on it.
The only way I was able to dothat was because I didn't buy it
directly from the GP in thiscase.
Okay, if you do that, you havea non-disclosure agreement with
them.
That's just how it works, okay,so a little tip for you when
(10:25):
you're looking at a product, ifit has where it was distilled at
, they didn't buy it from thatplace.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Okay, so that's a secondary workaround, the MGP
thing Okay.
Speaker 4 (10:42):
I don't have a nondisclosure with them.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
Right and you're able to say that, and then, at the
same point, that's what shouldhappen down the line.
I mean honestly so anyways.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
You think.
But it's difficult when you'redealing with corporations.
Corporations have a lot ofsecrets.
They think they have thatnobody knows about, that
everybody actually knows about.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
But that's because.
That's because a bigcorporation has to have a lot of
little people working for themthat know about it.
I mean, I just you know, you,you, you know, Buffalo trace
does not disclose their mashbills, but it's not like you
can't find out what their mashbills are.
I don't disclose them here, butyou can find out.
(11:27):
Anyways, so well, I mean, let'stalk about the progression from
the last time when you releasedthe high ride to this point.
How much have you learned?
I mean, you've had to know alot going in being the head of
(11:49):
those barrel picks that you didmultiple, multiple barrel picks,
and then, as far as thedistribution of those barrel
picks at the store, I mean youknew how the market, you know
what the market was doing andhow it was going.
But I think, from this pointone, it's a bottle change,
correct, definitely.
Speaker 4 (12:11):
New package.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
Now and you did that and you've explained it, but not
on the audio part of thepodcast why this is a teardrop
looking bottle.
I mean it's fantastic.
I love the neck it's petite, Imean it's just different from
(12:33):
what other people have had.
And then just like the RisingTide at the bottom on the base,
and then you've got yourinternal Rising Tide logo there.
Just I mean it is, it's, it'sthe coolest thing.
I'm looking at it through theyou know the, the ring light
(12:54):
through there and it itbasically lights up like it's
neon in there.
It's like you can, it's like alight, like a burning phoenix.
Speaker 4 (13:07):
It's gold.
So we put our logo right in themiddle and that was really
interesting.
When I told them I wanted to dothat, they were like what?
So then they started telling mewell, it's going to take a mold
to do that.
I'm like, okay, I loved it, andonce they were able to adhere
it and it's all perfect.
I mean I just super cool, ifyou take the labels off and use
(13:28):
the bottle for something elseafter you're done drinking it,
it'll be super cool, I thinkit'd make a cool base.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
And then I don't think you said before what was
the uh, the name, the oldswagger name?
Was that something just thatyou came up with?
Was it something that youbrought back?
Speaker 4 (13:47):
It was our team that came up with it.
We liked it because we wantedsomething that was a little
different than Old Stubborn.
Old Stubborn is like a robustwhiskey to us, and Old Swagger
is more of an elegant whiskey.
So we tried to come up withsomething that was a
characteristic, that would beeye-catching but also meant a
little something with what wewere putting out product-wise.
It was pretty cool.
(14:09):
It also just rolls off thetongue real nice.
I like it.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Intentional, controlled and elegant are the
words on the tube.
The tube is fantastic, I mean.
And then the logo.
You've got a whole.
It's the same guy from the oldStubborn right, and in old
Stubborn he's just kind ofhanging out, he's crossed, he's
(14:35):
just kind of posing.
You can see that right there.
But this one, this one here,he's basically got the swagger
right.
He's sitting there fingers inhis you know, the thumbs in his
pocket and you know he's justthere like this.
This is like.
He's like, this is just goingto this.
(14:55):
He's got the swagger.
I mean, he's kicking ass.
This, this is going to be.
You know he knows it's goodright.
Speaker 4 (15:06):
It's super cool.
Our artist is awesome.
He does a great job with it,for sure.
But yeah, we tried to have someproduct continuity so everybody
knew it was from us, but it'sstill a built identity because
it's a completely differentproduct.
When I released these whiskeys,I tried to hit every single
palate out in the market.
You'll notice this as we tastethem how completely different
they are.
Old Swagger is soft, it'selegant, it's very much a
(15:30):
whiskey that everyone can enjoy.
It's what I like to say wouldstart your evening off with an
awesome tasting.
You wouldn't end your eveningwith a bottle of Bond, but to
start your evening off with anawesome one would be fantastic.
And then, if you keepprogressing from there, our
barrels go from 117 proof up to142 proof.
Potstil versus columndistillate, that's a 12-year low
(15:52):
rye MGP bottled in bond NCDFversus a high rye bourbon from
West Virginia that's Potstil andcash strength.
They're just complete differentends of the spectrum.
When you go to tasting, what'samazing about them is they're
both excellent.
So it shows that you can havegood and it'd be just completely
opposite in taste, but they'restill awesome.
(16:13):
I think that's important.
A lot of people, when they dotasting notes, they talk about
their flavors, but what very fewpeople talk about is what
you're feeling.
I think that our mouthfe feelon our whiskeys especially
separate us from everybody else.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
I have a very high viscosity when it comes to my
whiskeys that I enjoy you, youtalked about it, talking about
the bottle and how the oil, andthat right there just says
everything.
You, you are looking for thatoil, you want that viscosity
when you drink something.
Speaker 4 (16:45):
So I want it to feel like butter in your mouth.
I want that uh, top of yourtongue to be slick.
I want everything that, becauseall that means is that that
flavor is just going to walkinto your mouth and hang around
for a long time.
When you get old, stubborn,it's like drinking motor oil.
That stuff will hang around.
You'll be tasting it 20 minuteslater.
It finishes wild on it.
I'm still, you know, yeah, it'sfancy and refined.
(17:10):
It pops to the Wild West.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Well, the viscosity on the old Swagger is pretty
intense too.
It's stuck there for a goodwhile, and then what's coming
down now is the long, the fulllength.
Speaker 4 (17:26):
The legs are pretty, it makes it so soft and elegant
that's the best word I can useto describe it.
It's an elegant whiskey.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
I can't believe we weren't listening before we
talked about the fact that thisnew release that you've been
doing for the past couple weekshas just been phenomenal, but I
think that it says a lot notonly for you, but obviously your
passion to put the best thingyou can into these bottles is
the reason why everybody is soeager to get out there and find
(17:58):
it.
I know a lot of the socialmedia people, whether they're
doing a TikTok or whatever.
A lot of these guys are justgoing nuts because your passion
is to absolutely put thisamazing distillate in these
bottles.
Speaker 4 (18:16):
I do my best.
We're my company, my founders,myself.
We were all enthusiasts longbefore any of us were ever in
industry and we're stillenthusiasts to this day.
We put out whiskey, we're goingto drink.
You know, I'm not going to lie,I have a few bottles myself.
You know, I want to drink it too, so we want to make sure we put
(18:38):
stuff out that we're going towant to drink too, and so that
was our agreement when westarted our company was that
we're going to ultimately alwaysstrive to put out the absolute
best product we possibly can.
Whatever that falls on theboard is great, but I'm going to
do my best to be at the top,and that's just how it is.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
That's great.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
Do you still have the collector in you?
Are you still drinking, fromtime to time, other people's
stuff because you love that too?
Speaker 4 (19:06):
For sure.
Especially when I go down toBrad's.
When I'm down there, I meanI'll drink all kinds of wild
stuff.
It's hard because there isn'tmuch I haven't had.
There's some newer stuff that Ihaven't had, some really
younger stuff that's just notaged all the way up yet.
When it comes back to likeDusties and things like that,
it's rare that I see one that Ihaven't seen when I go to brands
(19:27):
.
A lot of times there's onethat'll pop in there and of
course I gotta try it.
That's just me how about that?
Speaker 3 (19:32):
how about that big handle of uh, uh, what's the
mcbrayer?
The mcbrayer, that's like 1913or whatever.
Speaker 4 (19:41):
I think it's gone.
Speaker 3 (19:43):
Yeah, it was amazing, that bottle.
We were talking about it thelast couple times I was there
and that bottle was thatdistillate was put in the bottle
before the titanic sank it waslike wow, just that realization
that this industry like stufflike that exists what's crazy is
that's the second car boy thatwe popped.
Speaker 4 (20:05):
The first one was a 1918 old jordan eight year that
was distilled by ap stitzel.
It was owned by a pharmacistduring prohibition.
We purchased it from thepharmacist daughter, who was 95
at the time we purchased it, wepopped it.
It was like it was the firstday it was in there.
It was absolutely amazing.
I pulled the cork out of thatthing.
(20:25):
The entire room smelled like it.
Wow, unbelievable.
It was still in my top threewhiskeys I've ever tried.
The other one was a cedar brook, right, yeah, well, he had a
metal on.
I think it was okay.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Yeah, I think I could be, wrong it might have been a
county fair.
Speaker 4 (20:41):
Can't admit it, since I've seen it.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
Yeah, but the corkways are cool.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
Oh, they're super cool.
And the corks that are wild.
And a lot of times the corkshold up really well compared to
the smaller bottles.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:59):
And also the whiskey just holds up better in them.
I'm going to say that you lefta word out of your on your tube
balanced yeah, it's super, superbalanced yeah, but it's hard to
balance 12 year char with thefront palette sweetness and then
(21:26):
the finish at a hundred proof.
I mean I'm drinking it and it.
Speaker 4 (21:34):
The flavors just line up like MGP makes some very
good whiskey and I know that'snot a secret.
A lot of people know that, butmost people gravitate towards
their high rye bourbon, which isfantastic.
I've picked some amazingbarrels of their high rye
bourbon.
Not a lot of people know aboutthe low rye.
The low rye, when you work withit right, can be just
(21:56):
absolutely phenomenal.
Speaker 3 (21:58):
What's the percentage on the low rye?
I think it's 21.
Okay it's 20, on the low rye, Ithink it's 21.
Okay, it's low 20s.
Speaker 4 (22:06):
I was just making sure it wasn't a lower.
I can't remember.
Off the top of my head, I thinkthat's what it is.
I've been staring atspreadsheets all day long.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
So farewell.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
When you get an MGP world and you start dissecting
all their stuff, that's a wholenother.
I mean you have to have a.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
Well, the hardest thing, in my opinion, when
you're using MGP whiskey this isjust my opinion is that it's
hard to make yourself differentfrom other people's MGP.
There is the classic MGPprofile that sometimes comes
(22:50):
across amongst a lot of brands.
But when I talk to somebodywho's doing MGP and they tell me
they just take the barrels,that they ship them, I'm like,
well, how does that work?
And then, well, we go throughand we do all the stuff.
But people like yourself,although you didn't do it
(23:11):
through MGP, you picked it.
You got those barrels from adifferent source.
But even when I deal with, likea Macaulay or whatever, there's
definitely the ability withthat whiskey that you have to be
what would you say diligent inthe barrels that you're picking
right.
Speaker 4 (23:31):
Just about selecting the right barrels at that point.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
Right.
And now?
A lot of brands don't get toselect the barrels, do they?
Speaker 4 (23:39):
A lot of brands don't buy enough barrels.
There you go.
Speaker 3 (23:43):
If you buy enough barrels, you're going to be able
to find good barrels.
And like anything, obviously,when you're picking, handpicking
the barrels you want, you'repaying a little more, which
doesn't matter At the end of theday.
You want to pay a little moreto get the best product instead
of just buying umpteen barrelsof whatever.
And then, oh crap, well, thosetwo are terrible, or those two
(24:04):
aren't as good, and we got toblend those and do this, and
that you get to know hey, thisis one that I'm gonna put in a
bottle.
Speaker 4 (24:12):
I make sure that I get a lot of samples.
I refuse to buy whiskey fromone sample.
There's not a lot of peoplethat do.
A lot of people will just flatout try one sample and buy
whatever, but I'm not that guy.
Too much money, there's toomuch reputation, there's just
too much the rep, is it Exactly?
Speaker 3 (24:30):
That's what matters.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Well, also, I think with your background and where
you've come from and what you'redoing, you understand after,
when you do that many differentbarrel picks that you had to do
at many different distilleries.
(24:52):
When you go to thosedistilleries and you do those
barrel picks, you get the tours,you get the thing and you start
to understand how differentdistilleries even big guys and
little guys and everybody howthey all do it different because
of the fact and then you get totaste the whiskey out the
barrel and understand whatthey're doing.
So there's so many differentways to do this.
(25:14):
So, with your understanding, Ireally feel that you transfer
what you've that part to thisand it's also comes down to you
managed.
You ran the store right and soyou saw, I ran the whiskey and
(25:36):
the beer department Right.
The entire, okay, you ran thewhiskey part of the store right.
Okay, you ran the whiskey partof the store right.
And you understand, with allthose people, what the average
consumer is looking for not theaverage consumer who buys Jim
Beam or Jack Daniels regularly,or they just buy one brand.
You understand what theconnoisseurs and the people who
(26:02):
you know secondary people.
You understand the people whoare looking for difference and
differences in their.
You know different palateexperiences and you've seemed to
, through this brand, takeeverything you know and put it
in there based off of it.
And Walter Zausch is alsosimilar to you.
(26:25):
He owns a distillery now, Imean, he owns Whiskey Thief but
he is very similar to you in thefact that he was such a fan of
bourbon and doing barrel picksand going on and getting this
and figuring it out that hewanted to get into the business
and he bought the distillery.
But he's still to this day,when you, when you go there, or
(26:45):
you talk to him or you're withhim.
He is a lover of bourbon andthat's kind of what you are Not
from a, not from a.
You're not a family that hasbeen making bourbon for 9,000
years or anything like that, andyou're not a corporation, but
you're just a lover of bourbonand you're able to give what you
(27:08):
learn to the people who want it.
And this is everything For me.
I want the package.
You not only give us anunbelievable bottle with a
purpose of having no pressurewhich you've explained but then
you put it in a tube.
And I mean putting it in a tube, I mean you saw what, what
(27:32):
putting eh taylor in a tube didto it I wonder what they do,
btac, what that tube's gonnalook like I mean you just, I
mean it's just like you know thepeople and so so.
On this release, were younervous?
Speaker 4 (27:51):
I'm always nervous okay it's always you know when
you do this stuff you you don'tsleep the week before release.
There's too much anxiety.
You want to make sureeverybody's happy.
My ultimate goal is to makeeverybody happy.
I like when people like what Ido, because I'm doing it for
them too, not just me.
I like putting whiskey inpeople's hands and seeing them
(28:14):
smile and talking about it andsharing it with their friends.
That's the biggest reward thereis.
I 100% would take that over anyspirits competition award any
day of the week.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
Honestly it's more important, honestly, than a lot
of those awards.
Yeah, if the consumer wants itand they want to buy it and they
buy because of you and theproduct you're putting in it.
They're buying that way morethan they're buying because you
want an award that's what I'msaying.
Speaker 4 (28:41):
It's like just seeing the smiles makes me, makes it
worth it for me.
I like it.
It's when I was at corkingbottle, I had a table in the
back room and I would bring thecustomers back there.
My favorite part about that washow special it is, so it makes
me feel good to see them failand like they have something
that is absolutely fantastic andsharing it with all their
friends and telling them allabout it.
There's nothing that makes mefeel better than that.
(29:03):
I love it.
The excitement is contagious.
Speaker 1 (29:07):
That is, that's obviously.
It comes through, it comes.
You've put that, that's thatenjoyment in a bottle.
That's, there's no doubt aboutit.
I'm there's like If anyonejoined us late, we doubt about
it.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
I'm there's like anyone joined us late we talked
about it early that the oldstubborn single barrels gone,
but there are a few old swaggerspossibly left out there and you
said where it was.
I'll let you say it again.
Speaker 4 (29:40):
It was the bourbon concierge dot com.
They took that.
They had quite abonconciergecom.
They took quite a few to beginwith and they're doing fantastic
.
They're not going to be theremore than another day or two.
We released it on Friday, sothe fact that they still have
them is kind of surprising.
They're going really fast.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
I think if anybody follows you and if you don't
follow Ed and follow Rising Tideon on social media, you'll see
you posted a link, I think, toit today.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
We, we go out of our way to make sure all of our, all
of our retail partners arelisted on our webpage as well.
So if you go torisingtidespiritscom, kind of,
for our emails, we don't.
I mean we said maybe four, three, four emails a year, nothing
crazy, but just to let you knowwhen releases are coming so that
you know to be ready.
And then they also have a listof all of our our retail
(30:33):
partners on our webpage.
So if you go on there and checkthere, you know there might be
a couple of bottles in Kentuckyhiding around somewhere that
nobody saw or realized.
Speaker 3 (30:43):
Yeah, you know, Just like the introduction of this,
the revival release was reallylike you know, if you had the in
on that, that was a great wayto get one, but if you were not
following you Rising Tide orRevival you didn't know anything
about it until right now.
Speaker 4 (31:05):
Yeah, it's true, truth, that's so true.
And uh, revival they pre-soldtheir, almost their entire
allocation and then they wentback and they purchased more and
pre-sold it and then purchasedmore again, pre-sold it again
and you have to cut them off,you have to say that that's
literally what happened.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
There's other people that want it so, so I was, I was
wrong on this one.
It's 44 of 55.
Super short barrel.
That is a super short barrel.
I like.
I love your rising tide tagwith your uh QR code.
That's great Then this is what.
(31:46):
So I opened that.
I opened.
You said you wanted to do oldswagger first, so I opened it
and had it.
I wanted to have it poured youknow what I mean and let it
breathe.
But this one I wanted everybodyto see me open it because this
has like what the seal of it islike almost like a champagne
(32:07):
seal, right, because of the, thethin it's and it's like also,
it's obvious how.
It's very cool because it'sobvious how to open it, because
it has a little perforated thingright here, but it says old,
stubborn, and the way that itsays the old stubborn is similar
to you feel like you're openinga champagne bottle on new
(32:28):
year's eve, but as you pull thatoff, I'm gonna yeah, I was a
liar, it isn't easy, no, but I,it's, it's pretty cool and
everybody.
So this is the part that Ed wastalking about.
It's not in there on pressureand it's.
(32:49):
I mean, technically, thisbottle is usable as a decanter,
right.
Speaker 4 (32:55):
You can even use it as a vase when you're done, if
you wanted to.
Speaker 1 (32:58):
A vase, but you got the glass top and again, once
again, again, the awesome 3d um,it's a cardinal right, here we
go.
Just very see, once again it'sgot a little bit of it.
(33:19):
Didn't have a big pull, bigcork pull but, know this one's a
lot.
What would you say?
136.13.
Nice.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
Super nice, so there we go.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
Was it 12 of them that you had lined up at revival
15.
So the range I know Kevin wasthere doing some stuff with you
guys that day and just goingdown through them, the color
difference and there was acouple and Jeff's looks like one
that is like super dark Yep,Like that thing looks like dark
maple syrup.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
You can see that that thing looks like dark maple
syrup.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
You can see the difference on my camera between
the old Swagger and the singlebarrel, with you having a dark
colored shirt on.
It's definitely dark, dark, butyeah, it's Put the tube behind
it.
Yeah, put that white tube.
Speaker 4 (34:21):
All right, the old stubborn tube, that one Okay
there you go.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
Yeah, look at that, it's not even a.
Are you sure that's notPennzoil?
Speaker 4 (34:38):
That's a short barrel for you they get dark and it's.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
You can see the seven .
Speaker 4 (34:46):
It's between 11 and 14 years.
Right, it's just a short barrel, our barrels are dark.
Speaker 1 (34:53):
Short barrels are depressing, especially when you
want people to have.
You're hoping.
Now, I mean, honestly, thething that I've always found
lately is that, from mystandpoint, if you did 375s and
doubled the amount of that woulddouble the amount of bottles
(35:16):
you can do.
But 375s always come across tome as a podcaster perfectly,
because you know there's there'snot a lot of bottles.
I'd I'd take the full 750milliliters anymore because I
have too much to taste and, asyou know, you're not always
drinking through.
You know the 700 but um, butwith these it's nice to have
(35:40):
because I definitely will besharing and and that's what you
want to do, you want to sharereally good spirits with your
friends and people.
So, wow, that has a lot ofchocolate on it.
It's like a Purtle, likecaramel, pecan and chocolate all
(36:12):
at once, man, and that's that'sopening, that's just opening
and pouring it.
Oh, and then there's a grape,like a concord grape.
Finish, I find a lot of timesaged whiskey and really good.
You know well, done in barrel.
You pick up, you start to pickup some grape.
You know some aspects of like agrape, like a wine or whatever
(36:36):
flavor on the finishes.
That is wait.
I would almost say that I don'tknow why I'm getting it, but
it's almost like Welch's grapejelly.
It's just like, let's see if Iget it again.
I got the chocolate and thecaramel and the pecan right off
the bat.
Yeah, ct, you're going to wantto get a sample of this.
(37:01):
You're going to want to get asample of this.
You're going to want to.
Speaker 3 (37:05):
I was planning on it Friday, but I was not able to
stay late enough.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
Well, ed's got us, you'll get some of this.
That actually is that makes mehappy.
That is a very that's fantastic.
So when you were picking theseso do you have?
So you still have moreinventory you said, uh, is it
going to be batches, singlebarrels or a combination of both
(37:33):
?
We never know what's going tocome.
Okay, you're not going to giveout.
You learned that.
Don't give out your secrets.
We get a little closer.
We'll let everybody know.
Speaker 4 (37:42):
But so are you saying stuff now all of a sudden.
You learned not.
Don't give out your secrets,we'll get a little closer, we'll
let everybody know.
So are you saying stuff now Allof a sudden, I'll start getting
a million PMs between now andrelease.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
So where do you do?
Speaker 4 (37:54):
it, I do what?
Speaker 1 (37:55):
Where do you do the blending and where are you
bottling?
Speaker 4 (38:00):
I mean, it's in Stanford, kentucky, stanford.
It's a place down in Stanford,kentucky, stanford.
Yeah, it's a place down inStanford.
It does, of course, great,great people, absolutely
fantastic people.
I don't want to give out theirsecrets or anything, so I
haven't cleared their releasinga name or anything like that
with them, but they're openingup their own distillery and when
they get ready I'm sure I'll beable to talk to them as well.
(38:20):
But they I'm sure you'll talkto them as well They've done
absolutely fantastic.
I do the blending up here,we're at my house and I do the
barrel selections up here andthen everything's done down
there.
Speaker 1 (38:31):
So do you have a lab?
Speaker 4 (38:34):
Well, I don't know if I necessarily have a lab or a
space it definitely takes mesome time to work through.
Speaker 1 (38:40):
Do you have a space in your house that you do it?
Well, not really, no, no, takesme some time to work through,
but do you have a space in yourhouse?
Speaker 4 (38:49):
that you do it.
Oh, not real.
No, you could just be watchingtv one night and going through.
I like take back, I have acouple.
No, I'm kidding, I have a wholesystem.
I use here a big countertop Iuse, set everything up, have a
lot of glens and startimmediately weaving out my nose
and working my way down andfiguring out how I want to, what
I want to release them and thenwhat, from that point I want to
do, whether, if it's a blend,then I'm going to start figuring
(39:10):
out the barrels I want to useand the structure of the blend I
want it to be.
It's a process and then ittakes multiple times of doing it
.
Single barrels is a littleeasier because you know, just
picking single barrels youshould find a winner.
You found a winner.
The blending is a wholedifferent animal.
It takes time for whiskey tomarry.
Speaker 1 (39:27):
It's not an instant thing well, I found that well,
put it this way, after you didthat blending, there's all also
the aspect that when you put thewhiskeys together as you keep
going further, there has to they.
They chemically don't bondinitial right away, when it's
(39:51):
almost like they repel eachother.
And I, I, I did a an infinitybottle with a bunch of uh wood
for double O bottles, okay ofWoodford Double O bottles, okay
Barrel picks, and I probably hadseven, eight of them and they
were all getting low andwhatever.
But I needed space so I justtook them all and put them
(40:15):
together in a decanter until thedecanter was full and I think
it was about six of them thatfinished them off and put them
in and when I tasted it ittasted horrible.
Speaker 4 (40:27):
When you put it in whiskey for a while, it tastes
rough.
And it's enough to make youreally really, really nervous.
Speaker 1 (40:34):
Yeah, and you're sitting there going wow, that
doesn't taste like any WoodfordDouble Oak I've ever had.
And the barrels weren't weren'tbad, you know what I mean they
weren't.
The some of them weren't asgood as like actual batches they
do.
But but now, after aboutsitting in there for about since
I did it right at a halloweentime uh, it's been sitting in
(40:59):
there.
Now the butterscotch is comingout, that wood for double oak.
So once they actually decidedthat they were going to become
one, then all the flavors thatwere that are there start to
express themselves.
So it's really such a unique umprocess that you it's almost
(41:19):
like you're trying always to hit, hit the target, but the
target's always, you know, 100yards ahead of you.
Speaker 4 (41:30):
It's difficult.
You kind of have to trust theprocess.
I mean you're working on pinsand needles for a few weeks.
For sure it does.
It tastes very rough when youfirst blend whiskey, so go ahead
?
Speaker 3 (41:41):
When do you think not pinning you down on a time,
because I don't want to do thatto you and anybody watching.
But what's your uh horizon looklike for the next release?
Are you a few months out, sixmonths?
Speaker 4 (41:53):
out, we're hoping by winter.
Um, it's a matter of gettingtubes in for the release.
Um, that's my issue.
Um, once we have tubes andwe'll be able to go.
That's that's my issue.
Once we have tubes, then we'llbe able to go.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
That's interesting.
Not the glassware, not thebottles, not the whiskey, the
tubes it's all about in ourbusiness.
Speaker 4 (42:16):
It's about minimums and how much you can purchase at
a time.
When it comes to releases, wemake individual tubes for
releases and it's not justsimple at a time when it comes
to releases.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
We make individual tubes for releases.
It's not just simple individualtubes Gold-foiled and really
nice.
Speaker 2 (42:34):
You can buy them on Amazon.
Speaker 4 (42:37):
No Amazon tubes.
Speaker 1 (42:40):
No, you don't buy them on Amazon, but people sell
them.
Speaker 4 (42:48):
We have a manufacturer and they're awesome
to work with, but it just takesso long to do that process
between designing andmanufacturing samples and all
that kind of good stuff.
It takes a while no, I canimagine.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Well, and then I, I just like you know, as a single
barrel person, how many timesdid the labels for the single
barrels hold, hold up therelease of the single barrel to
you?
When I mean it would?
It's just like if it's, if it'sa new product that you're
picking and they offer it to you, all of a sudden the labels
(43:24):
have to get made and they'lltell you, oh, it'll be ready in
two and a half, three months.
And you know, six and a half,six months later is when you get
it, because they just couldn'tget the labels.
Speaker 4 (43:35):
The issue was our labels were too big that we
originally designed for thebottle.
We got the bottles in, finally,and we went to put the labels
on that we had printed andbubbled.
So we went to put the labels onthat we had printed and bubbled
.
We had to stop redesign thelabels and have them reprinted
again.
It was a learning experience.
Speaker 1 (43:50):
That was painful, that was not a cheap lesson the
label is what government goes by, right?
Speaker 4 (43:57):
It's not like that, but it's got to look right on
the bottle.
Speaker 1 (44:00):
It's got to appear right.
Speaker 4 (44:02):
Unfortunately, it just didn't work the way we
originally had it, so we had togo back to the drawing board on
it, but now we've rectified thatproblem, it's good to go.
Speaker 1 (44:10):
I know, but it had to be a bitch if you had them
printed, already authenticatedfor the government, and then
said oh oops, it didn't fit,We've got to do it again.
That's probably not the bestthing to say to them, right?
No I mean the garbage was cool.
Speaker 4 (44:24):
We, we just had to do .
It was more of a materialchange to get them to lay flat,
and so once we did that, we wereokay.
I had to think of material onthere.
It was uh, it was bubbling, andrather than lay it flat because
the bottles curved there's andevery one of those bottles is
slightly different.
None of them are exactly thesame.
They're all hand-blown glasses.
It takes 14 minutes to makeeach individual bottle, three
(44:48):
molds for it and it's hand-blownglass.
It takes a long time and theywere not cheap.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
So the base I wanted something that really was very
eye-appealing.
Speaker 4 (45:00):
I wanted something that was unique and a little
different than what you normallysee.
I wanted something that stillfit into the type of image that
we wanted for our product.
Speaker 1 (45:09):
Well, I'm going to play with shooting the cardinal
through the light because itturns.
Neon, it turns this, I meanthere's about you know, neon, it
turns this, I mean there'sabout you know.
So, basically, the base had thecardinal and then you drop down
(45:29):
the teardrop on top of it youknow?
Speaker 4 (45:34):
that's how.
The base is a separate mold,the bottle was a separate mold,
the cardinal was a separate mold.
Speaker 2 (45:39):
So well, how do you?
Speaker 3 (45:40):
I'm gonna suggest you take the picture of, not the
one you have in your hand,because you're not gonna get it
through that dark, or I'mtelling you it looks like that's
cool.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
I'm looking at it through the ring light and it
looks like the Cardinals on fire.
Speaker 4 (46:01):
It's the coolest thing we liked it.
I like our logo a lot and Ithink it looks super cool in
here Well.
Speaker 1 (46:07):
I've never seen a logo in somebody's bottle.
Now, who else has done it?
I mean, where did you see it?
Speaker 4 (46:15):
I've seen other.
My first one I ever saw donewas Port Fideo.
And then of course, yeah, theyhave their own version, but Port
Fideo Tequila, they have thecactus in the middle of their
bottle.
I love that.
I saw that when I was like 16,and I love that, so it's always
kind of stuck in the back of myhead.
Speaker 1 (46:35):
Okay, well, as long as you don't drop scorpions in.
Speaker 4 (46:41):
This is their high, high-end tequila, super high-end
.
I actually saw them at acountry club when I was learning
how to cook when I was 16.
Interesting.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (46:53):
Wow, Wow that that both of them are very, very
unique in what they, what theybring to the table.
(47:17):
It's definitely each one is anexperience.
Oh my gosh, A Rocky Patel CTwould go with that.
Speaker 3 (47:23):
Really well, I guess that just about a lot of cigars
would go well with it.
Knowing what it is, I'll try it.
I'll try it with several.
Speaker 1 (47:35):
Give it my opinion.
Speaker 2 (47:36):
And my goal is to try it with several Give it my
opinion and my goal is to try itwith you.
Speaker 3 (47:45):
We'll go through like maybe 10 cigars see which?
Speaker 4 (47:47):
one pairs with it best.
Speaker 3 (47:50):
Hey, I got to show you this one.
And, matt Lyson, your Scorpionis not awesome, it's nasty.
Speaker 1 (47:54):
I drank some of it.
He gave me some from the bottle.
That was a old swagger.
Oh, that's a barrel head Nice.
Speaker 4 (48:08):
That's cool, that's super cool.
Yeah very cool Brett.
Speaker 3 (48:13):
Baird did that for me .
Speaker 4 (48:14):
He had to send me a thrillies.
Who did that for you?
Speaker 2 (48:16):
Brett Baird did that for me he had to send me a
thrillies.
Speaker 4 (48:18):
Who did that for you?
Brett Baird.
Brett Baird's bourbon barrelfurniture Okay, he, he did that
for me.
Super cool, loved it, came outso good.
Speaker 3 (48:28):
You got to get that up on the wall behind you.
I literally just got a hug.
That black candle holder hasgot to go, yeah, so that black
candle holder's gotta go, yeah,so there you go.
Speaker 4 (48:40):
Wow, nice, super cool you got the releases of the
first two?
Speaker 1 (48:46):
yeah, I was all.
I'm just happy that I have ahat.
Speaker 3 (48:54):
Hey, ct, so you like the new setup using the shit out
of me, but whatever, how is itconfusing?
Speaker 1 (49:08):
you a lot going on if there's a single guest, it'll
be be like look at.
Speaker 3 (49:16):
Ed's screen.
Look how clean it is.
And you know you got a picturebehind him.
The candle Nice and clean.
I can you get lost in yours?
I can't even tell where you'reat.
That's the goal.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
It's, it's.
It's all about the whiskey, Notabout me.
Speaker 3 (49:31):
I thought you were the old swagger guy for a minute
yeah, it's just like, uh.
Speaker 1 (49:38):
So.
So I was proud of myself, ed,with ct we collected barrel
staves.
We broke a barrel with brokenbarrel and we picked up all the
staves and threw it in his truckand we got them back and they
sat in my garage for about ayear.
So last fall I decided I wouldsand them.
Then this spring I stained themand so you can see the front of
(50:03):
it now.
Initially I was thinking I wasgoing to do it horizontal, you
know, like you see, with thewalls and everything.
But it just worked out that itwould be vertical.
You can kind of see itunderneath.
Just worked out, um, that itwould be vertical.
You can kind of see itunderneath.
I don't want to get too faraway, but I want to show, you
know, show it.
Plus, then my sister-in-law hadthat done.
(50:24):
The scotchy bourbon boys stavea while back, so that's like.
So I just did that.
And then, uh, I've been havingproblems on youtube getting the
screen and me facing the rightway, so I don't look like it's
taking a picture of me in theworst way you could ever take a
picture of me.
So I figured this out, I and I,like I said I was.
(50:46):
I was pretty happy to.
So this is the first time thestudio is together this way and
it was for your podcast.
I was like how, how, you know,this weekend I'm working on it,
and I knew I was getting closeand went, you know, on friday
when, or thursday when you saidit I'm just like, let's do it
monday, so what's your schedulegoing forward?
(51:09):
I mean, well, you got to be abusy guy.
Now you're.
You're in michigan right now,right?
Speaker 4 (51:16):
yeah, so, yeah.
So we're pushing hard to haveboth products out twice a year
right now.
That's our goal right now, andthen eventually it will increase
from there.
Speaker 1 (51:29):
So I mean honestly three times a year.
If it's going to increase threetimes a year probably would be
what you'd go with, the model oflike Stag and Elijah Craig
Barrel Pro barrel proof.
Just go with that model threetimes.
Speaker 4 (51:43):
So about what we got, product one.
So the old plumber is going toeventually run out there.
We know that.
Um, I mean it's, it's not.
It's a product that is notbeing produced anymore.
So you can get it because it'sgone when it's gone it's a
beautiful bottle, beautifulproduct, beautiful everything.
Speaker 1 (52:00):
But I think your old swagger and what what's coming
you know, down the line I thinkthat's going to be fantastic.
Uh, so what kind of time andeffort are you when you're
searching the world for barrels?
Speaker 4 (52:13):
kind of time it definitely takes time.
That's why I have my releasesalready working before and I'm
not worried about buying themfor each release.
Speaker 1 (52:22):
So it's all ready, but you're always buying for two
, three releases down the road.
Speaker 4 (52:29):
We buy ahead.
It's just too hard to keep your.
It's too expensive to buy a tonup front.
You can't work on just buyingfor every single release.
It doesn't work that way.
The reason we were a littleslow on this release was because
of the new packaging.
It took a little while to getit all in.
We literally beat the tariffsby three days.
(52:49):
It was.
Speaker 2 (52:55):
Woo Woo.
Speaker 4 (53:01):
Yeah, i's more hairs.
I think everybody's pullingtheir hair with that whole deal.
Oh man, it literally.
Speaker 1 (53:07):
Our boat landed three days before they took effect
yeah, that would have delayedyou for another like three, four
weeks, because you know youwould have had to just get it in
once they got paused.
Speaker 4 (53:20):
Oh, it was even worse than that.
It's the amount of money itwould have cost for them just
coming into America.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (53:28):
Woo.
Speaker 1 (53:31):
That was a lot.
I mean, now, do you get theglass out of China?
Yeah, we have a manufacturer inChina.
So it's so funny because as apodcaster I get probably three,
four times a month people notlast month, but before that I
was getting three, four people,that would you know.
(53:52):
They would basically ask thefriend and then they tried to
sell me glass.
I'm like, I'm a podcast.
You should see my LinkedIn.
Speaker 4 (54:03):
It's 90% by manufacturer's first name.
Speaker 1 (54:05):
Yeah, they just come and they're trying to right
Right, yeah.
Speaker 3 (54:09):
How in the world do you settle on one then With that
many?
How do you?
Obviously you can't go thereand see the facility and check
it?
Speaker 4 (54:17):
Well, actually we did .
We have a company that we workwith here.
You may know him, he may notBrett Atlas at MGS.
He's fantastic.
He used to write for Bourbonand Banter.
His company has representativesthat will literally go out
there and inspect the placebefore you spend the time with
them.
Really, yeah, you've got gottaprotect your money.
Speaker 3 (54:40):
It's too expensive.
That's what I'm thinking.
You order a thousand bottles,they come in and bust it up.
Not nearly what they should be,or the quality sucks.
Speaker 4 (54:51):
I wish you could only order a thousand, I was just
using it easy.
Speaker 1 (55:01):
I wish Well.
And then you, like you said,just like in the whiskey world,
for all you listeners, as youknow, in all the groups there's
the scammers, and the scammersare, but but for what you're
into also, they're scammers,right, that's why you have to be
very, very, very sure.
Speaker 4 (55:21):
It's not necessarily scammers, but there's definitely
variations in quality of work.
You have to pay attention towho you're working with.
I think supply chain isimportant in our industry for
sure, 90% of what we do issupply chain work.
If your supply chain is weak,you're going to have a weak
product.
You need to make sure that youalign yourself with the best you
can.
That's just how it is.
You are who you are.
(55:43):
We want to be playing in thetop of the realm.
We want everything to becomparable with the top brands
all the time.
That's where we want to placeourselves in the market.
We spend extra money inpackaging and everything else to
make sure that we look the part.
Speaker 3 (55:59):
I think that's important.
I don't know that anybody elseand I mean this sincerely I
don't know that anybody isputting as much effort into the
bottle and packaging as you are.
I mean, you had a good bottlebefore and to totally redesign
(56:20):
it from the ground up.
Speaker 2 (56:20):
Says a, says a lot, but the packaging you're doing
is phenomenal.
Speaker 4 (56:23):
They say you taste with your eyes first.
I think that's true.
I think, well, I think that ina sea of bottles, when you have
one that stands out, it's goingto get a little bit of extra
attention, and I think that ourproduct on the inside warrants
that extra attention anyways ifanybody actually sees your
bottle in a shelf for sale, letme know it's not sitting
(56:43):
anywhere that you can buy itmaybe that was my first bottle.
We put our heart and soul intothat.
It took a lot.
I had seen shapes that I likedthat were similar and some
concepts that were similar, butthe design itself and the molds
and everything else is all I didfor the first time I'd never
done before.
(57:05):
It was a.
It was a chance to really becreative and that's something I
really enjoy with.
My aspect of my job is to beable to be creative.
So we had um Chris Zeverick atCraft and Create.
He designed those tubes for usand the labels.
He's amazing, that guy.
He's been around the bourboncircuits for a long time.
My entire teams and supplychains are all into the bourbon
(57:25):
world.
Everything's been set up inbourbon.
Everybody I've met throughbourbon.
It's amazing when you getpeople that care and are
passionate about the productthat's going in, they're going
to give you an extra effort onthe packaging on the outside and
it's just amazing.
Speaker 1 (57:39):
It's absolutely amazing.
Speaker 4 (57:40):
I'm very grateful for this.
Speaker 1 (57:42):
Yeah, I, I, I agree with you wholeheartedly.
People that you meet there'salways like you know, when
you're meeting them and you'retalking to the people that you
met through bourbon, you don'tknow down the line what's going
to happen and how, if you'llever be able to use them, but
(58:05):
the you just keep meeting thepeople and it's just amazing to
me how cool it is that when it,when the time comes, the team
usually assembles, you know, andyou, you being where you were,
and all the stuff that you weredoing and understanding and
being you know.
So I've always said, when I gotinto, you know, I'm originally
(58:30):
an artist, I was, you know, asfar as I've done commercial art,
I've done fine art.
I enjoy, I'm very creative.
But when I started getting intobourbon and meeting all the
people and then understandingthat creating good bourbon and
unique bourbon and differentstuff is an art form in itself
(58:55):
Just attention to detail is verysimilar.
You can put all your attentionto detail in barrels.
You can put your attention todetail in grains.
You can put your intention todetail.
But the thing that I lovedabout it was, and why I got in
it, and what I love about it isI want it all.
That's one of the reasons whymy first thing that I loved was
(59:17):
Booker's.
I felt that the packaging I gotthe packaging, I got the label,
I got the wax and then I gotthe barrel strength uncut the
first ever uncut, unfilteredbourbon.
And that's similar to whatyou're doing.
You understand why people loveboogers Because you worked at
(59:38):
the store and you understood whysome people Now we've all seen
somebody try and do this andwhat's in there is not good and
that lasts about five minutesand it's gone.
So the key is yes, you give usa tube, you give us a great
(01:00:01):
bottle, you give us your logo,three-dimensional in there, and
then you give us fantasticwhiskey, bourbon.
I mean and I don't know what tosay.
It's the whole package andthat's worth something.
Speaker 4 (01:00:19):
I've given this analogy a lot.
Bourbon is a lot like a pie.
Go to the grocery store.
You can buy a slice of pie.
You could be missing threequarters of the pie, right, but
that slice of pie has not workednearly as much as a pie that
hasn't been cut into.
What I'm talking about is thepackage the interior, the
contents of the package, thestory that goes with it, the
person that's selecting it.
The entire package has to bethere in order to get the best
(01:00:42):
value out of what you're doing,and I think that's very
important.
If you have a slice missing outof your pie, it's only worth a
fraction of what it was to beginwith.
You need the whole thing.
Speaker 1 (01:00:53):
Well, you got to be proud of, of yourself and just
let's just say, you go back towhen you're working at the store
and you take your older, yourolder self delivers these tubes.
You know that you first, youknow that you'd want to try it,
and then, two, you know thatyou'd love every aspect about it
(01:01:14):
, right?
I?
Speaker 4 (01:01:15):
mean that it was so much fun designing it.
It's like it's one of your kids, but yeah, when you see it.
And the other thing is is Iwant it to stand out on the
shelf because I think it's astandout product.
Speaker 1 (01:01:27):
So the eye appeal has to match the interior.
It's just as Chris said.
You got to get it to the shelf.
Speaker 3 (01:01:38):
You're talking about my shelf, that's any shelf.
Speaker 4 (01:01:40):
Everybody I know has walls of bottles.
You know, if you're just theone, everybody that kind of
walks into the room and goeswhat is that you?
Know yeah that's right, that'sthe goal I mean, even with, uh
the single barrels.
Speaker 1 (01:01:51):
I mean just just the weeded.
I mean even with the singlebarrels, I mean just the weeded.
Then the rye bourbon, theweeded bourbon, the rye bourbon,
and now the single barrels.
You just completed the trifecta, and then you came out with a
(01:02:15):
bottled in bond.
Speaker 4 (01:02:17):
I tried to hit every spectrum.
Speaker 1 (01:02:18):
Now you talked to bernie lubbers about this
because like he's always he's mrbottled in bond.
You got to get him.
Um, you know he needs to.
He needs to have a sample ofthat baby.
I think he would comparetattoos, right?
Yeah, I think he would lovethat.
He's a good guy, all right.
(01:02:41):
So just go over how people canfind out about you, you know,
give that out.
That's one thing when they canfind out about the next release,
that kind of thing, and thenalso the last few.
Just give your whole, you know,marketing thing for them.
Speaker 4 (01:03:01):
Right now.
The first thing that everybodyshould do is immediately go to
rising tide spiritscom and signup for our newsletter.
Like I said, we only send itout three, four times a year at
the most, and it's only to letyou know when bottles are coming
so that you can be ready.
Um, but we anticipate beingready again this fall, so be on
the lookout for winter,depending on as soon as I get
tuned in.
I got some neat things comingthat you're not anticipating.
Speaker 2 (01:03:25):
Awesome.
Speaker 4 (01:03:26):
Rising Tide Spirit.
You can catch us on socialmedias on TikTok, on Facebook,
on Instagram.
Rising Tide, old Stubborn, oldSwagger Just give us a little
follow.
We have a little fun on there.
There's a lot of influencersthat are having reviews coming
out that we'll be tagging onthose pages as well so that you
can see for yourself what theythink of the product.
(01:03:47):
It'll help you if you're on thesearch for one barrel in
particular, especially becauseeverybody's got different
bottles.
Speaker 1 (01:03:54):
A lot of people.
That's amazing, that's amazing.
So, anyways, all right, you gotany more CT.
You got any more questions.
Speaker 4 (01:04:07):
I've got nothing when you?
If they want to try each one ofthose barrels Brad still has
them at Revival open.
I don't have much left of eachone.
It won't be a whole lot, but ifthey hurry they can still try
every one of them, and it's likeonly five bucks a piece.
Speaker 1 (01:04:20):
Are you headed back down there anytime soon?
Speaker 4 (01:04:31):
Probably not until this fall or winter, I guess.
Speaker 1 (01:04:32):
But yeah, down there I'll still go down and see that,
yeah, and it's a lot warmerthan Michigan.
Gotcha, I'm like right inbetween right.
Speaker 4 (01:04:43):
Yeah, yeah, I was just down in the bottom of the
sea here this past spring inToledo.
That was awesome.
Speaker 1 (01:04:49):
Why?
Oh so you slayed them.
Speaker 4 (01:04:56):
My gosh.
The amount of walleye you catchduring the walleye run is
crazy's.
Speaker 1 (01:05:01):
I think I made six trips and limited five of those
six trips.
You gotta let me know when youdo that.
I've been trying to convince I.
I'm originally from wisconsinand did a lot of fishing up
until I moved to ohio and I'mbasically in by.
You know, when it comes tofishing I'm here by myself.
It wasn't the family or thepeople that I.
(01:05:22):
They don't fish.
So I've always been looking togo, but it's been.
I swear to God it's probablybeen 15 years since I've been
out, but every time I wentfishing after I moved was in
Wisconsin, so I've never fishedin time.
I went fishing after I movedwas in Wisconsin, so I've never
fished in Ohio.
Speaker 4 (01:05:39):
So I'm always intrigued catch a largemouth and
smallmouth this afternoon andthat's what you need to do.
Speaker 1 (01:05:48):
So so what'd you have for dinner?
Speaker 4 (01:05:53):
tonight and uh, let me think here, uh, tonight was
walleye.
Speaker 1 (01:05:57):
All right.
So yeah, it's healthy, good,healthy options, that's for sure
.
And you prepare walleyeProbably.
There's about 15 different ways, right.
I grow them tonight, yeah.
All right, just hold on a littlebit after we're going to finish
up the podcast right now.
(01:06:18):
Then we'll still be out live onYouTube and Facebook so we can
talk a little bit and then we'lllet you go, all right, and
checking out.
You know Ed and everything thathe's doing with Rising Tide
Spirits.
The old swagger was fantasticand the old stubborn, the single
(01:06:46):
barrels, they deliver.
This one delivered.
I mean that's spectacular, butall right.
So rememberwwwscotchiebourbonboyscom for
all things.
Scotchie Bourbon Boys t-shirts.
Glencairns.
You can find out all about us.
Find out.
I'm still trying to get a biofrom CT.
You've got to send that up tome.
I've got the picture ready togo to put it on the website.
(01:07:08):
You just need your bio.
I sent it.
Speaker 3 (01:07:12):
When Just a couple weeks ago All right.
When Just a couple weeks agoRight.
Speaker 1 (01:07:19):
Well, maybe resend that to me and I'll get it up
there.
And then also remember onFacebook, instagram, youtube and
X, and then also all thepodcast media of Apple, iheart
and Spotify mainly, but if youlisten anywhere on a podcast
you'll find us, but if youlisten or watch us, it doesn't
(01:07:40):
matter.
Make sure you like, listen,subscribe, comment and leave
good feedback.
And then remember good bourbonequals good times and good
friends.
Make sure that you don't drinkand drive, drink responsibly and
live your life uncut andunfiltered.
(01:08:01):
Little Steve-O's going to takeus out.
Oh, that's not good Actually hegot to the door.
Speaker 3 (01:08:16):
Oh, show me the way to the next whiskey bar.
Speaker 2 (01:08:28):
Oh don't ask why.
Oh don't ask why.
Show me the way to the nextwhiskey bar.
Oh don't ask why.
Oh don't ask why.
All right,
Tiny here to tell you about Whiskey Thief Distilling
Company and their newly openedtasting room.
Whether you are up for afarm-to-glass distilling
experience on the Three BoysFarm in Frankfort, kentucky, or
an out-of-this-world tastingexperience in New Loo, you won't
be disappointed At bothlocations.
Their barrel picks all day,every day are like none other.
(00:24):
Each location features stationswith five barrels, each
featuring their pot distilledbourbons and ryes.
Once the barrels have beenthieved and tasted, you can make
a selection and thieve your ownbottle A day at Whiskey Thief,
with their friendly staff andownership, will ensure you many
good times with good friends andfamily.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Remember to always drink responsibly.
Never drink and drive and liveyour life uncut and unfiltered,
drinking birdies and sipping onsome scotch.
We get a little wild at a shortfun watch Because what we do,
we're drinking every brew andwe're a family of tall sons, but
we're telling the truth.
Yeah, we're the Scotchy BirdieBoys Raising the hill and making
(01:22):
some noise.
Yeah, we're the Scotchy BirdieBoys.
Boys raise your hands and makesome noise.
Yeah, we're the Scotch andBatty boys.
We're here to have fun and makeall of you enjoy.
We're here to have fun.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Yeah, all right, welcome back to another podcast
of the Scotchy Bourbon Boys.
Woo, all right, you guys, I gotgotta see what's going on there
.
I must have paused my all rightback to live, uh, so, uh, it's
(02:15):
a.
This is going to be a fantasticpodcast tonight.
We've got ct on tonight.
Welcome ct everybody.
And we's up everybody.
And we got Ed Blabe, one of thefounders of Rising Tide Spirits
, right, I got that right, Ijust like it should be in my
(02:36):
head and burned in my head.
But also his brand, oldStubborn.
And then this is actually thenew brand, right, the Old
Swagger, correct?
I mean, I was reading about itand everything, brand old,
stubborn.
And then this is actually thenew brand, right, the old
swagger, correct?
I mean I was reading about itand everything, and it's kind of
cool everything.
But I was like, well, it's cool, I won't have to read about it
tonight because I got got you ontonight to tell everybody about
(02:59):
it.
Welcome ed, thank you, it'sgood to be back.
It's good to be back.
It's great to be back, I meanlast time.
If anybody doesn't want to knowhow dedicated this man is to
bourbon, we could go over yourpast.
But just the fact that he livesin Michigan, about what?
Five hours away from me, right,right Five hours.
(03:25):
And he drove down for an 8 30podcast, which meant that
whatever, but after the podcastwe ended about 10, finished up
about 10, 10, 30 ish he hoppedback in his car and drove home.
So that was pretty amazing.
But what we did on that podcastwas something that I always I
(03:46):
found very, very special wasthat we blended.
He had all the the barrelsamples from his next batch that
he was going to do.
He had first done a weeded andthen he wanted to do a rye
bourbon and he had brought allthe barrel samples and he
(04:07):
blended.
We blended together and that'ssomething that I've never done
before and it really gave us aninsight into what somebody goes
through when they're blendingand all the tools that you have.
Correct.
Speaker 4 (04:23):
Wow, that's definitely the reason I don't
have hair right now.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
But now the release that you just had.
You released the old stubbornsingle barrels, which was cool,
and then you released a 12-, 12barrel batch of old swagger a 12
year Now.
Talk about, were those singlebarrels going through as you
(04:57):
were making your batches, youknow, leading up to this?
Were those the single barrelsthat you were putting off to the
side that were like man, thosewill be really good single
barrels.
Or was this another separatepurchase kind of thing?
Speaker 4 (05:14):
I wouldn't say it's a separate purchase, but it was
just some additional barrelsthat we had first two releases.
I only put out 24 barrels, so Ihad, uh, still have other
inventory as well.
So I was working through andjust seeing what I found.
I found some very unique ones.
I without 24 barrel barrels, soI still have other inventory as
well, so I was working throughit and just seeing what I found.
I found some very unique ones.
I thought would be awesome and,since we've done marriages on
the first two single barrels,would be nice to try something a
(05:34):
little different and give youan idea of the barrels that I'm
working with when I am doing themarriages for these ones.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
That is a great thing , people.
Now let's get to your, yourpast, what led you to this, this
place, and then people canunderstand why I'm very excited
to taste this single barrel, andall in as many single barrels
as I can.
That, ed, is releasing because,honestly, where you come from,
(06:04):
you understand.
Single barrels is releasingbecause, honestly, where you
come from you understand singlebarrels, I've done a few of them
?
Speaker 4 (06:11):
Yeah, just a few.
I used to run Cork and Bottleback in the day and when I did
that obviously I did all theirbarrel selections.
So I've done well over 250private barrel selections and so
you get an opportunity toreally climb around some
rickhouses and have some neatexperiences.
But you also have a chance toreally define your palate at the
(06:32):
same time and the things thatyou look for in barrels and
things that separate the barrelsyou pick from what everybody
else does.
It's amazing the experiencesthat I did while I was there
that were just mind-blowing.
Just picking barrels on my 40thand 41st birthday with me and
Eddie Russell was justphenomenal.
(06:54):
I climbed around the bricks fora minute with him.
We trailed so many barrels thatday.
I think we were both walkingsideways out that might answer
Ann Demick's question.
Speaker 3 (07:05):
She wants to know where did you find those barrels
?
Which ones?
I'm guessing the ones that youfound with Jimmy, since that's
Ann's hot spot.
Speaker 4 (07:20):
I'm going to tell you what I have picked barrels.
I was sitting there the otherday thinking about this.
I done b, um, e, g, h, k, m, o,t, I think, and I know I'm
probably missing a couple otherricks I picked barrels from well
(07:41):
and also said.
Speaker 3 (07:42):
She said and also, where is he storing them?
Speaker 4 (07:45):
tell us more about starting up a brand, bottling,
etc it's hard, I'm gonna tellyou, in this market especially,
it's a nightmare.
It's yeah, it's polluted.
Right now there's so muchwhiskey out there it's hard to
separate yourself.
But the truth is is that I Ihave some great partners down in
stanford, kentucky, that areholding for me.
They're're fantastic.
They're actually going intotheir own distillery now working
(08:07):
on building that.
Whenever they get ready to talkabout that, I'll have them
contact me.
They're fantastic people downthere.
They've been over backwards toput out quality products and do
the things I need them to do toget our brand up and ready to go
.
Finding barrels is difficulttoo.
There's a lot of barrels outthere, but it doesn't mean
(08:28):
there's a lot of good barrelsout there.
It's very difficult.
Speaker 3 (08:33):
He's yelling at me through text now.
No, so many O's I can't evenput in here.
Where did he find the swaggerbarrels?
There must be a joke to this.
I don't know, but she must knowsomething.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
There you go Ann, Are you happy?
Speaker 4 (08:57):
Ann's putting my feet to fire here.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
I mean if Ann wanted to be this involved.
She could have just got on.
I'm saying she's got her intothe Zoom, Come on, Ann could
have just got on.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
I'm saying we could have just got her into the.
Speaker 4 (09:09):
Zoom.
Come on, ann.
She's so fun.
I love Ann, she's so nice.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
Yes, definitely, ann, is fantastic.
Well, the swagger barrels comefrom MGP.
I mean, it says it right thereand that's something at this
point that's fairly that's newto you, right, because before
that you were working with WestVirginia.
(09:31):
Pot still barrels, do you havewith them?
And how do you get 12-year?
Is 12-year just the youngestand you had 13 and 14 before, or
(09:57):
were they all 12?
Speaker 4 (10:01):
In this case.
I have multiple sources forwhiskey.
This came from a differentsource, but in this case it
ended up being bottled andbonded.
We obviously have fulldisclosure on it.
The only way I was able to dothat was because I didn't buy it
directly from the GP in thiscase.
Okay, if you do that, you havea non-disclosure agreement with
them.
That's just how it works, okay,so a little tip for you when
(10:25):
you're looking at a product, ifit has where it was distilled at
, they didn't buy it from thatplace.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Okay, so that's a secondary workaround, the MGP
thing Okay.
Speaker 4 (10:42):
I don't have a nondisclosure with them.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
Right and you're able to say that, and then, at the
same point, that's what shouldhappen down the line.
I mean honestly so anyways.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
You think.
But it's difficult when you'redealing with corporations.
Corporations have a lot ofsecrets.
They think they have thatnobody knows about, that
everybody actually knows about.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
But that's because.
That's because a bigcorporation has to have a lot of
little people working for themthat know about it.
I mean, I just you know, you,you, you know, Buffalo trace
does not disclose their mashbills, but it's not like you
can't find out what their mashbills are.
I don't disclose them here, butyou can find out.
(11:27):
Anyways, so well, I mean, let'stalk about the progression from
the last time when you releasedthe high ride to this point.
How much have you learned?
I mean, you've had to know alot going in being the head of
(11:49):
those barrel picks that you didmultiple, multiple barrel picks,
and then, as far as thedistribution of those barrel
picks at the store, I mean youknew how the market, you know
what the market was doing andhow it was going.
But I think, from this pointone, it's a bottle change,
correct, definitely.
Speaker 4 (12:11):
New package.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
Now and you did that and you've explained it, but not
on the audio part of thepodcast why this is a teardrop
looking bottle.
I mean it's fantastic.
I love the neck it's petite, Imean it's just different from
(12:33):
what other people have had.
And then just like the RisingTide at the bottom on the base,
and then you've got yourinternal Rising Tide logo there.
Just I mean it is, it's, it'sthe coolest thing.
I'm looking at it through theyou know the, the ring light
(12:54):
through there and it itbasically lights up like it's
neon in there.
It's like you can, it's like alight, like a burning phoenix.
Speaker 4 (13:07):
It's gold.
So we put our logo right in themiddle and that was really
interesting.
When I told them I wanted to dothat, they were like what?
So then they started telling mewell, it's going to take a mold
to do that.
I'm like, okay, I loved it, andonce they were able to adhere
it and it's all perfect.
I mean I just super cool, ifyou take the labels off and use
(13:28):
the bottle for something elseafter you're done drinking it,
it'll be super cool, I thinkit'd make a cool base.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
And then I don't think you said before what was
the uh, the name, the oldswagger name?
Was that something just thatyou came up with?
Was it something that youbrought back?
Speaker 4 (13:47):
It was our team that came up with it.
We liked it because we wantedsomething that was a little
different than Old Stubborn.
Old Stubborn is like a robustwhiskey to us, and Old Swagger
is more of an elegant whiskey.
So we tried to come up withsomething that was a
characteristic, that would beeye-catching but also meant a
little something with what wewere putting out product-wise.
It was pretty cool.
(14:09):
It also just rolls off thetongue real nice.
I like it.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Intentional, controlled and elegant are the
words on the tube.
The tube is fantastic, I mean.
And then the logo.
You've got a whole.
It's the same guy from the oldStubborn right, and in old
Stubborn he's just kind ofhanging out, he's crossed, he's
(14:35):
just kind of posing.
You can see that right there.
But this one, this one here,he's basically got the swagger
right.
He's sitting there fingers inhis you know, the thumbs in his
pocket and you know he's justthere like this.
This is like.
He's like, this is just goingto this.
(14:55):
He's got the swagger.
I mean, he's kicking ass.
This, this is going to be.
You know he knows it's goodright.
Speaker 4 (15:06):
It's super cool.
Our artist is awesome.
He does a great job with it,for sure.
But yeah, we tried to have someproduct continuity so everybody
knew it was from us, but it'sstill a built identity because
it's a completely differentproduct.
When I released these whiskeys,I tried to hit every single
palate out in the market.
You'll notice this as we tastethem how completely different
they are.
Old Swagger is soft, it'selegant, it's very much a
(15:30):
whiskey that everyone can enjoy.
It's what I like to say wouldstart your evening off with an
awesome tasting.
You wouldn't end your eveningwith a bottle of Bond, but to
start your evening off with anawesome one would be fantastic.
And then, if you keepprogressing from there, our
barrels go from 117 proof up to142 proof.
Potstil versus columndistillate, that's a 12-year low
(15:52):
rye MGP bottled in bond NCDFversus a high rye bourbon from
West Virginia that's Potstil andcash strength.
They're just complete differentends of the spectrum.
When you go to tasting, what'samazing about them is they're
both excellent.
So it shows that you can havegood and it'd be just completely
opposite in taste, but they'restill awesome.
(16:13):
I think that's important.
A lot of people, when they dotasting notes, they talk about
their flavors, but what very fewpeople talk about is what
you're feeling.
I think that our mouthfe feelon our whiskeys especially
separate us from everybody else.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
I have a very high viscosity when it comes to my
whiskeys that I enjoy you, youtalked about it, talking about
the bottle and how the oil, andthat right there just says
everything.
You, you are looking for thatoil, you want that viscosity
when you drink something.
Speaker 4 (16:45):
So I want it to feel like butter in your mouth.
I want that uh, top of yourtongue to be slick.
I want everything that, becauseall that means is that that
flavor is just going to walkinto your mouth and hang around
for a long time.
When you get old, stubborn,it's like drinking motor oil.
That stuff will hang around.
You'll be tasting it 20 minuteslater.
It finishes wild on it.
I'm still, you know, yeah, it'sfancy and refined.
(17:10):
It pops to the Wild West.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
Well, the viscosity on the old Swagger is pretty
intense too.
It's stuck there for a goodwhile, and then what's coming
down now is the long, the fulllength.
Speaker 4 (17:26):
The legs are pretty, it makes it so soft and elegant
that's the best word I can useto describe it.
It's an elegant whiskey.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
I can't believe we weren't listening before we
talked about the fact that thisnew release that you've been
doing for the past couple weekshas just been phenomenal, but I
think that it says a lot notonly for you, but obviously your
passion to put the best thingyou can into these bottles is
the reason why everybody is soeager to get out there and find
(17:58):
it.
I know a lot of the socialmedia people, whether they're
doing a TikTok or whatever.
A lot of these guys are justgoing nuts because your passion
is to absolutely put thisamazing distillate in these
bottles.
Speaker 4 (18:16):
I do my best.
We're my company, my founders,myself.
We were all enthusiasts longbefore any of us were ever in
industry and we're stillenthusiasts to this day.
We put out whiskey, we're goingto drink.
You know, I'm not going to lie,I have a few bottles myself.
You know, I want to drink it too, so we want to make sure we put
(18:38):
stuff out that we're going towant to drink too, and so that
was our agreement when westarted our company was that
we're going to ultimately alwaysstrive to put out the absolute
best product we possibly can.
Whatever that falls on theboard is great, but I'm going to
do my best to be at the top,and that's just how it is.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
That's great.
Speaker 1 (18:56):
Do you still have the collector in you?
Are you still drinking, fromtime to time, other people's
stuff because you love that too?
Speaker 4 (19:06):
For sure.
Especially when I go down toBrad's.
When I'm down there, I meanI'll drink all kinds of wild
stuff.
It's hard because there isn'tmuch I haven't had.
There's some newer stuff that Ihaven't had, some really
younger stuff that's just notaged all the way up yet.
When it comes back to likeDusties and things like that,
it's rare that I see one that Ihaven't seen when I go to brands
(19:27):
.
A lot of times there's onethat'll pop in there and of
course I gotta try it.
That's just me how about that?
Speaker 3 (19:32):
how about that big handle of uh, uh, what's the
mcbrayer?
The mcbrayer, that's like 1913or whatever.
Speaker 4 (19:41):
I think it's gone.
Speaker 3 (19:43):
Yeah, it was amazing, that bottle.
We were talking about it thelast couple times I was there
and that bottle was thatdistillate was put in the bottle
before the titanic sank it waslike wow, just that realization
that this industry like stufflike that exists what's crazy is
that's the second car boy thatwe popped.
Speaker 4 (20:05):
The first one was a 1918 old jordan eight year that
was distilled by ap stitzel.
It was owned by a pharmacistduring prohibition.
We purchased it from thepharmacist daughter, who was 95
at the time we purchased it, wepopped it.
It was like it was the firstday it was in there.
It was absolutely amazing.
I pulled the cork out of thatthing.
(20:25):
The entire room smelled like it.
Wow, unbelievable.
It was still in my top threewhiskeys I've ever tried.
The other one was a cedar brook, right, yeah, well, he had a
metal on.
I think it was okay.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Yeah, I think I could be, wrong it might have been a
county fair.
Speaker 4 (20:41):
Can't admit it, since I've seen it.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
Yeah, but the corkways are cool.
Speaker 4 (20:47):
Oh, they're super cool.
And the corks that are wild.
And a lot of times the corkshold up really well compared to
the smaller bottles.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:59):
And also the whiskey just holds up better in them.
I'm going to say that you lefta word out of your on your tube
balanced yeah, it's super, superbalanced yeah, but it's hard to
balance 12 year char with thefront palette sweetness and then
(21:26):
the finish at a hundred proof.
I mean I'm drinking it and it.
Speaker 4 (21:34):
The flavors just line up like MGP makes some very
good whiskey and I know that'snot a secret.
A lot of people know that, butmost people gravitate towards
their high rye bourbon, which isfantastic.
I've picked some amazingbarrels of their high rye
bourbon.
Not a lot of people know aboutthe low rye.
The low rye, when you work withit right, can be just
(21:56):
absolutely phenomenal.
Speaker 3 (21:58):
What's the percentage on the low rye?
I think it's 21.
Okay it's 20, on the low rye, Ithink it's 21.
Okay, it's low 20s.
Speaker 4 (22:06):
I was just making sure it wasn't a lower.
I can't remember.
Off the top of my head, I thinkthat's what it is.
I've been staring atspreadsheets all day long.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
So farewell.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
When you get an MGP world and you start dissecting
all their stuff, that's a wholenother.
I mean you have to have a.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
Well, the hardest thing, in my opinion, when
you're using MGP whiskey this isjust my opinion is that it's
hard to make yourself differentfrom other people's MGP.
There is the classic MGPprofile that sometimes comes
(22:50):
across amongst a lot of brands.
But when I talk to somebodywho's doing MGP and they tell me
they just take the barrels,that they ship them, I'm like,
well, how does that work?
And then, well, we go throughand we do all the stuff.
But people like yourself,although you didn't do it
(23:11):
through MGP, you picked it.
You got those barrels from adifferent source.
But even when I deal with, likea Macaulay or whatever, there's
definitely the ability withthat whiskey that you have to be
what would you say diligent inthe barrels that you're picking
right.
Speaker 4 (23:31):
Just about selecting the right barrels at that point.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
Right.
And now?
A lot of brands don't get toselect the barrels, do they?
Speaker 4 (23:39):
A lot of brands don't buy enough barrels.
There you go.
Speaker 3 (23:43):
If you buy enough barrels, you're going to be able
to find good barrels.
And like anything, obviously,when you're picking, handpicking
the barrels you want, you'repaying a little more, which
doesn't matter At the end of theday.
You want to pay a little moreto get the best product instead
of just buying umpteen barrelsof whatever.
And then, oh crap, well, thosetwo are terrible, or those two
(24:04):
aren't as good, and we got toblend those and do this, and
that you get to know hey, thisis one that I'm gonna put in a
bottle.
Speaker 4 (24:12):
I make sure that I get a lot of samples.
I refuse to buy whiskey fromone sample.
There's not a lot of peoplethat do.
A lot of people will just flatout try one sample and buy
whatever, but I'm not that guy.
Too much money, there's toomuch reputation, there's just
too much the rep, is it Exactly?
Speaker 3 (24:30):
That's what matters.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Well, also, I think with your background and where
you've come from and what you'redoing, you understand after,
when you do that many differentbarrel picks that you had to do
at many different distilleries.
(24:52):
When you go to thosedistilleries and you do those
barrel picks, you get the tours,you get the thing and you start
to understand how differentdistilleries even big guys and
little guys and everybody howthey all do it different because
of the fact and then you get totaste the whiskey out the
barrel and understand whatthey're doing.
So there's so many differentways to do this.
(25:14):
So, with your understanding, Ireally feel that you transfer
what you've that part to thisand it's also comes down to you
managed.
You ran the store right and soyou saw, I ran the whiskey and
(25:36):
the beer department Right.
The entire, okay, you ran thewhiskey part of the store right.
Okay, you ran the whiskey partof the store right.
And you understand, with allthose people, what the average
consumer is looking for not theaverage consumer who buys Jim
Beam or Jack Daniels regularly,or they just buy one brand.
You understand what theconnoisseurs and the people who
(26:02):
you know secondary people.
You understand the people whoare looking for difference and
differences in their.
You know different palateexperiences and you've seemed to
, through this brand, takeeverything you know and put it
in there based off of it.
And Walter Zausch is alsosimilar to you.
(26:25):
He owns a distillery now, Imean, he owns Whiskey Thief but
he is very similar to you in thefact that he was such a fan of
bourbon and doing barrel picksand going on and getting this
and figuring it out that hewanted to get into the business
and he bought the distillery.
But he's still to this day,when you, when you go there, or
(26:45):
you talk to him or you're withhim.
He is a lover of bourbon andthat's kind of what you are Not
from a, not from a.
You're not a family that hasbeen making bourbon for 9,000
years or anything like that, andyou're not a corporation, but
you're just a lover of bourbonand you're able to give what you
(27:08):
learn to the people who want it.
And this is everything For me.
I want the package.
You not only give us anunbelievable bottle with a
purpose of having no pressurewhich you've explained but then
you put it in a tube.
And I mean putting it in a tube, I mean you saw what, what
(27:32):
putting eh taylor in a tube didto it I wonder what they do,
btac, what that tube's gonnalook like I mean you just, I
mean it's just like you know thepeople and so so.
On this release, were younervous?
Speaker 4 (27:51):
I'm always nervous okay it's always you know when
you do this stuff you you don'tsleep the week before release.
There's too much anxiety.
You want to make sureeverybody's happy.
My ultimate goal is to makeeverybody happy.
I like when people like what Ido, because I'm doing it for
them too, not just me.
I like putting whiskey inpeople's hands and seeing them
(28:14):
smile and talking about it andsharing it with their friends.
That's the biggest reward thereis.
I 100% would take that over anyspirits competition award any
day of the week.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
Honestly it's more important, honestly, than a lot
of those awards.
Yeah, if the consumer wants itand they want to buy it and they
buy because of you and theproduct you're putting in it.
They're buying that way morethan they're buying because you
want an award that's what I'msaying.
Speaker 4 (28:41):
It's like just seeing the smiles makes me, makes it
worth it for me.
I like it.
It's when I was at corkingbottle, I had a table in the
back room and I would bring thecustomers back there.
My favorite part about that washow special it is, so it makes
me feel good to see them failand like they have something
that is absolutely fantastic andsharing it with all their
friends and telling them allabout it.
There's nothing that makes mefeel better than that.
(29:03):
I love it.
The excitement is contagious.
Speaker 1 (29:07):
That is, that's obviously.
It comes through, it comes.
You've put that, that's thatenjoyment in a bottle.
That's, there's no doubt aboutit.
I'm there's like If anyonejoined us late, we doubt about
it.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
I'm there's like anyone joined us late we talked
about it early that the oldstubborn single barrels gone,
but there are a few old swaggerspossibly left out there and you
said where it was.
I'll let you say it again.
Speaker 4 (29:40):
It was the bourbon concierge dot com.
They took that.
They had quite abonconciergecom.
They took quite a few to beginwith and they're doing fantastic
.
They're not going to be theremore than another day or two.
We released it on Friday, sothe fact that they still have
them is kind of surprising.
They're going really fast.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
I think if anybody follows you and if you don't
follow Ed and follow Rising Tideon on social media, you'll see
you posted a link, I think, toit today.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
We, we go out of our way to make sure all of our, all
of our retail partners arelisted on our webpage as well.
So if you go torisingtidespiritscom, kind of,
for our emails, we don't.
I mean we said maybe four, three, four emails a year, nothing
crazy, but just to let you knowwhen releases are coming so that
you know to be ready.
And then they also have a listof all of our our retail
(30:33):
partners on our webpage.
So if you go on there and checkthere, you know there might be
a couple of bottles in Kentuckyhiding around somewhere that
nobody saw or realized.
Speaker 3 (30:43):
Yeah, you know, Just like the introduction of this,
the revival release was reallylike you know, if you had the in
on that, that was a great wayto get one, but if you were not
following you Rising Tide orRevival you didn't know anything
about it until right now.
Speaker 4 (31:05):
Yeah, it's true, truth, that's so true.
And uh, revival they pre-soldtheir, almost their entire
allocation and then they wentback and they purchased more and
pre-sold it and then purchasedmore again, pre-sold it again
and you have to cut them off,you have to say that that's
literally what happened.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
There's other people that want it so, so I was, I was
wrong on this one.
It's 44 of 55.
Super short barrel.
That is a super short barrel.
I like.
I love your rising tide tagwith your uh QR code.
That's great Then this is what.
(31:46):
So I opened that.
I opened.
You said you wanted to do oldswagger first, so I opened it
and had it.
I wanted to have it poured youknow what I mean and let it
breathe.
But this one I wanted everybodyto see me open it because this
has like what the seal of it islike almost like a champagne
(32:07):
seal, right, because of the, thethin it's and it's like also,
it's obvious how.
It's very cool because it'sobvious how to open it, because
it has a little perforated thingright here, but it says old,
stubborn, and the way that itsays the old stubborn is similar
to you feel like you're openinga champagne bottle on new
(32:28):
year's eve, but as you pull thatoff, I'm gonna yeah, I was a
liar, it isn't easy, no, but I,it's, it's pretty cool and
everybody.
So this is the part that Ed wastalking about.
It's not in there on pressureand it's.
(32:49):
I mean, technically, thisbottle is usable as a decanter,
right.
Speaker 4 (32:55):
You can even use it as a vase when you're done, if
you wanted to.
Speaker 1 (32:58):
A vase, but you got the glass top and again, once
again, again, the awesome 3d um,it's a cardinal right, here we
go.
Just very see, once again it'sgot a little bit of it.
(33:19):
Didn't have a big pull, bigcork pull but, know this one's a
lot.
What would you say?
136.13.
Nice.
Speaker 4 (33:36):
Super nice, so there we go.
Speaker 3 (33:42):
Was it 12 of them that you had lined up at revival
15.
So the range I know Kevin wasthere doing some stuff with you
guys that day and just goingdown through them, the color
difference and there was acouple and Jeff's looks like one
that is like super dark Yep,Like that thing looks like dark
maple syrup.
Speaker 1 (34:02):
You can see that that thing looks like dark maple
syrup.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
You can see the difference on my camera between
the old Swagger and the singlebarrel, with you having a dark
colored shirt on.
It's definitely dark, dark, butyeah, it's Put the tube behind
it.
Yeah, put that white tube.
Speaker 4 (34:21):
All right, the old stubborn tube, that one Okay
there you go.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
Yeah, look at that, it's not even a.
Are you sure that's notPennzoil?
Speaker 4 (34:38):
That's a short barrel for you they get dark and it's.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
You can see the seven .
Speaker 4 (34:46):
It's between 11 and 14 years.
Right, it's just a short barrel, our barrels are dark.
Speaker 1 (34:53):
Short barrels are depressing, especially when you
want people to have.
You're hoping.
Now, I mean, honestly, thething that I've always found
lately is that, from mystandpoint, if you did 375s and
doubled the amount of that woulddouble the amount of bottles
(35:16):
you can do.
But 375s always come across tome as a podcaster perfectly,
because you know there's there'snot a lot of bottles.
I'd I'd take the full 750milliliters anymore because I
have too much to taste and, asyou know, you're not always
drinking through.
You know the 700 but um, butwith these it's nice to have
(35:40):
because I definitely will besharing and and that's what you
want to do, you want to sharereally good spirits with your
friends and people.
So, wow, that has a lot ofchocolate on it.
It's like a Purtle, likecaramel, pecan and chocolate all
(36:12):
at once, man, and that's that'sopening, that's just opening
and pouring it.
Oh, and then there's a grape,like a concord grape.
Finish, I find a lot of timesaged whiskey and really good.
You know well, done in barrel.
You pick up, you start to pickup some grape.
You know some aspects of like agrape, like a wine or whatever
(36:36):
flavor on the finishes.
That is wait.
I would almost say that I don'tknow why I'm getting it, but
it's almost like Welch's grapejelly.
It's just like, let's see if Iget it again.
I got the chocolate and thecaramel and the pecan right off
the bat.
Yeah, ct, you're going to wantto get a sample of this.
(37:01):
You're going to want to get asample of this.
You're going to want to.
Speaker 3 (37:05):
I was planning on it Friday, but I was not able to
stay late enough.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
Well, ed's got us, you'll get some of this.
That actually is that makes mehappy.
That is a very that's fantastic.
So when you were picking theseso do you have?
So you still have moreinventory you said, uh, is it
going to be batches, singlebarrels or a combination of both
(37:33):
?
We never know what's going tocome.
Okay, you're not going to giveout.
You learned that.
Don't give out your secrets.
We get a little closer.
We'll let everybody know.
Speaker 4 (37:42):
But so are you saying stuff now all of a sudden.
You learned not.
Don't give out your secrets,we'll get a little closer, we'll
let everybody know.
So are you saying stuff now Allof a sudden, I'll start getting
a million PMs between now andrelease.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
So where do you do?
Speaker 4 (37:54):
it, I do what?
Speaker 1 (37:55):
Where do you do the blending and where are you
bottling?
Speaker 4 (38:00):
I mean, it's in Stanford, kentucky, stanford.
It's a place down in Stanford,kentucky, stanford.
Yeah, it's a place down inStanford.
It does, of course, great,great people, absolutely
fantastic people.
I don't want to give out theirsecrets or anything, so I
haven't cleared their releasinga name or anything like that
with them, but they're openingup their own distillery and when
they get ready I'm sure I'll beable to talk to them as well.
(38:20):
But they I'm sure you'll talkto them as well They've done
absolutely fantastic.
I do the blending up here,we're at my house and I do the
barrel selections up here andthen everything's done down
there.
Speaker 1 (38:31):
So do you have a lab?
Speaker 4 (38:34):
Well, I don't know if I necessarily have a lab or a
space it definitely takes mesome time to work through.
Speaker 1 (38:40):
Do you have a space in your house that you do it?
Well, not really, no, no, takesme some time to work through,
but do you have a space in yourhouse?
Speaker 4 (38:49):
that you do it.
Oh, not real.
No, you could just be watchingtv one night and going through.
I like take back, I have acouple.
No, I'm kidding, I have a wholesystem.
I use here a big countertop Iuse, set everything up, have a
lot of glens and startimmediately weaving out my nose
and working my way down andfiguring out how I want to, what
I want to release them and thenwhat, from that point I want to
do, whether, if it's a blend,then I'm going to start figuring
(39:10):
out the barrels I want to useand the structure of the blend I
want it to be.
It's a process and then ittakes multiple times of doing it
.
Single barrels is a littleeasier because you know, just
picking single barrels youshould find a winner.
You found a winner.
The blending is a wholedifferent animal.
It takes time for whiskey tomarry.
Speaker 1 (39:27):
It's not an instant thing well, I found that well,
put it this way, after you didthat blending, there's all also
the aspect that when you put thewhiskeys together as you keep
going further, there has to they.
They chemically don't bondinitial right away, when it's
(39:51):
almost like they repel eachother.
And I, I, I did a an infinitybottle with a bunch of uh wood
for double O bottles, okay ofWoodford Double O bottles, okay
Barrel picks, and I probably hadseven, eight of them and they
were all getting low andwhatever.
But I needed space so I justtook them all and put them
(40:15):
together in a decanter until thedecanter was full and I think
it was about six of them thatfinished them off and put them
in and when I tasted it ittasted horrible.
Speaker 4 (40:27):
When you put it in whiskey for a while, it tastes
rough.
And it's enough to make youreally really, really nervous.
Speaker 1 (40:34):
Yeah, and you're sitting there going wow, that
doesn't taste like any WoodfordDouble Oak I've ever had.
And the barrels weren't weren'tbad, you know what I mean they
weren't.
The some of them weren't asgood as like actual batches they
do.
But but now, after aboutsitting in there for about since
I did it right at a halloweentime uh, it's been sitting in
(40:59):
there.
Now the butterscotch is comingout, that wood for double oak.
So once they actually decidedthat they were going to become
one, then all the flavors thatwere that are there start to
express themselves.
So it's really such a unique umprocess that you it's almost
(41:19):
like you're trying always to hit, hit the target, but the
target's always, you know, 100yards ahead of you.
Speaker 4 (41:30):
It's difficult.
You kind of have to trust theprocess.
I mean you're working on pinsand needles for a few weeks.
For sure it does.
It tastes very rough when youfirst blend whiskey, so go ahead
?
Speaker 3 (41:41):
When do you think not pinning you down on a time,
because I don't want to do thatto you and anybody watching.
But what's your uh horizon looklike for the next release?
Are you a few months out, sixmonths?
Speaker 4 (41:53):
out, we're hoping by winter.
Um, it's a matter of gettingtubes in for the release.
Um, that's my issue.
Um, once we have tubes andwe'll be able to go.
That's that's my issue.
Once we have tubes, then we'llbe able to go.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
That's interesting.
Not the glassware, not thebottles, not the whiskey, the
tubes it's all about in ourbusiness.
Speaker 4 (42:16):
It's about minimums and how much you can purchase at
a time.
When it comes to releases, wemake individual tubes for
releases and it's not justsimple at a time when it comes
to releases.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
We make individual tubes for releases.
It's not just simple individualtubes Gold-foiled and really
nice.
Speaker 2 (42:34):
You can buy them on Amazon.
Speaker 4 (42:37):
No Amazon tubes.
Speaker 1 (42:40):
No, you don't buy them on Amazon, but people sell
them.
Speaker 4 (42:48):
We have a manufacturer and they're awesome
to work with, but it just takesso long to do that process
between designing andmanufacturing samples and all
that kind of good stuff.
It takes a while no, I canimagine.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Well, and then I, I just like you know, as a single
barrel person, how many timesdid the labels for the single
barrels hold, hold up therelease of the single barrel to
you?
When I mean it would?
It's just like if it's, if it'sa new product that you're
picking and they offer it to you, all of a sudden the labels
(43:24):
have to get made and they'lltell you, oh, it'll be ready in
two and a half, three months.
And you know, six and a half,six months later is when you get
it, because they just couldn'tget the labels.
Speaker 4 (43:35):
The issue was our labels were too big that we
originally designed for thebottle.
We got the bottles in, finally,and we went to put the labels
on that we had printed andbubbled.
So we went to put the labels onthat we had printed and bubbled
.
We had to stop redesign thelabels and have them reprinted
again.
It was a learning experience.
Speaker 1 (43:50):
That was painful, that was not a cheap lesson the
label is what government goes by, right?
Speaker 4 (43:57):
It's not like that, but it's got to look right on
the bottle.
Speaker 1 (44:00):
It's got to appear right.
Speaker 4 (44:02):
Unfortunately, it just didn't work the way we
originally had it, so we had togo back to the drawing board on
it, but now we've rectified thatproblem, it's good to go.
Speaker 1 (44:10):
I know, but it had to be a bitch if you had them
printed, already authenticatedfor the government, and then
said oh oops, it didn't fit,We've got to do it again.
That's probably not the bestthing to say to them, right?
No I mean the garbage was cool.
Speaker 4 (44:24):
We, we just had to do .
It was more of a materialchange to get them to lay flat,
and so once we did that, we wereokay.
I had to think of material onthere.
It was uh, it was bubbling, andrather than lay it flat because
the bottles curved there's andevery one of those bottles is
slightly different.
None of them are exactly thesame.
They're all hand-blown glasses.
It takes 14 minutes to makeeach individual bottle, three
(44:48):
molds for it and it's hand-blownglass.
It takes a long time and theywere not cheap.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
So the base I wanted something that really was very
eye-appealing.
Speaker 4 (45:00):
I wanted something that was unique and a little
different than what you normallysee.
I wanted something that stillfit into the type of image that
we wanted for our product.
Speaker 1 (45:09):
Well, I'm going to play with shooting the cardinal
through the light because itturns.
Neon, it turns this, I meanthere's about you know, neon, it
turns this, I mean there'sabout you know.
So, basically, the base had thecardinal and then you drop down
(45:29):
the teardrop on top of it youknow?
Speaker 4 (45:34):
that's how.
The base is a separate mold,the bottle was a separate mold,
the cardinal was a separate mold.
Speaker 2 (45:39):
So well, how do you?
Speaker 3 (45:40):
I'm gonna suggest you take the picture of, not the
one you have in your hand,because you're not gonna get it
through that dark, or I'mtelling you it looks like that's
cool.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
I'm looking at it through the ring light and it
looks like the Cardinals on fire.
Speaker 4 (46:01):
It's the coolest thing we liked it.
I like our logo a lot and Ithink it looks super cool in
here Well.
Speaker 1 (46:07):
I've never seen a logo in somebody's bottle.
Now, who else has done it?
I mean, where did you see it?
Speaker 4 (46:15):
I've seen other.
My first one I ever saw donewas Port Fideo.
And then of course, yeah, theyhave their own version, but Port
Fideo Tequila, they have thecactus in the middle of their
bottle.
I love that.
I saw that when I was like 16,and I love that, so it's always
kind of stuck in the back of myhead.
Speaker 1 (46:35):
Okay, well, as long as you don't drop scorpions in.
Speaker 4 (46:41):
This is their high, high-end tequila, super high-end
.
I actually saw them at acountry club when I was learning
how to cook when I was 16.
Interesting.
Speaker 2 (46:52):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (46:53):
Wow, Wow that that both of them are very, very
unique in what they, what theybring to the table.
(47:17):
It's definitely each one is anexperience.
Oh my gosh, A Rocky Patel CTwould go with that.
Speaker 3 (47:23):
Really well, I guess that just about a lot of cigars
would go well with it.
Knowing what it is, I'll try it.
I'll try it with several.
Speaker 1 (47:35):
Give it my opinion.
Speaker 2 (47:36):
And my goal is to try it with several Give it my
opinion and my goal is to try itwith you.
Speaker 3 (47:45):
We'll go through like maybe 10 cigars see which?
Speaker 4 (47:47):
one pairs with it best.
Speaker 3 (47:50):
Hey, I got to show you this one.
And, matt Lyson, your Scorpionis not awesome, it's nasty.
Speaker 1 (47:54):
I drank some of it.
He gave me some from the bottle.
That was a old swagger.
Oh, that's a barrel head Nice.
Speaker 4 (48:08):
That's cool, that's super cool.
Yeah very cool Brett.
Speaker 3 (48:13):
Baird did that for me .
Speaker 4 (48:14):
He had to send me a thrillies.
Who did that for you?
Speaker 2 (48:16):
Brett Baird did that for me he had to send me a
thrillies.
Speaker 4 (48:18):
Who did that for you?
Brett Baird.
Brett Baird's bourbon barrelfurniture Okay, he, he did that
for me.
Super cool, loved it, came outso good.
Speaker 3 (48:28):
You got to get that up on the wall behind you.
I literally just got a hug.
That black candle holder hasgot to go, yeah, so that black
candle holder's gotta go, yeah,so there you go.
Speaker 4 (48:40):
Wow, nice, super cool you got the releases of the
first two?
Speaker 1 (48:46):
yeah, I was all.
I'm just happy that I have ahat.
Speaker 3 (48:54):
Hey, ct, so you like the new setup using the shit out
of me, but whatever, how is itconfusing?
Speaker 1 (49:08):
you a lot going on if there's a single guest, it'll
be be like look at.
Speaker 3 (49:16):
Ed's screen.
Look how clean it is.
And you know you got a picturebehind him.
The candle Nice and clean.
I can you get lost in yours?
I can't even tell where you'reat.
That's the goal.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
It's, it's.
It's all about the whiskey, Notabout me.
Speaker 3 (49:31):
I thought you were the old swagger guy for a minute
yeah, it's just like, uh.
Speaker 1 (49:38):
So.
So I was proud of myself, ed,with ct we collected barrel
staves.
We broke a barrel with brokenbarrel and we picked up all the
staves and threw it in his truckand we got them back and they
sat in my garage for about ayear.
So last fall I decided I wouldsand them.
Then this spring I stained themand so you can see the front of
(50:03):
it now.
Initially I was thinking I wasgoing to do it horizontal, you
know, like you see, with thewalls and everything.
But it just worked out that itwould be vertical.
You can kind of see itunderneath.
Just worked out, um, that itwould be vertical.
You can kind of see itunderneath.
I don't want to get too faraway, but I want to show, you
know, show it.
Plus, then my sister-in-law hadthat done.
(50:24):
The scotchy bourbon boys stavea while back, so that's like.
So I just did that.
And then, uh, I've been havingproblems on youtube getting the
screen and me facing the rightway, so I don't look like it's
taking a picture of me in theworst way you could ever take a
picture of me.
So I figured this out, I and I,like I said I was.
(50:46):
I was pretty happy to.
So this is the first time thestudio is together this way and
it was for your podcast.
I was like how, how, you know,this weekend I'm working on it,
and I knew I was getting closeand went, you know, on friday
when, or thursday when you saidit I'm just like, let's do it
monday, so what's your schedulegoing forward?
(51:09):
I mean, well, you got to be abusy guy.
Now you're.
You're in michigan right now,right?
Speaker 4 (51:16):
yeah, so, yeah.
So we're pushing hard to haveboth products out twice a year
right now.
That's our goal right now, andthen eventually it will increase
from there.
Speaker 1 (51:29):
So I mean honestly three times a year.
If it's going to increase threetimes a year probably would be
what you'd go with, the model oflike Stag and Elijah Craig
Barrel Pro barrel proof.
Just go with that model threetimes.
Speaker 4 (51:43):
So about what we got, product one.
So the old plumber is going toeventually run out there.
We know that.
Um, I mean it's, it's not.
It's a product that is notbeing produced anymore.
So you can get it because it'sgone when it's gone it's a
beautiful bottle, beautifulproduct, beautiful everything.
Speaker 1 (52:00):
But I think your old swagger and what what's coming
you know, down the line I thinkthat's going to be fantastic.
Uh, so what kind of time andeffort are you when you're
searching the world for barrels?
Speaker 4 (52:13):
kind of time it definitely takes time.
That's why I have my releasesalready working before and I'm
not worried about buying themfor each release.
Speaker 1 (52:22):
So it's all ready, but you're always buying for two
, three releases down the road.
Speaker 4 (52:29):
We buy ahead.
It's just too hard to keep your.
It's too expensive to buy a tonup front.
You can't work on just buyingfor every single release.
It doesn't work that way.
The reason we were a littleslow on this release was because
of the new packaging.
It took a little while to getit all in.
We literally beat the tariffsby three days.
(52:49):
It was.
Speaker 2 (52:55):
Woo Woo.
Speaker 4 (53:01):
Yeah, i's more hairs.
I think everybody's pullingtheir hair with that whole deal.
Oh man, it literally.
Speaker 1 (53:07):
Our boat landed three days before they took effect
yeah, that would have delayedyou for another like three, four
weeks, because you know youwould have had to just get it in
once they got paused.
Speaker 4 (53:20):
Oh, it was even worse than that.
It's the amount of money itwould have cost for them just
coming into America.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (53:28):
Woo.
Speaker 1 (53:31):
That was a lot.
I mean, now, do you get theglass out of China?
Yeah, we have a manufacturer inChina.
So it's so funny because as apodcaster I get probably three,
four times a month people notlast month, but before that I
was getting three, four people,that would you know.
(53:52):
They would basically ask thefriend and then they tried to
sell me glass.
I'm like, I'm a podcast.
You should see my LinkedIn.
Speaker 4 (54:03):
It's 90% by manufacturer's first name.
Speaker 1 (54:05):
Yeah, they just come and they're trying to right
Right, yeah.
Speaker 3 (54:09):
How in the world do you settle on one then With that
many?
How do you?
Obviously you can't go thereand see the facility and check
it?
Speaker 4 (54:17):
Well, actually we did .
We have a company that we workwith here.
You may know him, he may notBrett Atlas at MGS.
He's fantastic.
He used to write for Bourbonand Banter.
His company has representativesthat will literally go out
there and inspect the placebefore you spend the time with
them.
Really, yeah, you've got gottaprotect your money.
Speaker 3 (54:40):
It's too expensive.
That's what I'm thinking.
You order a thousand bottles,they come in and bust it up.
Not nearly what they should be,or the quality sucks.
Speaker 4 (54:51):
I wish you could only order a thousand, I was just
using it easy.
Speaker 1 (55:01):
I wish Well.
And then you, like you said,just like in the whiskey world,
for all you listeners, as youknow, in all the groups there's
the scammers, and the scammersare, but but for what you're
into also, they're scammers,right, that's why you have to be
very, very, very sure.
Speaker 4 (55:21):
It's not necessarily scammers, but there's definitely
variations in quality of work.
You have to pay attention towho you're working with.
I think supply chain isimportant in our industry for
sure, 90% of what we do issupply chain work.
If your supply chain is weak,you're going to have a weak
product.
You need to make sure that youalign yourself with the best you
can.
That's just how it is.
You are who you are.
(55:43):
We want to be playing in thetop of the realm.
We want everything to becomparable with the top brands
all the time.
That's where we want to placeourselves in the market.
We spend extra money inpackaging and everything else to
make sure that we look the part.
Speaker 3 (55:59):
I think that's important.
I don't know that anybody elseand I mean this sincerely I
don't know that anybody isputting as much effort into the
bottle and packaging as you are.
I mean, you had a good bottlebefore and to totally redesign
(56:20):
it from the ground up.
Speaker 2 (56:20):
Says a, says a lot, but the packaging you're doing
is phenomenal.
Speaker 4 (56:23):
They say you taste with your eyes first.
I think that's true.
I think, well, I think that ina sea of bottles, when you have
one that stands out, it's goingto get a little bit of extra
attention, and I think that ourproduct on the inside warrants
that extra attention anyways ifanybody actually sees your
bottle in a shelf for sale, letme know it's not sitting
(56:43):
anywhere that you can buy itmaybe that was my first bottle.
We put our heart and soul intothat.
It took a lot.
I had seen shapes that I likedthat were similar and some
concepts that were similar, butthe design itself and the molds
and everything else is all I didfor the first time I'd never
done before.
(57:05):
It was a.
It was a chance to really becreative and that's something I
really enjoy with.
My aspect of my job is to beable to be creative.
So we had um Chris Zeverick atCraft and Create.
He designed those tubes for usand the labels.
He's amazing, that guy.
He's been around the bourboncircuits for a long time.
My entire teams and supplychains are all into the bourbon
(57:25):
world.
Everything's been set up inbourbon.
Everybody I've met throughbourbon.
It's amazing when you getpeople that care and are
passionate about the productthat's going in, they're going
to give you an extra effort onthe packaging on the outside and
it's just amazing.
Speaker 1 (57:39):
It's absolutely amazing.
Speaker 4 (57:40):
I'm very grateful for this.
Speaker 1 (57:42):
Yeah, I, I, I agree with you wholeheartedly.
People that you meet there'salways like you know, when
you're meeting them and you'retalking to the people that you
met through bourbon, you don'tknow down the line what's going
to happen and how, if you'llever be able to use them, but
(58:05):
the you just keep meeting thepeople and it's just amazing to
me how cool it is that when it,when the time comes, the team
usually assembles, you know, andyou, you being where you were,
and all the stuff that you weredoing and understanding and
being you know.
So I've always said, when I gotinto, you know, I'm originally
(58:30):
an artist, I was, you know, asfar as I've done commercial art,
I've done fine art.
I enjoy, I'm very creative.
But when I started getting intobourbon and meeting all the
people and then understandingthat creating good bourbon and
unique bourbon and differentstuff is an art form in itself
(58:55):
Just attention to detail is verysimilar.
You can put all your attentionto detail in barrels.
You can put your attention todetail in grains.
You can put your intention todetail.
But the thing that I lovedabout it was, and why I got in
it, and what I love about it isI want it all.
That's one of the reasons whymy first thing that I loved was
(59:17):
Booker's.
I felt that the packaging I gotthe packaging, I got the label,
I got the wax and then I gotthe barrel strength uncut the
first ever uncut, unfilteredbourbon.
And that's similar to whatyou're doing.
You understand why people loveboogers Because you worked at
(59:38):
the store and you understood whysome people Now we've all seen
somebody try and do this andwhat's in there is not good and
that lasts about five minutesand it's gone.
So the key is yes, you give usa tube, you give us a great
(01:00:01):
bottle, you give us your logo,three-dimensional in there, and
then you give us fantasticwhiskey, bourbon.
I mean and I don't know what tosay.
It's the whole package andthat's worth something.
Speaker 4 (01:00:19):
I've given this analogy a lot.
Bourbon is a lot like a pie.
Go to the grocery store.
You can buy a slice of pie.
You could be missing threequarters of the pie, right, but
that slice of pie has not workednearly as much as a pie that
hasn't been cut into.
What I'm talking about is thepackage the interior, the
contents of the package, thestory that goes with it, the
person that's selecting it.
The entire package has to bethere in order to get the best
(01:00:42):
value out of what you're doing,and I think that's very
important.
If you have a slice missing outof your pie, it's only worth a
fraction of what it was to beginwith.
You need the whole thing.
Speaker 1 (01:00:53):
Well, you got to be proud of, of yourself and just
let's just say, you go back towhen you're working at the store
and you take your older, yourolder self delivers these tubes.
You know that you first, youknow that you'd want to try it,
and then, two, you know thatyou'd love every aspect about it
(01:01:14):
, right?
I?
Speaker 4 (01:01:15):
mean that it was so much fun designing it.
It's like it's one of your kids, but yeah, when you see it.
And the other thing is is Iwant it to stand out on the
shelf because I think it's astandout product.
Speaker 1 (01:01:27):
So the eye appeal has to match the interior.
It's just as Chris said.
You got to get it to the shelf.
Speaker 3 (01:01:38):
You're talking about my shelf, that's any shelf.
Speaker 4 (01:01:40):
Everybody I know has walls of bottles.
You know, if you're just theone, everybody that kind of
walks into the room and goeswhat is that you?
Know yeah that's right, that'sthe goal I mean, even with, uh
the single barrels.
Speaker 1 (01:01:51):
I mean just just the weeded.
I mean even with the singlebarrels, I mean just the weeded.
Then the rye bourbon, theweeded bourbon, the rye bourbon,
and now the single barrels.
You just completed the trifecta, and then you came out with a
(01:02:15):
bottled in bond.
Speaker 4 (01:02:17):
I tried to hit every spectrum.
Speaker 1 (01:02:18):
Now you talked to bernie lubbers about this
because like he's always he's mrbottled in bond.
You got to get him.
Um, you know he needs to.
He needs to have a sample ofthat baby.
I think he would comparetattoos, right?
Yeah, I think he would lovethat.
He's a good guy, all right.
(01:02:41):
So just go over how people canfind out about you, you know,
give that out.
That's one thing when they canfind out about the next release,
that kind of thing, and thenalso the last few.
Just give your whole, you know,marketing thing for them.
Speaker 4 (01:03:01):
Right now.
The first thing that everybodyshould do is immediately go to
rising tide spiritscom and signup for our newsletter.
Like I said, we only send itout three, four times a year at
the most, and it's only to letyou know when bottles are coming
so that you can be ready.
Um, but we anticipate beingready again this fall, so be on
the lookout for winter,depending on as soon as I get
tuned in.
I got some neat things comingthat you're not anticipating.
Speaker 2 (01:03:25):
Awesome.
Speaker 4 (01:03:26):
Rising Tide Spirit.
You can catch us on socialmedias on TikTok, on Facebook,
on Instagram.
Rising Tide, old Stubborn, oldSwagger Just give us a little
follow.
We have a little fun on there.
There's a lot of influencersthat are having reviews coming
out that we'll be tagging onthose pages as well so that you
can see for yourself what theythink of the product.
(01:03:47):
It'll help you if you're on thesearch for one barrel in
particular, especially becauseeverybody's got different
bottles.
Speaker 1 (01:03:54):
A lot of people.
That's amazing, that's amazing.
So, anyways, all right, you gotany more CT.
You got any more questions.
Speaker 4 (01:04:07):
I've got nothing when you?
If they want to try each one ofthose barrels Brad still has
them at Revival open.
I don't have much left of eachone.
It won't be a whole lot, but ifthey hurry they can still try
every one of them, and it's likeonly five bucks a piece.
Speaker 1 (01:04:20):
Are you headed back down there anytime soon?
Speaker 4 (01:04:31):
Probably not until this fall or winter, I guess.
Speaker 1 (01:04:32):
But yeah, down there I'll still go down and see that,
yeah, and it's a lot warmerthan Michigan.
Gotcha, I'm like right inbetween right.
Speaker 4 (01:04:43):
Yeah, yeah, I was just down in the bottom of the
sea here this past spring inToledo.
That was awesome.
Speaker 1 (01:04:49):
Why?
Oh so you slayed them.
Speaker 4 (01:04:56):
My gosh.
The amount of walleye you catchduring the walleye run is
crazy's.
Speaker 1 (01:05:01):
I think I made six trips and limited five of those
six trips.
You gotta let me know when youdo that.
I've been trying to convince I.
I'm originally from wisconsinand did a lot of fishing up
until I moved to ohio and I'mbasically in by.
You know, when it comes tofishing I'm here by myself.
It wasn't the family or thepeople that I.
(01:05:22):
They don't fish.
So I've always been looking togo, but it's been.
I swear to God it's probablybeen 15 years since I've been
out, but every time I wentfishing after I moved was in
Wisconsin, so I've never fishedin time.
I went fishing after I movedwas in Wisconsin, so I've never
fished in Ohio.
Speaker 4 (01:05:39):
So I'm always intrigued catch a largemouth and
smallmouth this afternoon andthat's what you need to do.
Speaker 1 (01:05:48):
So so what'd you have for dinner?
Speaker 4 (01:05:53):
tonight and uh, let me think here, uh, tonight was
walleye.
Speaker 1 (01:05:57):
All right.
So yeah, it's healthy, good,healthy options, that's for sure
.
And you prepare walleyeProbably.
There's about 15 different ways, right.
I grow them tonight, yeah.
All right, just hold on a littlebit after we're going to finish
up the podcast right now.
(01:06:18):
Then we'll still be out live onYouTube and Facebook so we can
talk a little bit and then we'lllet you go, all right, and
checking out.
You know Ed and everything thathe's doing with Rising Tide
Spirits.
The old swagger was fantasticand the old stubborn, the single
(01:06:46):
barrels, they deliver.
This one delivered.
I mean that's spectacular, butall right.
So rememberwwwscotchiebourbonboyscom for
all things.
Scotchie Bourbon Boys t-shirts.
Glencairns.
You can find out all about us.
Find out.
I'm still trying to get a biofrom CT.
You've got to send that up tome.
I've got the picture ready togo to put it on the website.
(01:07:08):
You just need your bio.
I sent it.
Speaker 3 (01:07:12):
When Just a couple weeks ago All right.
When Just a couple weeks agoRight.
Speaker 1 (01:07:19):
Well, maybe resend that to me and I'll get it up
there.
And then also remember onFacebook, instagram, youtube and
X, and then also all thepodcast media of Apple, iheart
and Spotify mainly, but if youlisten anywhere on a podcast
you'll find us, but if youlisten or watch us, it doesn't
(01:07:40):
matter.
Make sure you like, listen,subscribe, comment and leave
good feedback.
And then remember good bourbonequals good times and good
friends.
Make sure that you don't drinkand drive, drink responsibly and
live your life uncut andunfiltered.
(01:08:01):
Little Steve-O's going to takeus out.
Oh, that's not good Actually hegot to the door.
Speaker 3 (01:08:16):
Oh, show me the way to the next whiskey bar.
Speaker 2 (01:08:28):
Oh don't ask why.
Oh don't ask why.
Show me the way to the nextwhiskey bar.
Oh don't ask why.
Oh don't ask why.
All right,
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